Tomorrow’s Super Bowl will climax another exciting season of football. But for Crosslines Churches of the Joplin Area that excitement will continue to the end of the month.
Crosslines, as it has for the last 15 years, has been participating in the Souper Bowl of Caring, an effort to collect food and funds for the needy in connection with the National Football League’s biggest game of the year.
“Although we do this in connection with the Super Bowl, it takes some time for the churches to get everything collected and brought in,” said Kathy Lewis, executive director of Crosslines. “We collect until the end of February but our churches cut it off the Sunday after Super Bowl. However, they continue the goods to Crosslines until the end of the month.”
Crosslines is a mission of concerned volunteers working together across denominational lines to meet human needs.
People who benefit from this largest food drive of the year for Crosslines are those referred from the Missouri Department of Family Services (including those signed up for food stamps), Economic Security Corporation, Red Cross, Community Hospice and any of the 63 supporting churches.
“A lot of our churches use this as their biggest food drive of the year,” Lewis said. “Whether a can of soup or nonperishable, we count each thing as one item and last year we collected 9,606 items, which was our most ever. We put all the food in our pantry and give it out through referral.”
Lewis said that number of families who avail themselves of the food pantry has tripled since 2003.
Each January Crosslines sends out information on the Souper Bowl to participating churches, which then detail it in their bulletins or newsletters. The information is also sent out at the end of December via the Crosslines newsletter.
“This year I plan to be brave and go out to the sports bars and see if they would like to partner with us by asking their patrons if they would like to bring in a can of soup when they come to watch the Super Bowl,” Lewis said.
Crosslines, at 131 S. High St., behind the outfield fence in Joe Becker Stadium, started in 1982 with the support of 10 churches.
“It used to be just our churches and then we got a lot of community partners involved, including a lot of businesses,” Lewis said.
In addition to help from churches, there are 250 volunteers and three part-time paid office staff members who assist people from the Joplin, Webb City and Carl Junction areas.
A senior high youth group from Spring Valley Presbyterian Church in Columbia, S.C., started the Souper Bowl of Caring in 1990. Twenty two churches raised $5,700 in that initial effort.
Last year the drive set a new national record of $10.3 million in cash and food.
More information is available on the Web site www.souperbowl.org or, locally, you may call Crosslines at 782-8384. Tax-deductible checks may also be sent to Crosslines at P.O. Box 1242, Joplin, MO 64802. The center is open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday to receive donations.
Address correspondence to Rich Brown, c/o The Joplin Globe, P.O. Box 7, Joplin, MO 64802, or rbrown@joplinglobe.com.
