Hunger Never Goes on a Break
June 09, 2009
Jeffrey and Darien are kind-hearted big brothers to their little sister, Belinda. It’s a joy to watch them when they bring her to Bosco Food Kitchen. First, they tenderly put her into a booster seat –she likes the pink one best—so that she can better reach the table. Then they take turns getting in line. Belinda comes first! One of them carefully brings her a plate of food, while the other gets her a glass of cold water and puts a napkin in her lap.
When they all get to the table with their plates, they hold Belinda’s tiny hands and bow their heads. “Dear Jesus,” Jeffrey prays quietly, “Thank you for this food.” The boys are ever patient with Belinda, who is named for their grandmother. They wait many long minutes while she spoons up peas two at a time, chattering busily between bites.
The boys are frequent guests at the Food Kitchen when they are out of school. They live with their family just across the railroad tracks in an old tin-roof wood house in need of repair. Their father was just laid off and their mother suffers from diabetes. This family is barely surviving in an area where the unemployment rate is the highest in the nation.
Our Bosco Manager, Mary Gayle has “adopted” the children because she is worried about how thin Belinda is for her age. She is glad when Belinda’s big brothers bring her to the Food Kitchen for a nourishing meal. When the children are ready to go home, one brother puts all three plates in the dish-washing room, while the other stacks her booster seat. Jeffrey takes Belinda’s hand, calls out a big “thanks” to “Aunt Mary” and they head out the door.
Sometimes “Aunt Mary” hands them a bag with peanut butter sandwiches to take home. When Jeffrey looks up at me with his big brown eyes and asks for a second one, I know I will do whatever it takes – even if I have to walk to the store to buy another loaf of bread—to grant his request. I know it’s likely they won’t have another meal that day.
As I watch them walk home, I smile to see Jeffrey bend down to give his little sister a piggy-back ride up the hot dusty road.
Bosco is vital for our children, especially in the summer. Most children in the neighborhoods we serve come from poor families who qualify for free school lunches. When school is out, parents and grandparents don’t have the money to provide enough healthy food to feed growing, active children. Often, they boil a pot of low-cost ramen noodles to fill empty stomach because the protein, fruits and vegetables they need daily are too expensive.
Mary Gayle is worried and so am I. We are feeding more people than ever at Bosco and summer puts a real strain on our budget. Mary Gayle watches every penny and often bargains with grocery store owners for better prices. But with hundreds of hungry men, women and children coming every day, she must have funds to buy the extra food needed, especially for the children.
Although the food bills are piling up, I promise that no child who comes in the door at Bosco this summer will leave hungry. I am counting on your help to fulfill my promise. With limited food at the Food Bank, we have to buy at grocery store prices the vegetables, fruit, rice and meat we need to feed hundreds of hungry people every day, 365 days a year.
A local grocer has been giving us loaves of day-old bread, but he also has had to cut back during these tough times. During the next eight weeks a summer heat hits, it will cost $4,615 to fill plates with food for the children and the others who depend daily on Bosco. It costs $288 weekly to buy hamburger and chicken for making spaghetti and soup.
Jeffrey, Darien and Belinda remind me so much of my own brothers and sister when I was a child, except my sister Rita was the oldest and my two brothers and I were the ones who needed help. Rita probably didn’t think I would amount to much until I began studying for the ministry. At my ordination, she was beaming with joy. It meant so much to me to see the pride in my “big sister’s” face. When I see Belinda and her brothers, it brings back fond childhood memories.
Be assured you are in my daily prayers as I thank God for your partnership in our ministry to feed the hungry. I have nowhere to turn but to you. I want to close with similar words from our founding Father Frank Casey, taken from one of the first letters he wrote after arriving in Selma in 1937, during the Great Depression:
“Without your help not only are we powerless to continue the work, but we could not even have started it. Without you we could not live, let alone work. If in His wisdom God has given you the means to help a little, would you like to?”
Sincerely in Christ,
Rev. Richard Myhalyk, S.S.E.
