Thanksgiving Food Drive 2007

Once again Gesu School families and parishioners made it possible for the junior high students to assemble over two hundred boxes of canned goods and food to be given to area parishes, shelters and food pantries.

On Monday afternoon, November 19th seven teachers and parents and fourteen junior high students were privileged to be selected to  make some of the deliveries.  Below you will find an explanation of this project accompanied by some pictures we took.

In addition to the deliveries we made, Mrs. Carmen Matz delivered some of our food to St. Herman's House. Mr. Jimmy Waugh came to get some food for the Epiphany Hunger Center and Ms. Renee Jones delivered a carload of food to the Empowerment Center.

Thanks to all of the Gesu families who helped with this annual project.  Thanks also to Ms. Karen Knaus, the Student Council and the junior high students who organized this project so that we could better understand the true meaning of Thanksgiving.

 

Each morning students from Student Council go to the classrooms to pick up the bags of food that have been brought in. 


 


Students deposit the bags in Ms. Knaus' classroom and eventually begin to sort through the bags.



They work on sorting the donations according to the different food types. 


It begins to look like a grocery store after awhile!


 

 
Once the food is sorted the students begin to arrange boxes for the different centers that will use our donations.

The Epiphany Hunger Center and the Empowerment Center sent vans to pick up the food. 
We help carry it down to their cars.


This involves a great deal of teamwork and many hours of service.

One of the highlights of this project is that students get to meet some wonderful people who are working to solve the problem of hunger in our city.  Pictured here are Mr. Jimmy Waugh from the Epiphany Hunger Center.  He visited with Mrs. Emily Schetter and her class before he left Gesu.  The bottom two pictures show Ms. Renee Jones from the Empowerment Center.  8th graders enjoyed hearing about the work she does there and the people they server.

Many teachers from the Peace and Justice Committee also help with details of this project. 
 The Gesu faculty donated many turkeys to add to the food brought in by students.
 
On the day we delivered food  we first stopped by to visit Father Jim O'Donnell at 35th and Central Avenue.  He told us about the programs he and Sister Maggie Conrad have developed to bring the presence of Jesus to the people living in the Central Ave. region of Cleveland. This year we got to meet the three children who are part of their family.  We had a lot of fun getting to know them and we look forward to meeting them again.  We left the food at his house because he said that he had people ready to take it to certain families he knew were in need during the holiday season.

 


Do all the good that you can,
by all the means that you can,
in all the ways that you can,
in all the places that you can,
to all the people that you can,
as long as you ever can. 
                                    -John Wesley

Our final stop was at  St. Catherine's Church at East 93rd and Heath Rd.

We delivered many boxes of food to add to the Market Day pies that were sent by the Gesu PTO.  Sister Kathleen  told us how St. Catherine's would soon be consolidating with St. Timothy and St. Henry's parishes.  There will be many new things to contend with in the coming year.  We promised to keep the people in their community in our prayers. 

 

Finally we pose for our annual picture with the staff of St. Catherine's. 
Thanks for your kind welcome to us!  We hope that our paths cross again.


Congratulations on a job well done!