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Bread ministry By Michael D. Wamble “Our bread is non-denominational,” says Ed Krupa, rolling off the names of Catholic, Lutheran and Baptist churches, orphanages and soup kitchens that receive donations from Our Lady of Perpetual Help’s (OLPH) parish sharing committee. If anybody could know a bread’s affiliation it would be Krupa. For 37 years, he ran Oven Fresh Bakery at Harlem and Foster Avenues on the Northwest Side of Chicago. The bread may be non-denominational, but the men and women who volunteer their time and talents to the parish’s sharing committee do so because this ministry is Catholic (the faith) and catholic (universal). “My wife volunteered me for work once a week. It really snowballed,” says the senior leader. It wasn’t long before Krupa was an invaluable volunteer, one of the reasons the “bread business” is so successful in Glenview. What drives Krupa and so many parishioners to give of themselves is Christ’s call to love your neighbor as yourself. “There are so many people who need help and so much food around here,” says Krupa. “No one should go hungry.” One would be hard-pressed to locate a pocket of poverty amid the lush green of suburban Glenview. So what motivated this parish ministry? Sister Paulanne Held, OLPH pastoral associate, credits the assignment of the late Father Myles McDonnell, from St. James Church on Wabash Avenue, in generating an interest in assisting the poor. “Coming from that parish, he taught us how important sharing was and got us to begin to collect food in 1971,” says the School Sister of St. Francis of the former pastor. In 1983, the parish’s sharing committee was organized. Today, that committee has over 200 members. “Over time, we’ve become aware of the need to make a difference in the lives of the poor,” she says. The generosity of OLPH is no secret to the people of St. James, Our Lady of Tepeyac, St. Lawrence and St. Sabina churches in Chicago, its sharing parishes. On July 23, chartered school buses will travel to the Glenview church for their annual Sharing Parish Picnic. The 23rd, like every third Sunday of the month, is Sharing Sunday. Whether it is after a Sharing Sunday or a weekday Mass, items constantly enter the parish’s garage-style pantry door that’s always open. It’s a regular drive-thru. Except in this case, the cars are zipping up the blacktop for drop-offs rather than pick-ups. Bread comes from places like Starbucks, Einstein Bagels and Panera Breads. Loaves are stored in a 10-foot-by-10-foot walk-in cooler donated by a parishioner. The parish also receives an estimated 2,700 canned goods each week. “After 6:30 morning Mass, people line up here with the bags and boxes of what they picked up the previous night after establishments close,” says Dick Bonk, one of many parish volunteers. While bread is a big slice of this ministry, it’s not the exclusive resource housed here. Volunteer Marge Thomas takes charge of the compiling and distribution of clothes and household goods, work that must be done every Friday and Monday. “It’s my job to get rid of this stuff,” Thomas says laughingly, looking around at “her girls,” the fellow seasoned citizens standing to Thomas’ right and left, and the assortment of donated baby strollers, pieces of luggage, bicycles, bedroom sets and mattresses that surround her. Thomas knows finding someone who wants what the parish has to offer isn’t really that hard a proposition. Most of the counter space presently occupied will be picked up or trucked out by day’s end, ready to be filled again. Along the wall adjacent to the cooler are computers and monitors awaiting the construction-laden sojourn to the far South Side. “A month ago 25 Macs that looked like they hadn’t been taken out of their boxes came in here,” says Bonk. “The parishioner told us he decided to change his office…” Before Bonk can continue, Tom Hughes drives up and steps out of his car, with a PC in hand. “My wife’s offices are upgrading computers so I brought over two computers, CPUs and keyboards. They’re in fine working order and will be of good use to somebody,” said Hughes, a longtime parishioner. Hughes’ computer, said Bonk, is headed for St. Sabina Parish. That donation wouldn’t be the first significant exchange between the two parishes. In 1974, then-deacon Michael Pfleger served at the Glenview church. “They [OLPH] were never officially assigned to us as a sharing parish,” says Pfleger, now pastor at St. Sabina. Because of his relationship with McDonnell, that became incidental. That relationship led to countless others in which the parishioners exchange music ministries, pro bono legal services and through a program called “Befriend a Family,” form bonds between parents and children. “Myles ignited the spirit of generosity at the parish, there is no question about that,” says Pfleger. “But Sister Paulanne has been the driving force from the beginning and still is today.” Krupa has even stronger praise of the pastoral associate. “She is our saint.” As for Hughes’ computer, Pfleger said it will likely help someone in the parish bridge what sociologists call “the digital divide,” enabling another group of have-nots to have. For years, the amount of bread walked up by parishioners was plenty to aid its sharing parishes, and more than adequate for volunteers to have to coordinate. But the people at OLPH wanted to do more. “People would bring bread from stores and donate these items to the parish. We just wondered why can’t we get bread right from the store,” says Held. Some of the committee’s bread did come from a large chain grocery, which, according to the letter of Illinois law, was illegal and ill-advised, due to the risk for litigation bad bread could bring about. It was a fact unknown to committee members like Chris Fragassi. Food flowed in from the chain until it closed, forcing the committee to find another source. “We found out that the other major chain absolutely refused to donate bread,” says Fragassi. “Looking back on that, it really was a blessing in disguise.” The revelation led the sharing committee to write a recipe for change by: (1) making friends with independent stores and bakeries; and (2) a legislative campaign to change Illinois law. Contacted in 1997 by sharing committee member Marianne Sebby, attorney Richard Waris became the parish’s point-man on snipping the red tape that restricted their ministry. In the meantime, Krupe began turning to local independent stores that resisted cautionary interpretations of Illinois’ Good Samaritan Donor Act. Waris’ approach to the problem was to change the law in Illinois. It seemed the parishioner’s experience in legislative and trial work was paying off. Catholic Charities, the American Jewish Committee and the Greater Chicago Food Depository joined the parish in supporting the change in the Samaritan Donor Act. His argument highlighted the fact that in 1997, nearly 15,000 people were recipients of donations by the OLPH Sharing Committee. The following year that number branched out to 16,423, with 65 percent of that group under age 18 and/or over age 60. But instead of meeting the group’s stamp of approval, the proposal sat before an Illinois House committee and spoiled on the vine. A new seed was planted in the state Senate where the proposal, supported by Ill. State Sen. Cathy Parker, was met with a receptive welcome. Passed in the Senate, it was then sent to a joint committee of House and Senate reps where the Illinois Trial Lawyers’ Association exerted its influence to try to stall the bill. To the sharing committee’s cause came Ill. Rep. Beth Coulsen, whom Waris says was “very instrumental” in negotiating the language in the bill in order to gain its passage. “In the end, they [the trial lawyer’s lobby] became more reasonable when they understood we weren’t trying to take clients away from them or affect consumer’s rights,” says Waris. “I explained to them that the people being helped here aren’t interested in litigation, they were interested in sustenance.” Last month, after three years in the oven known as the General Assembly, “The Day Old Bread Act”—was signed into law. The amendment to the Samaritan Donor Act doesn’t exempt food that is known to be “bad” from future lawsuits nor will it supersede other legal and health safeguards in Illinois. “We’d love to see the larger chains get involved. Unfortunately that hasn’t been the case. At least, not yet,” says Fragassi. The larger grocery chains and their officials would surely benefit from the donations of time and edible items, says Fragassi. “Jesus taught us to love our neighbors and to feed the poor,” she says. “I believe very strongly that this is mission that we should all be thinking about.” This is a ministry, says Held, where to give of one’s self is to be open to so much more. “Father McDonnell had a saying,” she says. “You will never be outdone in generosity.” Our Lady of Perpetual Help’s sharing ministry gives witness to that wisdom every day. To find out more about the parish sharing ministry call OLPH at
(847) 724-2044.
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