Massachusetts Soup Kitchen/Food Pantry >> Allston Food Assistance >> Holy Resurrection Orthodox Church - Open Door Ministry and St. Bridget's Food Pantry

  • Name: Holy Resurrection Orthodox Church - Open Door Ministry and St. Bridget's Food Pantry
  • Address: 62 Harvard Ave
  • City: Allston, MA 02134
  • Phone: 617.787.7625
  • Website: http://hrocboston.org/
  • Contact Email:
  • Counties Served:
  • Basic Programs:
  • Description: Our Open Door Ministry has been serving a free home cooked meal at our church every Monday night since 1988. We are currently serving 50-60 guests each week - 3,000 meals a year. At the beginning of each meal all guests are asked to rise for the "Our Father". The overall emphasis is to provide a safe peaceful environment for guests to eat and socialize. Most guests are low income, a few are literally homeless. Some have serious mental health issues and/or problems with drugs and alcohol. The majority are white males, although lately there has been an increase in the number of women in attendance (approx 10%). Children rarely attend. Also there has been an increase in Hispanic immigrants, some non-English speaking (approx 10%). Will Raiman runs and supervises the program. A rotating staff of 6 cooks from the parish prepare the meals. The meal-serving staff consists of student volunteers from Holy Cross and Boston University as well as friends from St. Mary's Orthodox Church in Cambridge, St. Mark's Coptic Church in Natick and others. Open Door has begun giving out small bags of non-perishable groceries at the end of each meal - approximately 25 bags/week, 1 bag/person from the St. Bridget's Food Pantry. Food is supplied by donations. Securing donations and maintaining consistent donations has been challenging, but by God's grace Food Drives have been run fairly consistently. Grocery bags are also occasionally given out if anyone comes to the church requesting groceries at other times.

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