Drive-thru Thanksgivings replace sit-down meals for needy and alone in southwest IL
Longtime volunteer Joe Hubbard hasn’t missed Thanksgiving dinner at Cosgrove’s Soup Kitchen in East St. Louis in decades.
But his friends with the Society of St. Vincent de Paul Belleville Council, which operates the soup kitchen and administers other programs to help the poor, asked him not to show up this year.
“I’ll be 78 years old, and they were afraid I’d get COVID,” said Hubbard, who worked 40 years for Catholic Urban Programs in Belleville before retiring as executive director in 2013. “These people (who eat at the soup kitchen) ... I’ve known them for years. They hug you and kiss you. They don’t stay distant.”
Cosgrove’s served a free Thanksgiving dinner on Tuesday, two days before the holiday, as is traditional. Hubbard wasn’t the only one who couldn’t go.
The Society of St. Vincent de Paul usually advertises the dinner, invites the whole community and serves 400 to 700 meals. This year, it was limited to regulars who live at the charity’s homeless shelter or on the street. They were asked to spread out and wear masks when not sitting at tables eating.
“This COVID thing is getting bad,” said Hubbard, who is considered high-risk because of his Parkinson’s disease and diabetes.
Cosgrove’s is one of the few metro-east places hosting sit-down Thanksgiving dinners for the community this year due to the coronavirus pandemic. Most churches and charitable organizations switched to carryouts or curbside pickup.
Some made the decision after consulting county health departments.
“We are encouraging them to do take-out versus in-person dining,” St. Clair County Health Department spokeswoman Brenda Fedak said Tuesday. “... Otherwise, they just need to follow the (Illinois Department of Public Health) guidelines with no more than 10 people, social distance and wear a mask.
“We’re not policing them or kicking them out, but if they call, that is the guidance we’re giving them.”
Donations up, volunteers down
Faith Lutheran Church in O’Fallon is inviting the public to drive through from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Thursday and get hot, boxed meals with turkey, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, dressing, corn, green beans and dessert.
Donations of food and money were up this year, according to organizer Linda Benedick, who founded the church’s annual Thanksgiving dinner seven years ago. But only about 20 volunteers will be working instead of the usual 100 to 150 because of occupancy limits and other state restrictions to slow the spread of the coronavirus.
“It’s a little scary because we don’t know what to expect,” Benedick said. “... We’re going to serve it until it’s gone. We’re going to cook right at 40 turkeys. We’ll just have to see. We’re going to do our best.”
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are providing homemade pies. Local businesses purchased ingredients for other dishes.
Last year, about 225 people gathered for a sit-down Thanksgiving meal at Faith Lutheran.
“You don’t have to be needy to come to the meal, and you don’t have to be needy to come to the drive-thru on Thursday,” Benedick said. “We just want people to be able to have a meal. Two people aren’t going to cook a whole turkey. ... If they’re not going to be with their family and they’re not going to have a traditional turkey meal, they should come and get one.”
Cars line up for dinner fixings
Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church in East St. Louis also canceled its annual sit-down dinner due to COVID-19. But it provided “Thanksgiving-to-go” baskets to about 225 families who pulled up in cars and popped their trunks on Nov. 14.
Each received a turkey, stuffing mix, five pounds of potatoes, corn, green beans, mac and cheese, cranberry sauce, gravy, a pound cake and a gallon of sweet tea, all bought with local donations.
The Rev. Darius Miller thought he was arriving early at 7:40 a.m. for the 9 a.m. giveaway, so he was amazed to see 70 cars already lined up on Kingshighway, and residents kept coming, despite steady rain.
“It was a reminder that people were still in need, and even though we couldn’t meet the need in the way that we have in the past, we were still playing a vital role in the community,” Miller said.
Later in the day, volunteers delivered baskets to shut-ins around town.
Morning Star normally goes all out for its sit-down Thanksgiving dinners, decorating with fall tablecloths and centerpieces, designating a table up front for first responders who have to work on the holiday and even providing musical entertainment.
While planning for this year’s drive-thru, organizers discussed the fact that many people would be alone on Thanksgiving. To help ease their loneliness, children made greeting cards for each basket.
“For some families, part of Thanksgiving is the smell of Thanksgiving cooking in the home,” Miller said. “So while we lost out on sitting at the same table, I do think some families got that benefit, that they were able to do it in the comfort of their own home.”
Diocese settles on gift cards
The Catholic Diocese of Belleville usually sponsors sit-down Thanksgiving dinners at local churches, but early on this year, organizers decided to offer pick-ups and deliveries instead.
Then last week, after Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced “resurgence mitigations” (tougher restrictions) due to rising COVID-19 cases in the region, Bishop Michael McGovern emailed the following message to parishes:
“Due to heightened concerns about the spread of the Coronavirus, this year’s Thanksgiving Dinner will not be held on site. Instead, the people who have registered for the meal are being contacted and a gift card is being provided them in advance so they can shop for a Thanksgiving meal at a local grocery store.
“The gift cards are made possible thanks to the generosity of donors who contributed to the Christmas Collection last December.”
Director of Development Judy Phillips and other staff sprung into action, reaching out to more than 100 individuals and families who had signed up for dinners and buying and mailing Schnucks gift cards that amounted to $15 per person.
The calls weren’t easy.
“I was almost in tears with some of them,” Phillips said. “People would say, ‘Well, I’m all alone. I have no one to be with. I wasn’t going to cook. I can’t cook like I used to.’ We still felt bad, even though we were doing the gift cards.
“But at least ... One lady said, ‘You know, they’ve got a hot food bar at Schnucks, so ... my neighbor will go for me. I’m homebound. I’m paralyzed. I can’t get out. But my neighbor’s going to go, and she’ll buy me the dinner the day before and I can warm it up.’ And that made me feel a little better.”
Last year, the diocese partnered with the Society of St. Vincent de Paul to serve Thanksgiving dinner at St. Henry’s Catholic Church in Belleville. Volunteers served about 220 meals.
Phillips called the atmosphere “festive,” noting not everyone who showed up was needy in the financial sense. She remembers an over-the-road truck driver who particularly appreciated not being alone on the holiday.
Christmas plans up in the air
New Shining Light Church in Venice also canceled its sit-down Thanksgiving dinner this year due to the pandemic. Instead, volunteers gave away about 400 bags of groceries and 150 turkeys to needy families earlier this month.
“COVID-10 has changed everything,” said the church’s founder, Bishop John Henry Williams.
“People really liked coming in and sitting down for a Thanksgiving meal. They would meet friends. It was like a family thing. We’ve been doing it for 24 years, but we just couldn’t do it this year. You can only have 10 people in the building.”
Many churches and charitable organizations are taking a wait-and-see approach on plans for Christmas dinners and other activities.
Hubbard, an advocate for the poor through Catholic Urban Programs and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul for nearly 60 years, has seen community needs increase in the metro-east during the pandemic, with more people out of work or unable to leave their homes due to underlying health conditions.
“We’re still helping people,” he said. “We’re doing as much as we did before. We’re just doing it in a different manner.”
This story was originally published November 26, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
