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Cathedral of the Beloved – 2023
September 26, 2023
On a soggy autumn Berkshire day on September 24, our church served about 60 meals to the guests on the lawn of St. Joseph’s Church in Pittsfield. A lovely outdoor worship service began at 1:00 before the meal. They even asked some of us to help act out the story of the workers in the vineyard. And a well-watered vineyard it was! Martha Floyd and Beth Cilley shopped for food and paper products purchased through the Mission & Action local needs budget. Cindy Brown received donations of fresh produce from The People’s Pantry in Great Barrington (thank you, Anne Hutchinson and Jenny Schwartz), Grace Episcopal Church’s Gideon’s Garden at Taft Farms in Housatonic (thank you, Joel Jorgensen and Jimmy Pickett), and Indian Line Farm in South Egremont (thank you, Elizabeth Keen and Al Thorp). The Saturday kitchen crew, Martha & Rick Floyd, Beth & Gary Cilley, Cindy Brown, Marion Pomeroy and Ronnie Cunningham, prepared several huge pots of homemade chili (both meat and vegetarian), tossed salad, and individually bagged cornbread. Sunday morning began with reheating the chili before worship. At 12:00, the serving crew, Beth & Gary Cilley, Cindy & Jack Brown, Stephanie & Carl Bradford, Holland Brown Eaton & Don Eaton, transported chili, salad, cornbread, clementines, cookies, bottled water, and coffee to Pittsfield, where we served buffet style on the lawn while “singin’ in the rain”! It wasn’t exactly like feeding the 5,000, but it almost felt like it, with overflowing baskets left over. And all the leftovers were gratefully spirited away by the Cathedral of the Beloved staff to be used at the homeless shelter and other Pittsfield organizations that gather hungry people in for an extravagant welcome.