The Food Backpack Ministry: Living out Stewardship and Serving Our Children in Need

As Christians, we are called to serve others and one way to do that is to live out the Corporal Works of Mercy. There are many different ways to do this, but one valuable way to serve those directly in our community is to support the Food Backpack Ministry. This ministry prepares bags of food to be sent home with children in need each weekend. This ministry at our parish has been directly supporting children at Stillwater Middle School for the past 16 years.

The parish supports this ministry through monetary donations to purchase the food, and then volunteers who put the bags together and deliver them to the school.

“It is an important ministry!” says Ashley Klepper, coordinator for the ministry. “It is hard to think about kids not having enough food on the weekends when they aren’t in school. Many of us are fortunate enough to not have to worry about this. By supporting this ministry, we can make an impact and directly help those in our community,”

Every few months, Ashley places an order for the food items. The volunteers for the ministry gather for a few hours and pack the bags with seven or eight different items. Volunteers sign up for one month when they collect the number of bags needed that week and deliver them to the school each Friday.

“The school counselor lets me know each week how many bags they need,” Ashley says. “It is usually somewhere around 75 bags. The volunteers pick up the bags from the church and bring them to the school where there are given out as needed.”

While St. Francis Xavier cares for the needs of Stillwater Middle School, other churches and organizations in the area make sure that this ministry is filled for each school in the area.

“Christ teaches us to serve the poor and love our neighbors,” Ashley says. “This is a way to actively do that. Our volunteers are so glad to be able to sacrifice a few hours to support these kids. This is important work and they are just so happy to do it!”