As Thanksgiving draws closer, students and residents are preparing to spend time with their families and friends to give thanks for what they have. For the people at Cristo Rey Community Center, it’s no different. They’re getting ready to hold a Thanksgiving feast event director Michael Hood said keeps getting bigger and bigger each year.
Anyone who is in need of a meal or who would otherwise be alone on Thanksgiving can go to the Cristo Rey Community Center at 1717 N. High S in Lansing from 1 to 3 p.m. to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal with all the fixings — turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce and, of course, pie. Everything is homemade.
“It’s the kind of meal your grandma would look at and go, ‘really?’” Hood said.
Cristo Rey Community Center has been serving meals to the Lansing community for 24 years. Hood took over as the event director about 15 years ago, and he said what started out as a soup line, cafeteria style serving has through the years blossomed into something almost like a sit-down restaurant. Guests come in, order from a menu and have their food brought out to them by waiters and waitresses dawned in black pants and white shirts.
“That way the elderly folks who are disabled don’t have to stand in line to get food,” Hood said. “It gives people a chance to sit down and relax and talk with their families.”
Hood said they’ve also come to realize through the years there are people who simply can’t make it to the meal. Either their car's broken, they’re elderly or they simply don’t have enough money to afford a bus ticket. That was a segment of the population Hood and the rest of the community center really wanted to be able to help and see them get fed. So they started deliveries, delivering hot meals right to peoples’ doorsteps.
“We now couple with a number of social service agencies around the Tri-County area and we now deliver meals to about 250 to 350 people,” Hood said. “The delivery meal has grown so popular it has actually has eclipsed the dinner meal. We serve more people out on the road than we do inside.”
The prepping, cooking and distribution could not be done without the help of volunteers. Hood said they have roughly 200 volunteers helping to put the event on. As for the people they’re serving, they never know what the number is going to be exactly. However, Hood said it has been going up every year. He said it could be anywhere from 600 to 1,000.
“We have operated by one bearing on our compass and that is this — if somebody wants a meal, then they’re going to get it,” Hood said. “We have been fortunate. We have never had to turn a single person away, and as long as I’m in charge of this we’re never going to. Everyone that wants food, gets food.”
For people who need a meal or want to help out by volunteering or donating they can contact Michael Hood at oldvoyageur@gmail.com or at 517-420-4341 or visit the website.
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