Mustard Seed project to enhance dining

In 2021, St. Anne collected $6,120 worth of gifts and gift cards for 274 people in need, according to Father Albert Irudayasamy, pastor.In addition, St. Anne will be distributing 50 boxes of Band-Aids of all sizes for the Our Father’s Table holiday appeal. Our Father’s Table is a feeding ministry in Fitchburg. St. George’s Parish in Worcester will have a Giving Tree with more than 200 tags. These gifts will be donatedto elder-care facilities in the city including Winter Hill Rest Home, Blaire House, St. Mary’s Health Care and St. Francis Rehabilitation and Nursing Center. There will also be tags for diocesan seminarians, the children at Our Lady of Providence Parish, the Mustard Seed Catholic Worker, and parishioners in need.According to Ann Doyle, parish outreach administrator,St. George’s has provided Giving Tree gifts to individuals, families, and agencies that serve the most vulnerable for more than 20 years.“Our parishioners fill the church with thoughtful and beautifully wrapped gifts every year. I notice that they often tuck in anextra treat even beyond what was requested or needed. We try to give to those who would otherwise have little or nothing on Christmas morning,” said Mrs. Doyle.“It is an honor and a privilege to hear their words of gratitude,” she said.Instead of a Giving Tree, Holy Cross Parish in Templeton conducts a children’s mitten, hat and sock drive. The parish also has a monthly food drive. The Office of Communications sent out a survey asking parishes if they provide food baskets at Thanksgiving and Christmas, orhad a pantry where people could pick up food.Of the 63 parishes that responded, 53 noted that they give out food to between 50and 250 families. Several parishes noted that they host a community Thanksgiving and/or Christmas meal, and some even deliver to homebound people on the holidays. Many parishes hold Brown Bag Sundays where parishioners are given empty shopping bags which they return full of non-perishables the following week. Parishes also noted that they take up food collections for other parishes in communities that are not as well off as theirs. As a recipient, Father Jonathan J. Slavinskas, pastor of Our Lady of Providence at St. Bernard Church, expressed gratitude to others. “Through the generosity of several parishes, St. Bernard’s is able to assist individuals in need,” he said.Most parishes also partner with other local organizations that help people in need.Deacon Benjamin Nogueira, who is retired but still helps at St. Bernard Parish in Fitchburg, reported that “during the month of November parishioners bring non-perishable food and place it in front of the altar. A week before Thanksgiving the confirmation students take the food to Catholic Charities and stock the shelves.”St. Vincent de Paul Parish has a program that restocks the local Templeton Food Pantry, Father Francis A. Roberge, pastor, reported. Sacred Heart of Jesus in Milford partners with the Daily Bread Food pantry; and Sacred Heart of Jesus in Hopedale helps the Milford Food Pantry and noted that, “We assist any family that asks for help at Christmas.” Our Lady of Mount Carmel and Our Lady of Loreto Parish in Worcester will have a Giving Tree withmore than 200 tags with gifts to be distributed to the St. Agnes Guild, Nazareth Home for Boys, and the Rainbow Child Development Center, all in Worcester.Sixty-one parishes reported a Giving Tree as part of their community outreach.Ministry expectsshortfall of giftsBy Maria LeDoux| CFP CorrespondentUrban Missionaries of Our Lady of Hope, a social action ministry in the Diocese of Worcester, was founded in 1979 with the mission to help “the least, the last, and the left out.” The organization has partnered with more than 50 parishes in the diocese toaid in their outreach, particularly during Christmas with the popular Giving Tree in each church displaying the needs of the vulnerable or asking for a toy for a child who otherwise may not receive one on Christmas. Starting the first weekend of October and continuing until Dec. 23, Urban Missionaries is busy working to keep up with demand, according to Deacon Walter F. Doyle, who founded the organization with his wife, Kathleen.The gifts are brought to a distribution center to be sorted before families pick them up. Urban Missionaries serves thousands of children each year through the generosity of more than 250 volunteers and the thousands who give to the ministry through parish Giving Trees.Because of lower Mass attendance in parishes si

By Tanya Connor| The Catholic Free Press

 

 

WORCESTER –The Mustard Seed, a Catholic Worker program which serves free meals inside and outside its building in one of the city’s lowest income areas, is marking its 50th anniversary this year and has announced a new project. Shortly after an anniversary gathering of Catholic Workers at the College of the Holy Cross, the Mustard Seed’s plans for expansion were made known.
The Mustard Seed community is seeking to raise $250,000 to build a pavilion for people who come for meals, Paula Robert Bushey, board treasurer, announced Nov. 15.
The project at 93 Piedmont St. includes a new patio under the pavilion, and a new ramp and wider walkways to increase accessibility to the building, she said.
“Many of our guests are elderly, homeless, in wheelchairs, or wrestling with mobility challenges,” she explained in a press release.
“When the pandemic hit, we had to shift gears and serve all of our meals outdoors,” Ms. Bushey said. “Creedon and Company lent us alarge tent for about five months, which provided our guests with a covered area to eat meals if they were unable to take them home. ... We realized it would be a good idea to have a permanent structure to provide protection from the elements” and allow for social distancing.
To date, $60,000 has been donated by foundations. Grants are pending and other donations are welcome, Ms. Bushey said.
“We .... hope to raise the remaining funds in the next few months so we can break ground in the spring,” she said.

She told The Catholic Free Press that the contractor, Robert deDiego of Walnut Hill Carpentry in Orange, expects the project to take about eight weeks.
Volunteers run the Mustard Seed, which is funded by donations, Ms. Bushey said. Meals are prepared, delivered and served from 5-6:30 p.m. Monday-Friday by businesses, congregations, civic and social groups. Usually about 100 individuals are served per night. The inside space can accommodate 42 people at once, the patio can accommodate 80 people at 10 picnic tables.Recent improvements included repaving the driveway, painting the building, replacing flooring, and installing solar panels and a new furnace with a ventilation system and central air, Ms. Bushey said.
“The Mustard Seed is proud to be celebrating its 50th anniversary and looks forward to 50 more years of serving the community,” she said.Among anniversary celebrations was an Oct. 21-23 gathering of Catholic Workers and supporters held at the Mustard Seed, the College of the Holy Cross and Blessed Sacrament Parish.
Claire Schaeffer-Duffy of the SS. Francis and Therese Catholic Worker community, one of the hosts, estimated that there were 150 participants from more than 10 states, including about 50 locals, and one from Puerto Rico and one from the Netherlands. One of the Catholic Worker movement’s pillars, which co-founder Peter Maurin communicated to co-founder Servant of God Dorothy Day in the 1930s, is houses of hospitality. Hospitality was among the charisms discussed at the Holy Cross gathering.

Ms. Schaeffer-Duffy once viewed works of mercy as her ticket to heaven, but now says she considers them Jesus’ “to do” list. Catholic Workers are not interested just in their own salvation, but bringing others to heaven too, she explained. They want to change the societal order where disregarding or de-humanizing others makes violence possible.“Hospitality, works of mercy, lessens the distance” between “‘us and them,’” Ms. Schaeffer-Duffy maintained.
She told of an encounter with a man she called, “M,” former head of the Savak, Iranian police dreaded for torturing opponents. Estranged from family and recovering from an injury, he was sleeping in his Mercedes Benz at UMass Medical Center. The SS. Francis and Therese house took him in. He did not know of their pacifist politics, but marveled at their hospitality, cooked them a meal and later sent them Christmas cards.“To sit with people like M ... (is to) realize atrocities are carried out by people like ourselves,” Ms. Schaeffer-Duffy said. Thus, one practices trust, which is not permissiveness or naïve cluelessness, but is essential for nonviolent life. Hospitality is an antidote to despair, and a pushback against mercilessness.
“We don’t walk past the world and its problems,” she said, quoting Catholic Worker Karl Meyer. “The world comes in with its problems and sits down for a cup of coffee and a word of consolation.” And, Ms. Schaeffer-Duffy added, “We who serve the coffee are also consoled.”
Matthew Harper, of the Los Angeles Catholic Worker, said if every group of 65 Catholics in his area housed one homeless person, all the homeless would have housing. He also told about advocating for money to be used for mental health centers instead of new jails. He wondered whether new works of mercy might include distributing Narcan to help overdose victims and supporting doctor-monitored safe injection sites for drug users. Someday we will need the works of mercy, and a system that throws anyone away will throw all of us away, he said.
Presenting another charism, pacificism, Dorothy Day’s granddaughter Martha Hennessy read what Ammon Hennacy wrote about his conversion to Christian pacifism while imprisoned for refusing to register for the draft during World War I.
“I had ... mentally listed those whom I desired to kill when I was free,” he wrote. Now he glimpsed what Jesus meant by “the Kingdom of God is within you.”“I could love everybody ... but the warden,” Mr. Hennacy wrote. “But if I did not love him, then the Sermon on the Mount meant nothing.” The warden, never imprisoned, hadn’t had a chance to know what Jesus meant. “I must not blame him. I must love him.”
“We question how we can love folks if we’re killing them,” Theodore Kayser, who travels among Catholic Worker communities, said in his talk. He said he thinks younger Catholic Workers are concerned about government money being used for wars, but also about domestic problems such as large policing budgets and “never enough money for human needs.”He also talked about looking inward, asking, “How can we live more peacefully, non-violently, in communities?”
During table discussions, Ms. Schaeffer-Duffy’s husband, Scott, told Holy Cross students that active violence includes being asked to kill someone, which they will not likely encounter unless they are in Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. Passive violence includes paying taxes and not speaking out when your country tortures people, he said.
Table member and local Catholic Worker Jo Massarelli suggested students could practice non-violence by praying for and not bad-mouthing people who annoy them. Ms. Schaeffer-Duffy said attendees gathered to “renew our commitment to trying to express the Gospel love of Jesus as it’s articulated through the Catholic Worker movement.”