Westminster Presbyterian Church hosting Stop Hunger Now packing project

By LINDA M. LINONIS

linonis@vindy.com

youngstown

The Rev. David B. Joachim witnessed the power of help firsthand while on a mission trip to Haiti in 2011.

“I saw empty, discarded boxes of Stop Hunger Now,” said the pastor of Westminster Presbyterian Church.

In 2011, 12 Valley churches packed food for that project. Though he had no way of knowing where the discarded boxes originated from, Pastor Joachim said he was happy about the evidence that showed the food made its way to people in need. Haiti experienced a devastating earthquake in 2010.

This year, about 120 Presbyterians from Valley Presbyterian churches of Eastminster Presbytery will gather from 10 a.m. to noon Saturday at Westminster Presbyterian, 119 Stadium Drive, to put together nutritious packets of food that includes beans, rice and lentils. The food is earmarked for school feeding programs in underdeveloped countries.

Pastor Joachim said a Stop Hunger Now truck will arrive from Pittsburgh earlier that day to deliver the food. “We’ll have an assembly-line process,” Pastor Joachim said. About 20,000 meals will be packed at a cost of $5,800. Those funds, the pastor said, came from contributing churches.

“It’s easy to write a check,” Pastor Joachim said. “This is a hands-on mission that gets people involved.” He added it is important for church members “to get beyond the walls” and do something to help people. The pastor said churches were involved in sending teams to part of the United States that were ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. He pointed out there is need beyond disasters.

In his view, the longtime pastor said, “The project brings Christians together ... and they can build relationships.”

Pastor Joachim said as the host church, Westminster will receive details and photos of meals arriving at the destination.

Stop Hunger Now, which was established in 1998, is an organization dedicated to getting food and life-saving aid to the world’s most-vulnerable people. The international hunger relief agency said nearly 800 million people worldwide face starvation daily; some 21,000 die every day from malnutrition and of that number, 15,000 are children.

Since 2005, Stop Hunger Now has involved more than 750,000 volunteers in the United States and worldwide. The volunteers have packed nearly 250 million meals in 73 countries and 120 million meals in the last two years.

For information on Stop Hunger Now or how to host a packing event, contact Andrew Moser, program manager of SHN Pittburgh, at amoser@stophungernow.org, or call 716-534-0467. Visit www.stophungernow.org.