Hi Saints!
Judy here! We began the day by celebrating the birth of Meghan. Happy 17th birthday, Child of God! Every candle on your cake makes our world brighter.
Breakfast grace was sung to the tune of Superman.
Thank you Lord, for giving us food! Thank you Lord, for giving us food!
Thank you Creator! Thank you Redeemer!
The gender-specific language led us into an animated discussion of God’s gender. No surprises – nothing was resolved.
Will, Amanda, Meghan and I went to Saint Susan’s – a busy soup kitchen in Jamestown where we sliced, diced, mixed, served, bused and scrubbed. We met some amazing volunteers! The young man who worked in the scullery with Will is unemployed and spending his time volunteering while he awaits work. The others were all older retirees like me. Many give one day a week year round to this labor of love. We saw God’s light in their willingness to serve.
This soup kitchen feeds between two and four hundred folks a day. Spaghetti, the freshest of salads, cantaloupe, mandarin orange slices, soup, beverage and dessert were available. We saw infants and the elderly, those infirm of body and those wounded in mind and spirit. We saw families and those who arrived, sat, and left alone. Some sat with downcast eyes and avoided our gaze. Others sought our smiles. A fellow in a bright Hawaiian shirt engaged us in enthusiastic conversation. Many were grateful for the lunch. Many were not. Many were helpful and brought their trays to our bussing station to save our poor legs.
A hundred and fifty years ago H.G. Wells believed that the revolutionary new technologies would allow mankind to wipe out sickness, ignorance and poverty by the beginning of the 1900’s. But Jesus said, “You will always have the poor around you.” We don’t see them in Clifton Park. Today was a startling reminder.
Having grown up Protestant, I associate saints with the Roman and Episcopal churches and always wonder about what a saint did. Saint Susan, I discovered, was a saint just like you and me – a believer, a worker for the kingdom, “nothing special.” She was simply a young woman of 21 who was fatally injured in an accident in the area, and spent her final days being cared for by the skilled and compassionate staff of the local hospital. In gratitude, her family created Saint Susan’s in her memory. Like yours and mine, her simple life was not filled with great deeds, astonishing miracles or intentional self-sacrifice. Yet each day the poor and the cast-down, the spat upon and the ratted on are greeted by her angelic smile and are fed in God’s name.
As the detritus of the luncheon meal was cleared away, a fresh batch of volunteers arrived to begin work on the supper meal and we left to restore our souls beside the still waters of Lake Chautauqua. Will got us home without benefit of a map by listening to an angelic female voice coming out of nowhere telling us when to turn right or left. Is it magic?
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