Photos by MATT GREGORY.
By CHRIS COLLINS
Contributing Editor
(Greenfield, MA) — The line snaked all the way down Beacon Street around the base of Rocky Mountain, containing cars full of people desperate to avail themselves of a true act of charity.
At the front of the line, flanked by 25 volunteers from Greenfield’s Blessed Sacrament Church stood Deacon John Leary, who helped spearhead this “grocery giveaway” which has, over four Saturdays, doled out close to 1,200 bags of groceries to needy residents.
“Never in my wildest dreams thought we’d have the turnout we’ve had,” Leary said. “In the last four weeks, we have given away 30,000 pounds of food, and haven’t had to ever turn anyone away…it’s really been like a miracle.”
And one which Leary has seen before. For the last 13 years, Leary and his wife Donna have run the “Bread Of Life Kitchen,” a food distribution effort which delivers hot, homemade meals to elders and shut-ins every weekend.
“It’s sort of like Meals on Wheels for the weekend,” Leary said, adding that the kitchen delivers about 100 meals with the help of a rotating group of volunteers from other area churches.
When the pandemic hit, Bread Of Life was forced to shut down operations, which forced Leary searching for a new cause.
“After a couple of weeks, I started saying to myself, ‘I’ve got to find some new way to help people,” Leary said.
Enter the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, with whom Leary had a previous relationship through Bread Of Life. He proposed the idea of doing a food giveaway, and Food Bank officials hooked him up with “Feeding America,” which organizes similar drives across the United States. Leary said they liked the idea, but he had a condition of his own.
“I told them I wanted to do it, but I didn’t want to have to ask any questions of the people receiving it,” Leary said. “I just wanted to be able to give them a bag of food.”
“This virus has caused a lot of people to lose their jobs, people who worked their whole lives,” Leary added. “I didn’t want there to be any conditions placed on this.”
The Feeding America connection allowed Leary access to a larger capacity of donated food than he would have received for the Bread Of Life program. He then contacted Pastor Timothy Campoli at Blessed Sacrament, which agreed to sponsor the giveaway. Then the question became where to hold it? Leary said it couldn’t be done at the parish parking lot, so he contacted Greenfield Mayor Roxann Wedegartner about using Beacon Field as a distribution location.
“She could not have been nicer about it,” Leary said, adding that the setup has cars line up on the street along the first base line with trunks open, allowing volunteers to load in the grocery bags while still maintaining proper social distancing protocols.
Leary said the items in the bags are largely dependent on what’s available. He said there are usually various fresh fruits and vegetables, non-perishable items like soups, and fresh or frozen proteins. This past weekend, Leary said 25 cases of frozen chicken legs were available, but in the past, spiral hams, whole chickens and ground beef.
“We literally had no food left over and everyone that lined up got something,” Leary said.
Leary said seven pickup trucks will be headed to the Food Bank headquarters in Hatfield later this week where they will pick up another load and bring it to the rectory where it will be bagged up Friday and distributed Saturday beginning at 10 am, though Leary said people have been lining up as early close to 8:30.
“The people who are coming in for this giveaway are people like you and me,” Leary said. “They’ve been laid off from their work, they’ve never had to ask for anything before, and they don’t know what to do next.”
Leary being able to provide this type of help is truly a gift.
“I’ve been able to develop relationships with people over the last four weeks,” Leary said. “There are some that have come through to pick up food for a neighbor or a family member and they ask ‘do you think I could have a bag for myself?’”
“That’s who we are serving,” Leary added. “These beautiful people who are thinking more about their neighbors than themselves, and we’ll be there for them every Saturday, however long this goes on.”
