“I was hungry and you gave me something to eat.”
Mt 25:35

Our first organized ongoing apostolate in service to the poor in Honduras was our food distribution program. In response to the many families that came daily to the friary door begging for food, and following the lead of Blessed Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity who formerly occupied our friary, the Friars began to do home visits for those seeking assistance. And so was formed our initial “food line list.” Since that time we have visited these families at regular intervals to evaluate how they were doing - removing some families who were no longer in grave need, and adding others who came later looking for help.

Currently we have about 85 families whom we assist monthly with a substantial supply of beans, rice, sugar, shortening, salt and laundry soap. We add powdered milk and other items to the distribution when they are available.

Once or twice a year, we are able to include clothing, house wares, personal care products, sacred images and catechetical materials, and even furniture and bicycles as a result of the generous efforts of friends and benefactors in the US who collect these items and ship them to us by container.

We distribute these supplies on the first Monday of every month. In order to make the experience clearly one of faith and the love of God, we include songs of worship, prayer – in particular the Rosary, and an inspirational message. Lay missionaries provide a separate, simultaneous program for children, making use of age-appropriate activities to draw them closer to Jesus. Our families really look forward to these monthly gatherings, not only because of the food they receive, but also because of the evident joy we all share in coming together in the name, and in the love of Christ.

Additionally, with the help of lay missionary and nutritionist Michelle Hinckley, the Friars sponsor a protein and vitamin rich hot lunch program one day a week for about ten extremely poor families who suffer from malnutrition. Occasionally we also make special excursions into mountain villages that are suffering from a scarcity of food.