The Poor You Will Always Have with You” (Mark 14:7)
by Frank Cordaro
This year’s beg begins with transparency: an account of Sister Maggie’s $150,000 estate. All but about $24,000 has been spent! Most of this was contributed to long neglected but imperative projects: dead tree removal, foundation and basement work on Dingman, Corrie and Berrigan houses, new shelves in Dingman basement, a shed for Rachel Corrie, bookshelves and a first-floor bathroom makeover at Manning House, new furnace in Rachel Corrie House, plus a few other smaller projects. Thank you, Sr. Maggie!
I’d say we got a good start on much needed rehabbing and upkeep projects for all four of our old houses. We still have major projects to do, for example, a remodel for the Dingman House kitchen, fire escapes for Dingman and Manning Houses, outside landscaping like new sidewalks and steps, major rehab of unused Manning House garage, smaller projects like windows and doors replacements, perhaps even a plumber on retainer! With eleven bathrooms in four old houses, we are always in need of one.
Most of the money we raise from our Via Pacis begging pays for the regular monthly and yearly bills that come with maintaining and operating four houses with 15 to 25 live-in members, like monthly utilities, internet, bed bug maintenance, and property taxes. Additionally, money raised pays for the cost for maintaining our five day a week, 18 hours of first floor hospitality at Dingman House, where we serve nine meals a week to 60 to 100 people at each meal.
Finally, money donated also pays for the upkeep/taxes/insurance/gas for our one community cargo van which is used for food runs and necessary errands, plus the cost of publishing and mailing the Via Pacis.
All of this comes to about $100,000/year for basic expenses. As we are very fond of pointing out, our operation here is extremely efficient in terms of money for output. We have no paid staff, and instead our live-in volunteers embrace voluntary poverty and the work of providing hospitality in exchange for room and board in our houses. Thanks to this model, the reader will be hard-pressed to find a nonprofit which provides as much for so many on such a low annual income.
We’re proud of the numbers of people we feed, but the Catholic Worker is far more than a feeding center: Our guests can use our bathroom, take a shower, get stuff from our storeroom pantry or groceries. from food runs twice a week, or they can just hang out and watch TV.
We are more than the stuff we give away and the food we serve. We are a safe and hospitable place to be human, something our guests sometimes struggle to find on the streets. Both the victim and perpetrator of the rougher aspects of street life come as guests to our home, and when in our house, they must treat each other with respect and kindness.
Our hospitality appears to be in more demand than ever: on good weather days we can fill both our first floor inside and outdoor picnic tables in the backyard of folks just hanging out, a kind of poor peoples’ country club.
For us who serve, we seek to see Christ in each one, especially the quest most difficult to serve. Besides money, we need help doing this work. We need people to help us serve our guests when we are open. We need help cooking the eleven meals we serve each week – specifically, we desperately need more meal providers for the 6pm meal on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays. We need people to help do food runs and outdoor yard work.
We can’t do what we do without the support that the community including you the reader provide. If you can afford it, please donate money to us; if you have the time, volunteer at our houses; if you have kitchen skills, please help provide a 6pm meal. You’ve kept us going for 47 years, we trust you to carry. us through for the next year and those which follow. Thank you all!
-Frank Cordaro, for the Des Moines Catholic Worker
See: https://viapacis.wordpress.com/2023/11/25/nov-2023-via-pacis/
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