See Beautiful Grant Applicant: MUST Ministries

The feature below is brought to you by MUST Ministries, an organization that is in the running to receive a See Beautiful Grant. For more information about our giving initiatives, please click here.
 
To learn more about the featured organization, please visit their website here.

"Hunger is the meanest, ugliest monster you’ve ever seen"

Beauty is reflected daily in the faces of thousands of MUST Ministries clients as our programs and services help move them from poverty to stability and self-sufficiency. MUST’s comprehensive services not only address immediate basic needs for food, shelter, healthcare, and clothing but also provide the resources and training needed for employment at a livable wage.  

For fifty years we have been providing for the basic needs of individuals and families in crisis, by connecting people who have a desire to help with those who need help the most. With facilities in Cobb and Cherokee counties and programs serving 6 additional metro-Atlanta counties, MUST serves around 40,000 individuals each year, over half of them children.  Thousands of volunteers support a small staff of about 100, continually helping MUST achieve our mission of “serving our neighbors in need…transforming lives and communities in response to Christ’s call”.  Our mission drives the work to create lasting equity of opportunity and better the lives of any individual disadvantaged by poverty. 

Poverty has many manifestations, but few are sadder than child hunger and malnutrition.  A recent report from Feeding America estimates 1 in 6 Georgia children will experience food insecurity in 2021.  Food insecurity describes a household’s inability to provide enough food for every person to live an active and healthy life.  Our Neighborhood Pantry Program eliminates hunger for at-risk students in local schools, providing food and other necessities, giving them a greater opportunity to grow, learn and thrive. The program currently operates in 34 schools throughout Cobb and Cherokee county, serving a cluster of over 100 schools.  

We work very closely with school social workers, counselors and staff to identify children and families in crisis. Once a month, including the summer, families can come to their pantry and choose items their families need and enjoy. As an extension of this Program, we have purchased a bus and are currently retrofitting the bus to hit the road in August as a Mobile Pantry. The bus will deliver fresh, nutritious foods in low-income communities and food deserts, where transportation is challenging and families may be unable to come to their pantry.

“Thank you for the food boxes - fresh vegetables, eggs and milk. Thank you for all I got from MUST Ministries. You’re great!” - A single mom

Many of our clients served through the Neighborhood Pantry Program are living on the margins, often having to choose between buying food or paying a bill. By providing for the basic needs of food and toiletries, our Program improves disparities and encourages equity and inclusion for high-risk families who are experiencing homelessness, households with children abandoned by a parent, special needs families, families with illnesses, families with recent job loss, and other hardships.  Providing for their basic human needs validates the beauty and dignity in every man, woman and child we serve, promoting social justice and improving the families’ chances for long-term stability and positive engagement in the community in which they live.  

“Thank you for all of the people at MUST who help others. There is a lot of hard work to do for this food program. Thank you so much. My husband died last year and it has changed my life.” - A single mom

Addressing hunger and poverty provides a foundation for stability and peace in a family, most especially in a child. We often discuss what hunger means for kids from an adult perspective — lower test scores, poorer health, a weakened ability to escape the cycle of poverty.  In a short, animated film depicting hunger, No Kid Hungry explored the question of what hunger means to a child. To a young girl, her hunger is not focused on the fact that her grades will suffer, or that she doesn’t have the proper nutrition to grow. To her, hunger is scary and emotional. To her, “hungry is the meanest, ugliest monster you’ve ever seen.”  By working with school personnel to identify the children who are struggling due to hunger, our Neighborhood Pantry Program is providing them with nutrition so they can grow, develop and focus on learning instead of thinking about the “monster.” That is beauty personified.

“This makes a big difference in their day to day life and the success they have at home, that they know they have food coming from somewhere consistently, especially coming from an organization such as MUST Ministries which is local.” – Neighborhood Pantry volunteer

Submitted by: Traci Bensley

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