Bridge got me over my trouble

"COMING here has put me on the straight and narrow. They're kind loving people, make you feel welcome. I've met a lot of new friends, good friends." says Adam Bradford of Coventry.

Adam Bradford

The Bridge provides subsidised breakfasts, showers, laundry facilities, haircuts, friendship, and much more to its visitors - mainly homeless or disadvantaged people.

Piers Young, Coventry Jesus Centre manager says: "It's been a hectic five years but worth it to see so many people helped and lives changed. Apart from meeting basic needs, we help people to get a useful life again by breaking cycles of deprivation and negative outlook. God is in it and we couldn't do this without His grace."

The Jesus army has had an affinity with the disadvantaged or marginalised since the church first started in the late 1960s.

A charity, Jesus Army Charitable Trust was created with the aim of setting up and running Jesus Centres: places of worship, friendship and care for every kind of person. They would have a particular emphasis on befriending and supporting the poor.

As well as the Jesus Centre in Coventry, there is a bigger one in Northampton (based on an old Art Deco cinema) and a third Jesus Centre is due to open at the end of the year in central London (just off Oxford Street).