 | Pictured on a recent Wednesday at the St. Thomas More Soup Kitchen are (from left) Matt Sherwin '05; first-year law student Susannah Camic; community volunteer Evelyn Veillette; Sam McDowell, a research scientist in physics; Professor Paul Kennedy; Evelyn Tang '07; community volunteers Janice Veillette and Estelle Camputaro; and Beth O'Connell of the Yale Law Library. |
Every Wednesday morning as she heads into work, Beverly Waters stops by three Dunkin' Donut shops to pick up large boxes of leftover goods.
Waters, a research associate in the Office of Institutional Research, has been making these donut rounds for 20 years, keeping a promise she made long ago while serving on a committee of parishioners at the St. Thomas More Chapel and Center on the Yale campus.
The committee was formed to evaluate whether the Roman Catholic church had the resources to take on the task of feeding the hungry on Wednesday afternoons -- the one day of the week that, because of a scheduling conflict, the neighboring Christ Church on Broadway cannot open its Community Soup Kitchen.
Waters had told her fellow committee members that she would be willing to provide the weekly dessert if her parish committed itself to providing free food to impoverished New Haven area residents each Wednesday.
While Waters and a few others on the committee -- nearly all of them Yale affiliates -- were sure they could meet the challenge, others were less certain. Among these was Yale professor Paul Kennedy, one of the founding members of the committee, who feared that there would never be enough volunteers to keep the soup kitchen running.
"I was really very pessimistic about our ability to keep it running," admits Kennedy. "But thanks to the terrific support we've gotten in the way of food donations and from a very committed group of volunteers, we've successfully been able to fill this important community need."
On a recent Wednesday at the soup kitchen, Kennedy -- the J. Richardson Dilworth Professor of History and director of the International Security Studies program -- proudly noted that, thanks to those dedicated volunteers, the St. Thomas More Soup Kitchen has served an estimated 28,000 meals to homeless, infirm, disadvantaged or down-on-their-luck clients since it opened its doors one October day two decades ago.
Many of the volunteers whose work has enabled the soup kitchen to mark its 20th anniversary this month are Yale faculty, staff or students, Kennedy points out.
Like Waters, some of them have shown their dedication to the cause of feeding the hungry ever since the soup kitchen was started.
Whenever possible over the past two decades, Cynthia Russett, the Larned Professor of History, has spent her Wednesday lunchtimes helping to prepare the food being served -- buttering piles of bread and rolls, making salads or helping to cook the soup that is a weekly staple.
"The people who work there love to do it," says Russett. "In a way, you get more out of yourself than you give, because it is such a lovely collective enterprise," she adds.
Dr. Marie Browne, who retired from Yale in 1988 after serving many years on the faculty as associate professor of pediatric cardiology, can often be found in the basement kitchen that adjoins the room where clients are served their meals on long tables neatly assembled in rows.
With cheeks flushed from the heat of a large oven as she slides huge trays of food, Browne comments that she is a veteran volunteer, having started at age 60 when the soup kitchen first opened.
"I'm 80 years old now," she notes, "and still coming in every week."
Browne especially enjoys the fact that many of the volunteers are Yale students who are also parishioners of St. Thomas More Chapel. "I never went into medical practice independently because I loved the business of having contact with students and being a mentor to them," explains Browne. "Here, I can still be a part of that. Our volunteer staff is a beautiful representation of the whole community."
Some of the Yale student volunteers help with the preparation or serving of food, while others put other talents to use at the soup kitchen, which draws on average 150 to 200 people weekly.
To the pleasure of soup kitchen guests, new volunteer freshman Kristine DiColandrea plays the piano to create a pleasant ambiance.
"In addition to being able to provide some music, my involvement here allows me to meet some great people -- both clients and other volunteers," says the Yale student, who also works with homeless New Haven residents as a volunteer for Harmony Place.
Also performing music on Wednesdays is Yale freshman Mark Dunn, who plays classical guitar.
While he went into the enterprise of starting the soup kitchen with skepticism, Kennedy is credited with being a guiding force behind it and, like Browne and Russett, is one of its longest-serving volunteers. Sam MacDowell, a research scientist in physics at Yale, and his wife, Miriam, have also continued to be faithfully involved since the planning stages.
Kennedy says that his volunteerism is inspired in part by his own belief in the Catholic tenet of social commitment and obligation to support those less fortunate.
"I grew up in an Irish Catholic ghetto in the northeast of England, where a lot of social life centered around the parish," he says. "There was, mentally, a deep bonding with religion and with church tenets about helping others."
After joining the Yale faculty in 1983 and becoming a parishioner at St. Thomas More, Kennedy wanted to continue the kind of community service work he was engaged in while teaching at the University of East Anglia in England, where he co-founded a chapter of the St. Vincent DePaul Society -- a long-running Catholic relief organization -- and visited with patients in a local mental hospital. He also encouraged student volunteers to become involved in this community service work.
Today, Kennedy makes a weekly trek from his Hillhouse Avenue office to St. Thomas More to help serve food and provide other assistance. He says he is impressed with the Yale students who are willing to fit time into their busy schedules to offer their help each Wednesday for an hour-and-a-half. These include Yale law students, who over the years have been engaged with soup kitchen clients through the Yale Law Clinic, providing legal advice on such issues as housing and employment, according to Sister Jo-Ann Veillette, associate chaplain at St. Thomas More Chapel and a lecturer in the Yale College Seminars program.
University Commons dining hall, as well as some of the residential college dining halls (particularly Davenport and Pierson), have been among the major contributors of food over the years to St. Thomas More, according to Kennedy. With assistance from students, the Reverend Robert Beloin picks up food from Commons each Wednesday morning. Other food is bought at or donated by The Connecticut Food Bank.
Kennedy pays close attention weekly to the number of clients at the soup kitchen, noting on a recent Wednesday, for example, that 117 clients had come within the first half hour.
That count, says the historian, is a "barometer of the state's economy," explaining that a higher-than-average number of guests is an indication of a poorer economy and increased unemployment.
Many of the soup kitchen's guests are permanently unable to work because of physical or mental illness, issues of substance abuse or "various other kinds of hurts," Kennedy says.
Since the soup kitchen relies heavily on support from Yale volunteers, it is open only during the academic year, beginning each new term in early October and running through May.
"From October to May, it is because of the generosity of so many Yale undergraduates, graduate and professional students, faculty and staff, along with St. Thomas More community members, that the soup kitchen can open its doors. ... Whether one cuts vegetables, serves soup or washes dishes, it is because each volunteer chooses to be there that we can welcome our guests with friendship and dignity," says Veillette.
Other Yale volunteers include Ann Chieppo, a senior administrative assistant at the Child Study Center; her sister, Debbie Camputaro, a senior administrative assistant in pediatrics at the School of Medicine; Yale undergraduates Evelyn Tang '07 and Matt Sherwin '05, and first-year Law School student Susannah Camic, among others.
Commenting on the steadfast dedication of these and other volunteers, Kennedy jokes that all deserve a place in heaven.
In fact, Kennedy quips, many of the soup kitchen's clients see him so regularly at St. Thomas More Chapel that they have confused him for a priest. "Often while walking down the street, one of the clients will say 'Hello, Father,'" he says. "If I'm walking with someone who knows me only as a Yale history professor, he or she will look at me with astonishment."
As committed as he is to his volunteer work, Kennedy says he would be happy if there was no longer a need for the St. Thomas More Soup Kitchen.
"It is sad that we need it," acknowledges Kennedy. "But since we do, it is a wonderful thing that -- because of all the campus and community support -- St. Thomas More has been able to offer it these 20 years, and, hopefully, will continue to for however long we must."
-- By Susan Gonzalez
St. Thomas More Chapel and Center will holds its 10th annual "Songs for Soup" concert on Jan. 18 to benefit its own soup kitchen and other community outreach ministries. It will feature the St. Thomas More Choir and a number of Yale a cappella groups. In celebration of its 20th year, the chapel aims to raise $20,000 at this event. For more information, call (203) 777-5537.
T H I S
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