KINGWOOD, W.Va. (WBOY) — Knights of Columbus members of West Virginia as well as Cross Catholic Outreach held a meal packing event called “Food for the poor is food for your soul” in the gymnasium of the Mountaineer Challenge Academy at Camp Dawson on Saturday.
Challenge Academy Cadets as well as others helped put meal packages together that would feed approximately six people. Organizers say they do this because people are in need. The meals consist of beans, rice, soy, a vegetable pack, and a vitamin pack to meet the whole nutritional need.
“So, this is our eighth packing that we’ve done in West Virginia. We are packing 60,000 meals today, 20,000 of them are staying in West Virginia and they’re going to get distributed across various food pantries across the state. The other 40,000 go to Florida to the Cross Catholic facility and then from there they go on to the hungriest in the world,” said Scott Nale, Grand Knight of the Morgantown Knights of Columbus.
Kingwood Knights of Columbus raised more than $19,000 to help the program and feed those in need. Knights of Columbus International has endorsed the project sponsoring it and now it is done all over the country.
“There is 15% of the West Virginia population that goes to bed hungry, worldwide there is over 280 Million. There is people starving to death in the world. We are very lucky here, we have a lot of safety nets,” said Ned Sawyers, an organizer and member of the Kingwood Knights of Columbus.
Cross Catholic Outreach members say by all the people coming together and packing meals that it makes a significant difference in the lives of those who are hungry. They stated that 15,000 children a day die from hunger-related causes and the meal packages are keeping people alive around the world.