St. Alphonsus students make sandwiches for homeless throughout the school year

Pictured above: It was St. Alphonsus sixth graders’ turn to make sandwiches for the hungry and homeless on Jan. 11. Additional photos may be viewed on the Clarion Herald’s Facebook page. (Photo by Beth Donze)

By BETH DONZE
Clarion Herald

After donning a construction-paper “Mercy Cross” – the necklace they always wear during off-campus outings – the St. Alphonsus sixth graders got busy answering Christ’s call to be his earthly hands and feet.

Every Thursday throughout the school year for the past two years, rotating groups of St. Alphonsus fifth, sixth and seventh graders walk to the former Sisters of Mercy convent, across the street from their school, to make 40 sandwiches for distribution to the hungry.

The sandwiches – generous whole-wheat ones with thick salami, two slices of cheese, lettuce and a mayo-mustard blend the students mix themselves – are offered to the city’s homeless, Lower Garden District neighbors in need and the guests of nearby Hope House, a ministry for the poor and needy that has an adult learning center, food pantry, rent and utilities help and a prison ministry. A resident of New Orleans’ Catholic Workers House oversees the distributions.

“I feel like I am giving back to the people and helping them. I wonder if they like it and how it will taste to them,” said sixth grader Najiah Hammond.

“It makes me feel good that they don’t have to struggle to find something to eat or find money to buy food,” added sixth grader De’Leah Lewis.

Depending on the flow of donations, the sandwiches sometimes come with a hard-boiled egg or fruit. The students pray over the sandwiches after packing them in plastic baggies.

The students’ weekly effort is part of a school wide focus on homelessness at St. Alphonsus Parish and School this year.

During Advent, school families collected winter hats, gloves and socks for distribution by the Catholic Workers House. They will collect toiletries as part of their Lenten charitable outreach.

St. Alphonsus parishioners assist through their donations of blankets, coats and other cold-weather gear, and the parish’s young-adult group also meets monthly to make sandwiches for the feeding effort.

Part of Mercy charism

The food-based outreach actually carries on the service work of the Sisters of Mercy. Although primarily known for their ministries in education and health care, Mercy foundress Mother Catherine McAuley dedicated her inheritance to going door-to-door to feed, clothe and minister to the poor and sick of Dublin, Ireland.

When the Sisters of Mercy arrived in New Orleans in 1869 –  to teach at St. Alphonsus School, at the request of the Redemptorist priests – they continued to visit the sick and offer sandwiches to anyone who was hungry from the door of their original convent on St. Andrew Street, built in 1870 and demolished in Hurricane Betsy in 1965.

“When I was a child going to St. Alphonsus School in the 1950s, the sisters would make sandwiches at night and ask us (students) to help make them after school,” recalled Sister of Mercy Monica Ellerbusch, school principal. “People would ring the convent doorbell, and those sisters would give them a sandwich!”

The curbside food ministry continued through the late 1990s, when the opening of the Mercy Endeavors senior center, located in the sisters’ rebuilt convent, made it unfeasible.

Still, the Mercy convent remained a beacon for the hungry after Katrina, with Second Harvest setting up a site there to feed returning residents and workers. During the pandemic, St. Alphonsus’ cafeteria provided hot, take-home meals to school families and never turned away any homeless individual who was seeking a meal.

“It’s something that the Sisters of Mercy have done from their very beginning,” Sister Monica said. “Serving food just seems to be a big part of who we are as Sisters of Mercy!”

[email protected]