"It's an opportunity to cooperate with another community group," Wesleyan student and Food Not Bombs member Abe Bobman said about the group's decision to accept the help of Middletown's First Church. "And it's an opportunity that's too good to miss."
On Sunday, Food Not Bombs shared it's Sunday meal for the first time in weeks without the threat of action from Middletown's Health Department, and Middletown Police.
"It's so much easier not having to worry," Bobman admitted. Last week Bobman was served with a summons to appear in court to answer to a misdemeanor charge of serving food to the public without a license.
Last week, First Church minister John Hall offered the group the ability to prepare the meal in the First Church kitchen, which is fully licensed.
"I think Food Not Bombs has a valid point about who is served by the food economy," Hall said Sunday after helping prepare and serve the food. "We feel this an act of prophetic witness. It's a comment about the system, and who is served better, those in wealth, or those in poverty. By helping we want to point it out and stand with those who are shortchanged by the system."
Bobman called the cooperation a temporary solution, motivated primarily by the prevailing atmosphere at the university which suffered through an unthinkable tragedy this week when a student was murdered in the Red and Black cafe.For First Church parishoner Lynn Shaw it was an opportunity to make a point too.
"There are too many people going without food," Shaw said. "And here we are in the wealthiest state, in the wealthiest country in the world."
Ann Marie Cannata, director of the Buttonwood Tree, who also helped organize the cooperative effort said that the Health Department would be satisfied as long as all volunteers signed in, and Food Not Bombs provide a list of their sources for the food distributed at each meal.
Good job to all of you! That was a brilliant idea.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great solution. Thanks to all parties involved for not creating any more discord this week. God bless First Church and FNB.
ReplyDeleteGreat!!!
ReplyDeletemadamnirvana
Shows that god is not all bad. This is an excellent solution.
ReplyDeleteI think as long as Food Not Bombs' message doesn't get watered down in the process, this has the potential to be a great collaboration.
ReplyDeleteIt's unfortunate that a group which was founded on not being religiously affiliated has had no choice but to go in this direction but I must commend First Church for their generosity and am glad that FNB has chosen to think about what is best for the community in making this decision. I hope this collaboration doesn't begin to overshadow the group's message that non-religiously affiliated people also care enough about their neighbors to help.
ReplyDeleteit's hard to seperate this attitude from the position of privelege that i have (not being the person who has to fear arrest/harassment from authorities, not living in the middletown community, not knowing the full details of the situation), but i don't know if i think this is as great of a solution as folks are making it seem.
ReplyDeletei'm happy to see that even christian institutions (which often purport values that are contrary to the values the fnb movement represents) are supportive of this work. however, it was a little disheartening to see the image of a table, not with a crude, hand-and-heart made fnb banner, but a slick plastic first church banner.
this isn't really meant to be hostile or even entirely critical, just making some analysis. i also fear that this move can water down the radical, autonomous and direct action nature of fnb. but thenagain, decentralization and autonomy also mean acting directly according to your needs and desires regardless of the demands of ideological structures.
interesting stuff though, hope all these issues get raised at the statewide fnb convergence. anyone know much about this yet?