Cathedral Community Cares (CCC

The Cathedral has always worked against suffering and inequality. Cathedral Community Cares grew out of early efforts to combat AIDS and was formally established by the Congregation of St. Saviour in the early 1990s. CCC continues that mission through preventive poverty services, education, and advocacy, specifically targeting health and hunger.

We Can Provide

CCC staff and volunteers Thomas Perry, Marva Kennedy, and Kalie Kamara at work at the Clothing Closet. Not pictured: Robert Finn. DEAN MORTON Service is at the very heart of scripture. Service is not just something we do. Service is what we are. It isn’t a profession, a hobby, a part-time activity. Service is being.

BISHOP DIETSCHE Outreach brings benefits to those in need, to those who help, and to the community as a whole.

MARSHA RA It is inevitable that when people regularly share the Eucharist they will want to respond to pain in the world. In 1981, several members of the worshipping community asked permission to start a homeless shelter on the grounds. The Episcopal Church Women group opened a soup kitchen in the Undercroft. Those programs live on today in Cathedral Community Cares.

KALIE KAMARA CCC is the social services program part of the Cathedral. We provide services to alleviate poverty. I’m the outreach coordinator here. I work every day all day to help people who really need help.

THOMAS PERRY There are three of us. Whoever gets here first opens up. Usually there are two or three people waiting either outside or in the Cathedral. They are looking for help with food stamps, housing, job referrals. They need a place to sleep or sometimes, especially if the weather is colder, a jacket.

MURRY STEGELMANN I have been a Trustee at the Cathedral for eight years. A hundred thousand people a month come through the Cathedral. Our mission is making this a place that those people leave feeling invigorated, energized, and craving more. The Cathedral should only be a home base. It’s not just what we do here, it’s what we do that multiplies and spreads out into the world.

BILL BAKER The Cathedral has always been a moral place that sheds light on the most critical things that get buried in a society, the human lives that have often been ignored. KALIE KAMARA We have a Soup Kitchen on Sundays. We serve breakfast around 10 am and lunch at 12:30 pm. Clients know about us through different soup kitchens, or shelters, or food pantries. It’s almost like a community, like its own world of people who are surviving off the different programs. If you see our soup kitchen, there are women and sometimes there are children, but you will be amazed at how much of it is black men living from shelter to shelter. About 150 to 200 people come. There are times it gets really crowded, sometimes it gets to 250. We try not to turn people away. We have to be creative.

TOM FEDOREK The soup kitchen has huge pots for cooking. It felt like “Jack and the Beanstalk in the Giant’s kitchen.” You know, you hear about the Holy Spirit and it’s kind of an abstract concept. But the camaraderie of the people working in the Soup Kitchen is what I think of when I think about the Holy Spirit. That’s the spirit there.

ISADORA WILKENFELD New Yorkers are hungry. Nearly one-sixth of our neighbors live in poverty, and many struggle to provide themselves and their families with adequate food.

ROBERT FINN The numbers of those seeking food at the Cathedral Soup Kitchen and other foodbanks around the country have been going up since 2008. It would be impossible for us to meet this need without all of the volunteers who help out.

MARSHA RA Sunday, into the pantry to get supplies for today’s lunch: 220 pounds of ground beef; 50 pounds of potato flakes; 30 pounds of cheese; 15 cases of canned fruits and vegetables; 50 pounds of sugar; 15 pounds of flour, honey, raisin, nuts; 10 pounds of butter; and all the necessary utensils, urns, and casserole dishes. I learned to cook a lot of really big things. Egg Foo Young for 200.

THOMAS PERRY We’re serving food in the same building at the same time that church services are happening. The clergy usually stop in during meal times so it really feels like we are just an extension of what is happening upstairs.

“Whoever has two shirts should share with the person who doesn’t have any. Whoever has food should share it too.” LUKE 3:11

KALIE KAMARA When the government cuts down food stamps or certain benefits, we’ll see an influx in a heartbeat. When I first started, we had this clock. It showed the number of hours to the day until the funding was going to be cut. The day the clock ended, literally that hour, we saw a surge of clients.

“I believe that in the faces of the homeless we may catch a glimpse of Christ.” TOM FEDOREK

JESSYE NORMAN I’ve gotten to know some of the people who have taken up residence around the 110th Street side of the Cathedral. I’ve encouraged them to take themselves to the Soup Kitchen where they have the chance to sit down and have something to eat. It is welcoming to everybody. That is what is so important.

FRANCIS EDMONDS We live across town and can see the Cathedral up on the hill. So when we had no food, we came to the Soup Kitchen. Now we come to mass on Sundays and then eat dinner here so we can save our food stamps to feed our children.

KALIE KAMARA We also have a Clothing Closet. About 40 clients come in every Tuesday or Thursday. Most are women trying to get clothing for their families. A good amount of the guys are coming out of prison trying to get back into the workforce. There are also grown men and women living in the streets just coming to get shoes on their feet and clothes to stay warm. You’re allowed to get clothing for your family members if you bring their IDs. Like a mother might have three kids. So she’s going to get clothing for herself and three others. The majority of clothes come from neighborhood people who donate to us. Most of our people are flexible finding things on their own. They’re not putting pressure on us. It’s never been that way. It could feel that way because you want to have the answer to help somebody immediately. I’ll find a way for someone to get to the next step. I do research and maybe look around. I have lists of different shelters, lists of food pantries, lists for jobs, lists for job-skills training, lists of clothing resources, or even just places where my people can take showers. If I don’t know the answer, I’ll find the answer.

Top Homeless Jesus. Timothy P. Schmalz. Bronze. 2017.

Bottom left Who Cooked the Last Supper? Robin Kahn. Neon. 1991. From The Value of Food: Sustaining a Green Planet, 2015-2016.

Bottom right Fresh and healthy ingredients serve as the foundation for everything cooked and served at the Soup Kitchen. THOMAS PERRY We’re not going to turn someone away. If we don’t have what the person is looking for we are a part of a network, so we know the places that serve hot meals every day or can provide a bed. And other organizations know to send people to us for the things that we can provide.

KALIE KAMARA Eventually I start to see people I know. I try to at least have a conversation. I take their hand and see how they’re doing unless it’s someone who’s just not in the right state of mind to get personal. People get into their own feelings if they’re going through a lot. Economic stress leads to psychological stress. This is one of the places they’ll come to vent. It could feel dehumanizing knowing that you have to go from one social services program to another just to survive. We also provide health screenings. We have HIV testing twice a month. This past Sunday we were working with the American Italian Cancer Foundation for breast cancer screenings. I learn a lot from the clients and the volunteers because every life is different. It really is even more than I knew.