‘RotherMen’ reachout
Catholic group members serve food to needy.
Saturday, April 21, 2018
“For I was hungry and you gave me food.” — Matthew 25:35
MOORE —
Feeding the hungry is one of the basic duties of Christians and is considered a work of mercy by the Catholic Church.
With that in mind, some members of St. Andrew Catholic Church, 800 NW 15, assemble on the third Sunday of each month and do their part to provide a hot meal to the hungry. The food is given to the homeless and others at Wiley Post Park in Oklahoma City and is done in partnership with Grace Fellowship of OKC Inc.
The parish’s Rother Men is the group organizing the third Sunday food
preparation, delivery and distribution.
Group members and other parishioners started their work at 8 a.m. April 15 in the church’s kitchen. The volunteers readied baked chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, bread, pudding and lemonade.
Bill Johnson, one the group’s leaders, said the Rother Men “are Catholic men who desire to follow the simplicity, courage, and love of God and His people for whom the Blessed Father Stanley Rother lived, and for which he was martyred.”
Rother was an Oklahomaborn priest who was slain in Guatemala in 1981. Pope Francis recognized him as a martyr in 2016. Rother was beatified in a sacred ceremony in September 2017 in Oklahoma City. His beatification placed him one step closer to canonization as a Roman Catholic saint. He is the first American recognized as a martyr by the Catholic Church and the first U.S. priest to be beatified.
The Rev. Joelene Barber, a nondenominational minister, greeted the St. Andrew’s group at they arrived and set up their serving line inside a building at the park.
Barber said sometimes more than 100 people show up for food. On April 15, the weather was cold and windy, and Barber counted only 63 men, women and children.
The Moore church group began serving at noon, and about 12:25 p.m., the hot food was gone. Some of the needy went back through the serving line a second or third time.
Johnson and fellow St. Andrew’s member Rick Atkins said they’ve noticed that those who return for seconds allow others to be fed first.
As those who had been fed left the building, many stopped to tell the St. Andrew’s volunteers “God bless you,” and “Thank you for what you do.”
The Catholic group loaded the empty food containers into their vehicles and returned to their church for the cleanup process, which was completed by 1 p.m. They finished their day knowing they had served their Lord by serving others.