Kris – A Passion to Feed People

Kris shared this story with a group of high school students in April 2017.

My own son found himself in trouble and had to do some community service. The ladies at the Schuyler Outreach Food Pantry of Catholic Charities agreed to oversee that. Being a super involved mom, I wanted to know more about the organization. I don’t think it ever occurred to me that there was so much true hunger in Schuyler County, our sweet little town. After he had filled his time, I stayed on as a volunteer. I helped with mobile food pantries where a line of people stretched around the corner the first Saturday of every month. I’d driven past this line, but I’d never questioned it. I donated my sweat and made sure these people had some food to get by and a kind smile from a stranger because the world doesn’t need to be a bad place. I then found time in my schedule to pick up bread from our local Tops Market on Thursday mornings and found that there were always people who were hungry waiting for me when I returned to the Pantry.

Eventually, those ladies moved on and a position opened at the Food Pantry. I applied for that position and when I interviewed, Debbie (the Agency Director), said she was hoping I’d apply. She knew that I had already been bitten by the passion to feed people. It’s a wonderful feeling to find your passion about something, it’s absolutely blissful to actually get paid to live that passion. I’ve come to find that Catholic Charities is so much more than offering people food and other services. They offer hope. Every day we see people at their worst moments: when they are starving, when they have no electricity, when they have lost their homes or when they decide it’s time to get out of a bad relationship. We meet with them, we connect, we LISTEN. There are so many ways to offer people hope. If you have a yearning in your heart to help people on their darkest days you should seriously consider social services as a career option. You will never get rich in a material way, but your life will be rich in so many other ways.

Please consider our volunteer opportunities or making a donation to help fund our food pantries. Thank you for helping us ensure that no one goes hungry in our communities!