Food for Hope

John van Hengel had everything a man could want. He grew up in Wisconsin during the Great Depression of the 1930s, but his family never lacked food. He attended college and grad school, married a model, had two children, and thrived as a salesman for a sportswear company.

Then, it all fell apart. Van Hengel lost his job, got divorced, lost custody of his children, and endured a spinal injury while breaking up a fight. On his doctor’s advice, he moved to Arizona because the warmer weather might aid in his recovery.

That’s how van Hengel, now destitute, wound up in Phoenix in 1967 at a St. Vincent de Paul-run soup kitchen at St. Mary’s Catholic Church.

In the Christopher Award-winning children’s book Food for Hope, author Jeff Gottesfeld writes, “John liked people. He talked with everyone in the dining room—disabled veterans, the homeless, and kids whose parents had to choose between rent and food. Their stories opened his heart. He found work at the kitchen, shelter in a cheap room above a garage, and faith in prayer with Father Ronald at St. Mary’s Church.”

One day, van Hengel met a woman who told him she had plenty of food for her 10 kids, and she didn’t pay for any of it. He was skeptical, but she led him to the dumpster behind a supermarket, which was full of discarded food that was completely edible. The woman said, “I just wish I could put this stuff in a bank.”

Van Hengel loved the idea, so he went back to St. Mary’s and told Father Ronald, a Franciscan priest, that they should start a bank to store food. Father Ronald agreed and told van Hengel, “Do it.”

Van Hengel protested that he already worked at the soup kitchen and didn’t have time. Father Ronald responded, “You heard the call, John. Decide if you want to listen.”

Van Hengel did listen. During a Christopher Closeup interview, Jeff Gottesfeld explained, “St. Mary’s Church gave him an abandoned bakery on Skid Row in Phoenix, and he started there… They [collected] 125,000 pounds of food their first year… This past year, the St. Mary’s Food Bank did 125 million [pounds], and… they’re helping people get job training.”

Motivated by his Catholic faith, van Hengel kept growing the food bank idea and eventually turned it into the nonprofit America’s Second Harvest, which helped create food banks around the country. He also chose to live in relative poverty because he looked back on his life and realized that money had not made him happy.

The joy that came from feeding people was profound, however, and it all started because van Hengel—with a little encouragement from a wise priest—answered God’s call.

 

A Vocational Call

“Oh no, I’ve got other fish to fry.” That was how Sister Caroline Tweedy, RSM, first responded to the question of whether she would consider becoming a nun. But as you can tell from the “Sister” in front of her name, those other fish got fried.

Sister Caroline grew up in a Catholic home and attended a high school run by the Sisters of Mercy, who impressed her with the joy with which they served. Tweedy excelled in athletics, which resulted in her getting a college scholarship.

After graduating, she accepted a job teaching physical education at her old high school because it involved training “the next generation to be good sports and to understand what their faith is and how to share their faith with one another.”

This is the period when someone asked Tweedy if she would consider joining the Sisters of Mercy. Though she said no initially, time passed, and the idea became more appealing because of their mission, their work, and the idea of living in community.

After joining the order, Sister Caroline went on to hold various jobs at Mercy Home for Children, which cares for developmentally disabled children and adults. It was a life-changing experience.

During a Christopher Closeup interview, she observed, “You see the face of God in those that are most fragile, those who don’t have a voice. You become their voice. You take a stand for them… We’re all equal, and we all have something to contribute.”

That experience proved to be the perfect foundation for Sister Caroline’s current work at St. John’s Bread and Life in Brooklyn, New York. Not only do they provide hot meals to the hungry, they have a state-of-the-art digital food pantry, which gives people the ability to shop for what they want instead of simply being handed a bag of groceries. Out of St. John’s Bread and Life’s 35 staff members, 10 are former clients who were able to get back on their feet with the assistance of the program, which also includes counseling on government benefits that can help them through a hard time. And food for the soul is always available to the guests through the compassionate interactions of the staff. Sister Caroline concluded, “I think the greatest gift is to know that you’ve helped someone.”

Once again, countless individuals have been helped because one woman answered God’s call to a holy and noble vocation.

 

Doctor on Call

Christopher Award-winning author Dr. Wes Ely (Every Deep-Drawn Breath) has heard God’s call numerous times throughout his life. The first was as a child when he took to heart the Christopher motto, “It’s better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.” That idea resonated with him because his father abandoned their family, leaving the young Ely feeling “defective.” His mother countered this feeling with a more affirming message: “Wes, Jesus loves you. May you know this, and love and serve Him all the days of your life.”

Another impactful experience for Dr. Ely was his work as a farmhand during his high school years. He got to know migrant workers who couldn’t afford healthcare for the simplest problems, so he felt called to study medicine.

Despite his good intentions, Dr. Ely admitted to The Christophers that he often lost sight of his patients’ humanity during the early part of his career. But God woke him up one day when he was working as a phlebotomist in a nursing home. One of Ely’s patients was an unresponsive elderly woman with dementia, who never spoke or indicated she was even aware of her surroundings.

During Ely’s regular visits, he would simply put a tourniquet on her arm and draw blood without saying a word or acknowledging her in any way. One day, he noticed that the sun was shining through this woman’s window, directly into her eyes, so he closed the curtain. He was shocked when she then turned to him and said, “Doctor, everything that is light is Jesus Christ.”

That incident had a profound impact on the Catholic doctor’s career, leading him to practice medicine in a way that looks at patients not just as a collection of symptoms, but as human beings whose emotional and spiritual needs are also a vital aspect of healing. This approach was made possible because Dr. Ely recognized God’s voice in his life.

How is God calling you? Is He pointing you toward a completely new direction in life—or simply asking you to make small changes: taking more time for prayer, performing small acts of kindness, expressing gratitude more regularly, etc.? Interestingly, when God calls us out of ourselves, we often discover the deepest yearnings of our hearts, minds, and souls. Ultimately, God always makes it worth our while to answer His call.