When we founded the Share Food Share Love food pantry, we referred to the people we served as our “clients”. Many helping professions use this term. But defense lawyers and psychologists also use the term. And we felt that in our situation, this can reinforce an unwanted stigma and relationship. A relationship that runs contrary to our pantry’s most guiding core value: Uplifting the dignity of people.
Let’s say you are a volunteer at our food pantry and it’s your role to welcome visitors through the pantry. So, you go into the pantry’s waiting room and call out the next service number. And among the several dozen people sitting before you, one raises her hand. And you suddenly realize that the person raising her hand is your next-door neighbor. What must her experience feel like? What do you want her experience to feel like?
These were the kind of questions we started to ask ourselves. And we soon stopped using the word “client”. Because the people who come to us for help are not our clients. They are our neighbors.
We’re all neighbors here. Our food pantry’s long-term goal is to alleviate the causes of hunger in our 15-village region. This requires that we bring neighbors together. Including those in need, volunteers, donors, and strategic partners. Because in a word, the first step toward ending our community-rooted problem is by recognizing that we are all neighbors in the effort.
Share Food Share Love Food Pantry
Our food pantry serves 15 villages, where over 7,000 of our neighbors are living below the poverty line. Most (83%) live in just 7 of our 15 villages. Which makes ours a region of “haves” and “have-nots”. But we are all neighbors here. Like many food pantries, we are a not-for-profit business. Which means our collective purpose is to one day go out of business: We are working collectively toward a time when neighbors in our region are no longer oppressed with hunger. A time when enough of us have come together to uplift all of us.
End Hunger. Uplift Neighbors. Learn how you can help at sharefoodsharelove.org