Inspiring Trip to southern Illinois

I travelled to southern Illinois on Friday morning to visit a soup kitchen in a town not too far from where I grew up.  I truly loved growing up in southern Illinois, but the dynamics are clearly different than where I live now.

It is an extremely rural area and there is a narrow scope of opportunity – health care, mining, farming, public service, and teaching.  Part of the reason I moved out of southern Illinois was to go to school in St. Louis, but also it made it that much easier for me to stay due to the lack of opportunity back home.

Work is even harder to come by and therefore, being able to have adequate funds to feed yourself and your family is an added challenge.

When I pulled up to House of House soup kitchen in Herrin, IL, I knew the building and area pretty well.  I had dined at this establishment, when it was an Italian restaurant, many times with family and even went there before my Junior High School Prom.  It was now converted to not only a soup kitchen, but also a thrift shop. 

I met the man behind the mission, John Steve, and he immediately took me around on a tour to show me what sets this soup kitchen apart from all the other soup kitchens in the southern Illinois area.  It is set up just like a restaurant.  He walked me through the kitchen and showed me the charts and regulations on the wall.  They have waitresses and waiters serving individuals for a few hours 3 days a week.  A typical soup kitchen, you don’t have much of a choice of what you eat and it is usually cafeteria-style where you go through a line and they hand you a tray with food.

At House of Hope, you are waited on and there is a menu you can select what you would like to eat.  Anyone can dine-in, the only difference is – you pay if you can and you don’t if you can’t.

I am always inspired when I do outreach in agencies like this.  You see volunteers that are meant to help people and those behind the scenes that created a space that provides an opportunity to bring all of those good people together to help the community.  It makes me realize there are still people out there everyday helping others and, in my mind, doing what is right.

I told Chris we will have to visit House of Hope sometime in the future when we both have a day off and have lunch.  The food looked amazing and smelled so good, but don’t worry, I didn’t cheat!  I ate my tuna salad sandwich, crackers and banana after I left in the comfort of my grandparents’ kitchen.