Sunday Suppers at St. Joe's

Help provide and serve a hot meal to needy people in Rochester - an effort co-created and nurtured by a teenager at our church

"It is no overstatement to say that my years volunteering there have been the primary influence on who I am now."
- Mike Freeman, original coordinator from First Unitarian Church as a teen, now majoring in social work at McGill University.

What happens:
Volunteers from our church cook and serve supper, and wash the dishes, two to three Sundays per month for whomever shows up at St. Joseph House of Hospitality. The 75-100 guests struggle to make ends meet due to problems with jobs, housing, health expenses, mental illness, substance abuse or other challenges. The shared meals fill stomachs and provide community.

When:
Dinner is served promptly at 4. Volunteers arrive by 3:15 p.m. (or earlier to use St. Joe's ovens/stove) and finish by 5:30 p.m.

Where:
St. Joe's is at 402 South Ave., Rochester, NY 14620, (585) 232-3262, just south of downtown, and has its own parking lot.

What's needed:
Several individuals or families collaborate per Sunday. The team decides what to buy/make/serve. Cook together at church or at St. Joe's, or each take on part of the meal and meet at St. Joe's ready to serve. Meals can be a main dish - such as chili, soup, hot dogs, pasta, roasted turkey - and a vegetable and whole fruit, or a casserole, plus drink and dessert.

What about the rest of the week:
St. Joe's, a Catholic Worker program, provides a hot meal Mondays through Saturdays and provides emergency shelter overnight in the winter. A St. Joe's board member and (as of Nov. 2008) another church each provide supper on one Sunday per month. We cover the other Sundays.

Why does our church do this?
We are inspired by the needs of hungry people and by Mike Freeman. He was a 15-year-old from Fairport in our church's Youth Group when the group was looking for a short-term service project in the fall of 2002. Meanwhile, a couple of people who worked and lived at St. Joe's were trying to start a Sunday drop-in meal and social time. Mike kept returning to help, Sunday after Sunday, because he liked how St. Joe's emphasizes human rights and an interdependent community. He learned to cook and to love cooking.

"It satisfied my needs as well - the need to belong, to have a purpose, to learn, to be supported, to experience genuine solidarity with people that have been trampled on by our economy and our faulty patchwork system of social services. I made friends there."

When the program's founders at St. Joe's left, Mike scrambled to continue the food and the warm atmosphere. He spoke at our church and recruited a handful of families who took turns helping him. A year or two later, when Mike was headed to college in Montreal, our church's Housing, Hunger, & Homelessness Task Force (3H) took over coordinating the Sunday suppers. From Mike, who's now 21:

"I hope that people from First Unitarian will continue to go down to St. Joe's to learn some important lessons about how to be human, to get comfortable living side by side with the people who our culture and our media tell us are 'untouchable' and 'dangerous', and get inspired to plunge headlong into lives dedicated to fighting poverty and economic injustice."

"Volunteering at St. Joe's helps me to keep life in perspective!" - Cindy Sutherland, 3H Task Force.

"I like helping people." - Mark Farnum, teenage volunteer.

"When I volunteer at St. Joe's, I feel connected to other parts of humanity. I am also reminded of how fortunate I am. And I enjoy giving." - Suzy Farrell

"With this program, we get so much more than we give. We enjoy working with the church members and the St. Joe's community and filling a real need." - Jeanne and Tryggvi Johnson, 3H task force.

"I work in a high school in the city and see how severe the needs are for many families. I love the fact that our daughter, who is growing up so close to the city, but yet so far from the serious stressors of poverty and violence, can get involved and see that not everybody lives like we do. I want her to grow up learning that it is our responsibility to help others. I like the saying that I have heard in church, that helping others is not something you do when all your personal goals are met." - Mette Stromnes

How do I sign up?
Contact Pat Swinton, nereid7@juno.com, from our church. If you're new to St. Joe's, she will help you find one Sunday when you can join experienced volunteers. Once you get the hang of it, it's a huge help if you can grab some other folks and sign up as a team for a future Sunday! We could also use new volunteer schedulers, even for part of the year.

Chicken/pasta casserole for a crowd

Shopping list to serve about 90 people:

3 Hefty EZ-Foil Pasta Pans (size: 191/2" x 111/2 " x 31/2, which fit in normal-size ovens) OR use larger pans at church or at St. Joe's.
225 ounces (about 2 gallons) of spaghetti sauce
9 pounds of uncooked pasta (macaroni/penne/ziti/rotini or a mix)
18 chicken breasts or strips (about 41/2 pounds), cooked and cubed (can do in advance).
At least 3 pounds of frozen peas (or frozen green beans, corn, spinach). To make the casserole cook faster, thaw or cook veggies.
4 1/2 pounds (72 ounces) shredded mozzarella cheese
Aluminum foil (to cover pans) and about 2 gallons of water
Optional: three medium onions, chopped.
Also drinks (perhaps milk, juice), paper cups, and dessert.

Directions: Preheat oven to 350o. Saute the chicken (with chopped onions, if using). Cube the chicken. Divide among the pans the chicken (& onions), the pasta (uncooked), spaghetti sauce, water, vegetables. Stir. Cover pans with foil. Bake for 45 minutes, until sauce is bubbling in the center of pan. Remove foil (save it to cover the casserole if you must transport it!), spread cheese on top and bake 10 more minutes.

Need more recipes? At http://allrecipes.com, type in the number of servings you want and amounts are instantly recalculated.

October 19 2011