Food for body and soul: Joseph church offers free community meals

Published 4:00 pm Tuesday, January 30, 2024

JOSEPH —When Beth Estock started approaching people about her plan to start offering free community meals at the Joseph United Methodist Church, she fully expected some of them to tell her it was a great idea — but that they were too busy to participate.

That didn’t happen.

To be sure, people told her it was a great idea.

But nobody begged off, saying that their schedules were too swamped to take on one more thing.

“Every community agency or group that I talked to, nobody said ‘no,’” said Estock, the pastor at the church. “Everybody was excited.”

And so it is that Estock — and a small army of volunteers — will launch a 13-week series of free community dinners, every Monday from 5 to 7 p.m., beginning Feb. 5 and ending April 29. The meals will be served at The Place, the church’s gathering hall, 301 S. Lake St. in Joseph.

The meals, Estock said, are intended to serve a couple of purposes.

They could be an important event for people facing food insecurity in the county, she said. And they could help alleviate a sense of loneliness and isolation that she has sensed in the county.

The free meal project is an extension of the church’s ministry, Estock said. “The church does a lot with food ministry,” she said — including a “blessing box” at the corner of Main and Third streets in Joseph that provides food to those in need. (She emphasized that the church would not be proselytizing during the meals.)

Even with its previous food ministry, though, she knew the church couldn’t do all the work for the free meals on its own.

“We wanted to build partnerships because we knew that if we did it on our own, that it wouldn’t be successful,” she said.

And so, in many ways, the project also is about building connections throughout the community, she said.

“We want to build connections with people,” she said. “We’re building connections with organizations in the community and volunteer groups.”

Among the organizations involved are Winding Waters Clinic, the Wallowa Valley Center for Wellness, the Hurricane Creek Grange, Building Healthy Families, the Maxville Heritage Center, and the Baha’is, along with volunteers from Enterprise High School.

Organizers hope that each dinner offers chances for attendees to renew old connections and make new ones: The plan is to expand the community-building by providing more than food and a place to enjoy it.

Craig Pesti-Strobel, the head chef for the project, said, “We’re hoping to have some music, some singing, maybe some games. So, people can sort of hang around and chat and connect up with one another if they haven’t seen each other for a while and make it a good time as well.”

The cost of the project is reduced by the donations of time, money, and resources it has received from individuals and organizations. Estock said she “guesstimates” that the total cost will be about $200 each evening, “because we’re able to source meat at seven cents a pound and produce at five cents a pound.”

The project also includes several professional chefs who will be volunteering their time and expertise.

Pesti-Strobel, a retired pastor, said he agreed to get involved with the project because “I want to feed people. That’s my whole thing. So, it was sort of a natural thing for me to say yes.”

He added: “Food is at the center of human community anywhere. So, if you’re going to build human community, the best way to do that is food.”

“You don’t have to have a financial need to attend these meals,” Estock said. “You don’t have to necessarily feel lonely or isolated to attend these meals. We want this to be a gathering place for the entire community that just wants to come together and have a nice cooked meal.”

If You Go

The free community meals will be served each Monday in February, March and April, from 5 to 7 p.m., at The Place, 301 S. Lake St. in Joseph. Vegetarian options will be available.