On Sunday morning, I went to Mass and brunch as usual. Afterwards, though, I headed to work at EECM. I'm not usually on duty over the weekends (the food pantry's closed) but it was the day of the LoveWalk and I was excited to take part. Between being a parishioner at Sacred Heart and the Food Services intern at EECM, I had been hearing about the LoveWalk for weeks.
The LoveWalk is an annual charity walk organized by the youth of the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh. Each year, hundreds of young people participate. They gather for a worship service at Sacred Heart Parish and then walk approximately one mile to the EECM Food Pantry, carrying bags of food to donate to the Pantry. The walk is meant to simulate the experience of the homeless, who must carry their belonging with them at all times.
We set up receiving and sorting tables in the dining room. LoveWalk participants would be following a specific route into the building, winding through the dining room and eventually into ELPC's Social Hall where 2,400 cookies and enough hot chocolate (24 gallons!) to wash them all down waited. I waited with the other staff and volunteers as Mass at Sacred Heart ended and word came that the Walkers were on their way.
All of a sudden, the deluge began. I ran back and forth behind the receiving table with the volunteers from the Newman Center, trying not to bump into anyone, sorting the donations. It was so heartening to see wave after wave of people laden with food. Macaroni and cheese, spaghetti sauce, rice, pasta of many varieties- really good stuff! For an hour they came, young people and adults both, overloading the table with their gifts. I barely had time to smile at a group before they would have passed by.
In the three hours I was at EECM on February 13, we saw nine hundred young people and received enough canned food to fill 27 plastic storage bins and enough boxed food to fill 81 cardboard boxes. Altogether, the walk collected more than 1,200 pounds of food!
The generous donations had an immediate impact on the food pantry. Much of this good food was packed up for distribution this week and is already on the tables of our clients. Thanks to the generosity and enthusiasm of the youth groups and their supporters, the 21st Annual LoveWalk for the Poor was a great success and a huge benefit to EECM's hunger programs.
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