Saint Camillus Food Pantry
Our Stories
"Why I volunteer!"
Dave Cape
"Time, Treasure, and Talent"
Dave Cape is one of our fantastic Friday afternoon pantry volunteers. When he and his wife Eileen joined the parish back in 2012, Dave was anticipating retirement and wanted to offer his services, so he asked where he could be of help. The person he spoke to in the parish office said she'd pass his name on to the food pantry coordinators, and we're so glad she did! Dave has been a tremendous asset to the food pantry ministry. He has been working in the bagging and distribution area of the pantry since he started and has even expanded his efforts into helping with food deliveries on Thursdays. When asked why he enjoys volunteering, Dave says, "Aside from knowing that we are helping people who really need it and the satisfaction this brings, I thoroughly enjoy working side by side with the other volunteers in the group." This is a common sentiment among food pantry volunteers, as the fellowship one finds working in the pantry makes the time spent volunteering even more rewarding. In addition to volunteering with the food pantry, Dave also volunteers as an usher at the Music Center at Strathmore. In his free time he enjoys singing with the Congressional Chorus; in fact, Dave is one of the group's founding members!
Ellen Smoller
"A Helping Hand"
Ellen has been an invaluable asset to the St. Camillus Food Pantry. Seven years ago, when she retired from her job as a high school math teacher in Wisconsin and moved to Silver Spring, she was seeking a vibrant parish and a place where she could volunteer to help others. She says, “I am not a committee person and much prefer doing than talking." Well, Ellen found the right place! She explains, the “St. Camillus Food Pantry is definitely a 'doing' place where we make a difference in the lives of others” on a weekly basis. Ellen initially worked as a volunteer with our data entry team to help us with the backlog of paper-based client registration records. She helped us transition from paper-based data entry to a fully computer based registration system. Ellen is at the Pantry every Saturday morning, helping to support the volunteers doing registration for new and returning clients, assisting those who are less experienced, and being there as a “go to” person when registration questions arise. She makes sure that new client information from Friday's sessions has been entered correctly in the database and also helps enter new client information for Saturday. Ellen is critical to the success of our database efforts by helping us assure the quality of the data that we enter that directly.
Joyce Romanus
"Dedicated Commitment"
Joyce Romanus, affectionately known as “Bernice” (smile), has been volunteering with the Pantry since 2009. For the past several months she has been a critical support as Bernie’s “backup”. She first joined the Pantry after talking with Joan Conway at the St. Camillus Ministry Fair. Joyce is a self-employed accountant and also serves as the volunteer coordinator for Hospitality and Fair Trade. Joyce began volunteering as a bagger, supporting the Food Pantry. Several years ago, she transitioned into helping Bernie as his backup supporting “anything that needs to be done,” including facilitating the distribution of turkeys for the Thanksgiving holiday. Joyce has also successfully recruited her neighbor to help volunteer and also brings her daughters to support the work of the Pantry.
Brian Crowe
"Faithful Support"
Brian Crowe is one of our shining stars from St. Elizabeth's Parish supporting the Food Pantry. As a faithful servant, each month Brian staples our menu to paper grocery bags and puts them out for the parishioners at St. Elizabeth's to fill. He delivers the over 150 bags filled with needed food, carrying them down the stairs into the Pantry. During previous winters, Brian conducted emergency coat, hat, and glove collections for our families in cold January, and delivered many cases of bath soap. We are so grateful to have Brian's unwavering and steadfast support for the Pantry!
Patty Kolar
"Helping Us Help Others"
Patty Kolar is one of our incredibly dedicated volunteers. She organizes the team that purchases groceries from the Capital Area Food Bank (CAFB). She became a shopper at the CAFB in the fall of 2008. She had taken the Just Faith course andwanted to become more involved in a service ministry. She was recruited by Joan Conway, as she knew that Patty could help out during the week and recruited her to become part of the team that interfaced with the CAFB. She later asked Patty to take on scheduling the Thursday volunteers. We now have four teams of shoppers that go to the CAFB each week, pick up the St. Camillus order and shop for any of the fresh produce that might be available. Another team of volunteers meets the shoppers at the pantry and unloads the truck and shelves the delivery. They also shelve the donations we get from other parishes and organizations. Patty states, "our Thursday volunteers are a wonderful group and I am so grateful to them for their flexibility and patience since the 'schedule'is frequently amended." According to Patty, shopping at the CAFB can be a bit of a treasure hunt. Some weeks there are boxes of beautiful apples and big bags of carrots and onions and that is so rewarding. When she has one of those trips, the phrase from the Magnificat comes to my mind, “He has filled the hungry with good things,” Patty enjoys feeling that we are bringing good things to people who have a lot of struggles in life. She also enjoys driving Fr. Mike’s truck.
Jude Cassidy
"Encouraging Food for Thought"
Jude Cassidy is one of our amazing volunteers for the Pantry. She joined St. Camillus in fall 2013 and "fell in love" with the church and immediately began exploring the website to find out about opportunities to help. After a quick perusal of the web, she contacted Joan Conway, who put her in contact with our Volunteer Coordinator, Jean Guevara, and immediately was scheduled to work as a bagger. As a professor at the University of Maryland with a background in developmental psychology, she was so impressed with how smoothly and efficiently the Pantry functioned that she wanted to get even more involved. After a couple of months working as a bagger, she noticed the children’s positive responses to the books they received at the pantry after a Christmas book drive. She was thrilled to see the faces of the children light up when they were given a book for their very own. When they ran out of books the following January, Jude sought to find other sources for the books. She would buy books at Value Village and yard sales to try to keep a supply on hand at the Pantry, but soon realized that the demand was steadily increasing and spoke about the need to Father Mike. Coincidentally, Father Mike had arranged for book drop off locations on the St. Camillus campus and in exchange, he coordinated the delivery of a large order of children's book to be delivered and stored in the basement of the church. Brian Carreira organized a youth group to help sort and shelve 1000s of books. To help coordinate the distribution efforts, Jude developed a program, now called "Food for Thought," where volunteer "librarians" are present at each Pantry session at St. Camillus to distribute children’s books to many smiling little faces on Fridays and Saturdays. (Although volunteers who give out the books are called “librarians”, the books are for the children to keep for themselves). Volunteers also prepare boxes of books for distribution at the Langley Park Pantry, which are picked up by Vincent Lu. Jude noted how Joyce Romanus and Bernie Relf set up the book table each week for the St. Camillus Pantry, and how countless “strong, young men” would transport the 50 lb boxes of books from the church basement to the Pantry as needed. Thanks to the combined efforts of many, last year over 3000 books were distributed!
Ralph and Chris Quinones
"Double Duty and Dedicated Support"
Ralph and Chris have been volunteering in the food pantry ministry for seven years now. Ralph says, "We became involved when we first saw the request in the church bulletin. We came to help on a Saturday morning, and when they found out we were retired they said they could really us on Thursdays." On Thursdays, Patty Kolar has groups of volunteers coming to one of the two pantries to meet the weekly, or sometimes biweekly, food delivery from the Capital Area Food Bank. A rotating team of volunteers does the shopping, vehicle loading, and driving, then the other group is on hand at the pantry waiting for the vehicle to arrive. The food is unloaded, taken down to the pantry, and put on the shelves.
Ralph and Chris have been a part of this effort for several years when Jean Guevara, who schedules our Friday and Saturday volunteers, found out they were available on Fridays and happy to help then as well. As an added bonus, Ralph speaks Spanish, so while Chris is working in bagging and distribution, Ralph is around the corner registering our clients to receive food.
When asked why they volunteer, Ralph insists, "We enjoy it, because it gives us an opportunity to give back to the community that gave us so much. An extra benefit is that we get to meet so many great people who also volunteer, so we've made some new friends. Besides the many hours they log at the pantry, they also volunteer at their daughter's school to help distribute food.
Delia Naranjo
"Dedicated Service to our Community"
Longtime volunteer, Delia Naranjo, was introduced to the food pantry by her daughter Carla. She knew the pantry needed bilingual volunteers and knew that her mother had volunteered in the past with the community where she'd lived in West Virginia, so she thought it could be a good fit for Delia. Seven years later, Delia is still volunteering at the pantry and is an integral part of our efforts in the registration room. A fellow volunteer sums it up best when she says, "Delia is fantastic with our clients - patient, attentive, warm, and supportive. She works the triage end of the registration table, and she is organized, thorough, and absolutely invaluable."
When asked why she enjoys volunteering, Delia says, "It's because I like to help people. I feel that there is always something I can do to help others. I try to put myself in their shoes and think how grateful I would be if someone tried to help me."
Delia was born in Ecuador, where she worked as a surgical nurse. Later she worked as an office manager and used her nursing profession skills as an advocate to improve the health and social issues of the community where she lived. Thank you, Delia, for sharing your talents and love for people with the food pantry ministry!
Judy Clavelli
Longtime Pantry Volunteer
Judy Clavelli is one of our longtime shining stars at the Pantry. Judy works in the bagging area of the St. Camillus food pantry. She is often there on Friday afternoons, hours before the pantry opens, working the recently-added "pre-shift." Judy is one of a few folks who come for the pre-shift and work all the way through the pantry's operational hours until it closes at 5:00pm.
She became involved with us via the Langley Park pantry, as Joan Conway and folks from the community were just starting it up several years ago. Judy belongs to St. Elizabeth's in Rockville; they were involved with the Langley Park pantry from the beginning, and that is how Judy learned about the opportunity to volunteer with us. She helped out at the Langley Park location for a period of time, but she saw that they were getting many more volunteers than they needed at the time, and the St. Camillus pantry needed help too, so she started volunteering there instead. She said it perfectly when she explained, "We are all helping the same communities, after all."
Judy has witnessed the many growing pains the pantry has gone through, but says now it runs so smoothly, thanks to many other wonderful volunteers, that it is a joy to work there.
Volunteering is not new to Judy; she has been volunteering all of her life at her church and her children's schools. She knew that when she retired in 2006, she would have time to be more involved in community outreach programs and other areas. Judy has a busy calendar and serves a variety of people in all walks of life. She states, "To me, volunteer work is a pleasure, and it is rewarding to know that you might be making some small difference in someone's life. The volunteers are all terrific, and I have met so many wonderful people. It is inspiring and rewarding to meet the people that come for assistance. They are always so pleasant and cheerful. It is such a pleasure to be able to provide them some help."