SANTA CRUZ — With "The Last Supper" hanging on a back wall like a reflection, a dozen volunteers gather around the table where later they will feed Santa Cruz's hungry.
For a half-hour every day, the warm-hearted cooks and servers at St. Francis Soup Kitchen dish about life's joys and heartbreaks as they gobble up a modest meal of soup and salad.
The tradition strengthens friendships and creates new ones. But more importantly, the volunteers say, the fellowship puts them in the right spirit for filling the plates of people who are homeless.
"When we sit down to break bread, that's where it starts," said kitchen director Richard Crowe of Santa Cruz.
St. Francis is expected to honor its volunteers todayduring a 25th anniversary celebration of the Mora Street kitchen. Monterey's Father Peter Carota, a former Santa Cruz Realtor who founded the center, will speak at 4 p.m. A dinner will follow.
The kitchen feeds up to 180 people at noon every weekday. Many among the 75 regular volunteers have dedicated at least 10 years to the center, which also draws help from churches, high schools, UC Santa Cruz and a center for the developmentally disabled.
Estimating there are 400 people who sleep outside in Santa Cruz, Crowe said it's difficult for one agency to treat the overall challenge of homelessness, which often involves mental illness and drug addiction, along with abject poverty.
"You have to start somewhere," said the 40-year-old Crowe, the kitchen's only full-time staff member.
| "When someone is bleeding, you have to stop the hemorrhaging" |
"People are a lot more apt to listen if they have a full belly," he said.
Cooks arrive at 8 a.m. to prepare salad, soup and bread donated by citizens, businesses and community centers. Some days, the kitchen also offers desert and pizza.
For 38-year-old Christopher Williams, the kitchen is "a refuge" from the uncertainty of the streets.
St. Francis means, "I've got something to look forward to," he said.
Santa Cruz's Jerry Wherity, 74, said volunteering in the kitchen is his chance to practice a biblical call to serve the downtrodden. In Matthew 25:40, he said, Jesus taught, "Whatever you did unto one of the least you did unto me"
"It always resonated with me, so I just kept doing it," Wherity said of his four years of service.
Although volunteers see many of the same people in the meal line every week, they don't get discouraged about what seems an endless need to serve.
"Whatever you can do, you do," said Wherity. "It's not perfect, but it's a start"
After growing up in a family that stressed community service, Scotts Valley's Peggy Kier said volunteering for the last few years has been "kind of like my duty"
Although St. Francis was founded on Catholic principles, volunteers hail from diverse religious and economic backgrounds. While it's easier for some supporters to write a check, 25-year server Wayne Shaffer applauded those who give the most precious gift of all — time.
"A lot of these folks don't have much," the 59-year-old Santa Cruz resident said. "But they give what they do have"
For information about volunteering at St. Francis, call 459-6712.
Contact J.M. Brown at kalexander@santacruzsentinel.com.
