Our Lady of Lourdes food drive a 'souper' success

The basement of Our Lady of Lourdes R.C. Church in Malverne was filled wall-to-wall with donations as neighbors unloaded food from wagons while others sorted the donations into categories marking another successful annual ‘Souper Food Drive’ at the church.

“We had an incredible turnout, incredible generosity,” said Linda Baldacchino, coordinator of youth ministry for the church. “It’s so inspiring, especially the little ones. It’s just a real feel-good day.”

The March 16 event saw Little league teams, religious education classes and just groups of friends come together to help collect donations for the pantry. The children range from high school students to 5-year-old Daisy Scouts.

“It’s really great for (the kids) to see that there’s a place right here in town that helps people who need basic things,” said Alison Sheridan, whose daughter Lucy raised food with her CYO basketball team. “(They’re) able to provide that, to be actually out on the streets collecting things for people that need them.”

Our Lady of Lourdes splits the village into 15 different sections, and a volunteer group of children is assigned to collect food in each section. After weeks of posting flyers and encouraging their neighbors to donate, the teams spent Saturday afternoon collecting goods to bring back to the church. This year, the kids raised nearly 10,000 pounds of donations.

“Just so many people, you can’t count how many people,” Baldacchino said. “Between all of the houses, and everyone doing their own individual thing. All the ages — Catholic school kids, public school kids — all different people in the community get involved.”

A little friendly competition, too, helped motivate the children. Each team tracked how much food they raised, and earned a point for every pound of donations they gathered. The items that the food pantry is in a little more need of — which this year were peanut butter, jelly, soup, stuffing, mashed potatoes and snacks — earned twice the points. Some teams had entire wagons full of peanut butter. Neighbors had paid close attention to what donations were especially needed — and, of course, would award their teams the most points.

“The people in the town are very thoughtful,” said Jessica Kuntz, whose daughter Hayden also collected food with her Our Lady of Lourdes CYO basketball teammates. “They shop specifically for this — they’re not just cleaning out their pantries.”

And people are getting more and more creative with their donations — one even made do-it-yourself birthday kits by packing cake mix, candles and utensils in individual Ziploc bags

The donations help keep the Our Lady of Lourdes pantry stocked, which is especially important in the months after the holidays when donating perhaps is no longer on the forefront of people’s minds, and the pantry sees a lull.

Though the kids were the main activists of the day, the massive turnout of donations wouldn’t have been possible without the effort of every neighbor.

“The mothers are all involved in getting their kids out to do this,” said Tom Dugan of the volunteer organization St. Vincent de Paul, which helps organize the many donations. “There’s an army of them!”

One neighbor played a friendly prank on the kids. Chris Calabrese psyched the team out by seeming to donate just one can of soup. He then opened his garage door, revealing entire pyramids of nonperishable item he bought for the food pantry. The kids were ecstatic.

“We have such a group of people,” said Sal Siino of St. Vincent de Paul. “So dedicated, so nice. We’re all a big family.”

“They were brought up right,” he added of the kids. “They were brought up to help others.”