All Are Welcome
"All Are Welcome"
An outlined hand holding a sign that reads, "All Are Welcome," is part of the unfinished and uncolored mural on the wall at Central Presbyterian Church in Mobile. Artist Kathleen Kirk Stoves is waiting for the COVID-19 pandemic to pass to fill it in. The mural is a celebration of community and Kirk hopes the community will one day add the colors that bring it to life.
"Stopping at this unfinished stage feels symbolic of this time," she says. "The mural will be even brighter and have more meaning when this is over.”
At Central’s Tuesday food pantry, volunteers wearing masks and gloves pass the "All Are Welcome" corner of the mural. They carry boxes filled with milk, cheese, fresh vegetables, salad, and frozen turkeys to cars waiting in the drive-thru lines.
Voices say, "Pull up." “How many do you need?" "Do you have an extra box for me?" and "Thank you." This Tuesday, the helpers are members of Rainbow Mobile and Prism United. Others serve before taking their own box home. Some give their boxes away to those who need it more.
Before the coronavirus, Central’s food pantry served 100 families a week. Most came by appointment and selected their food. The shopping pantry converted to pre-boxed curbside pickup to remain open during social distancing. In only three weeks, those needing food tripled. Almost 300 families wait for hours in the parking lot and down the right lane of Dauphin Street. Pantry Director Connie Guggenbiller expects that number to keep growing, and is grateful for donations that help keep up with the need. But the elderly and families without transportation worry her the most.
"We are trying to be the arms, legs, and love of God to as many people as possible," she says. “I wish we could reach everyone who needs us.”
Behind the wall of the mural is the smaller church sanctuary converted into the art studio of Ardith Goodwin (the active congregation meets in the main sanctuary). She explains her painted portraits with fractured lines: “We are all imperfect, but we are beautiful and valuable with those imperfections. The lines are a reminder that we are all relevant, even in our brokenness.”
Goodwin’s assistant, Christopher Parnell Hill, sits at his sewing machine in the studio making masks for healthcare employees and church staff working the pantry line. He says this is a time of uncertainty, difficulty, and shadows in his life, but he turns to sewing to get him through.
“Making masks may only be a small way to help, but I have to do something.”
Welcome. Relevant. Needed. Loved. It is hard to feel this way when we are scared of tomorrow and forced apart from each other. But the virus is bringing out new ways of sharing kindness.
Norma Jean Burns says God called her to back to her bead desk, and jewelry ideas started flowing in new ways. Instead of selling the new pieces, she gives them away in exchange for donations to charities and good deeds.
Emily Pharez, PE Coach at J.L. Newton school in Fairhope, hops in a bunny suit outside of assisted living homes on Easter weekend. Singing, dancing, and shaking her bunny tail, she makes lonely quarantined residents smile. Human connection is missed while visits are restricted to friends and family members sitting outside windows and talking by telephone. No hugs. No holding hands.
As Pharez blows bubbles and kisses, residents touch their fingertips to the glass and smile. Some blow kisses back.
Pharez tells each one, “I see you.”
“So many people feel forgotten, invisible, or unappreciated, especially now,” she says. “I remind you that you are important and the world needs you.”
Danielle Law spent parts of her childhood living in shelters and it took years to feel important. Leaving an abusive relationship made her the single mother of three young children. Making only $6,000 a year, she realized her life had to change. She added two more jobs, budgeted every penny, and worked her way up to become a manager at Arby's.
In 2017, Law picked up a mother carrying a newborn and walking miles to Walmart. She bought formula and items the mother needed then drove them to the shelter where they were staying.
That was the day Laws realized other people needed her.
"I don't know the woman’s name and never saw her again, but she changed my life," Laws said. "God called me to help other single parents who are going through the same hardships I have been through.”
Laws started The Village Foundation to help single parents in Mobile and Prichard. Approved as a non-profit last week, the first action of The Village Foundation was delivering school supplies to 16 students who didn’t have the pencils, pens, and notebooks they needed to learn from home. Danielle’s Arby's restaurant donated free meal coupons for each child.
Law is trying to help feed these struggling families and connect them to the services they need.
“Single mothers have been some of my biggest first supporters,” she said. “So many of us want to find a way to give back and not just take. We want to help each other.”
These are times of isolation, hunger, loneliness, and uncertainty, but this is also the time to help each other.
We need the hope of this Easter Sunday with the reminder of unconditional love where all of us are welcome.
