For many years, my family and I have known about the Soup Kitchen of Muncie, and found small ways to be supportive of its mission. Like many of you, we have responded to financial appeals and requests for specific donations of food staples such as bags of sugar and flour. At times, we have been involved with other community organizations and events where dinners or receptions have been held and extra food has been bought or left over; we have arranged for its safe delivery to the Soup Kitchen. If we have more produce from our garden than we can use, we have taken it to the Soup Kitchen to be use in the preparation of hot meals. Our scout troop has organized an annual food drive that benefits the Soup Kitchen, and like many other community organizations, has provided sack lunches.
For short periods of time when our work and school schedules made it possible, we have volunteered to help in the kitchen with food preparation and serving, but we were never able to make long-term, early-morning commitments to volunteer weekly. Through our periodic, piecemeal involvement we realized that the need is great, and our contributions have seemed small and incomplete.
About a year ago, I was asked to join the board of the Soup Kitchen of Muncie. I was pleased to accept this invitation, and now serve as treasurer. For me, this has been another small way that I can participate in the mission of this amazing organization. Most importantly, my work on the board has given me the chance to meet, get to know, and work with many other people who contribute in seemingly small, but incredibly important ways to our mission.
I now realize that it is precisely because of the contributions of so many people and families that we are able to feed the hungry in our community. What may seem to each of us like small, periodic contributions of time, food, and money are, in fact, one of the strengths of our organization. I am proud to continue to serve this organization in various small ways, thank those of you who do the same, and invite others to consider how you can contribute to our mission.
Executive Directors note: Beth Bremigan joined our board in January 2020.