I'm hoping to see all my big and little kids on Sunday as we make "Lent at Home Kits" with lots of goodies to help families observe this sacred season.

"It is hard to believe that there is a hunger problem on this beautiful peninsula where we live, but when you think of the employment opportunities and compare them to the cost of living it is easy to see that there is a disconnect. This problem is not unique to Cape Cod. A recent article in The Greater Boston Food Bank's Harvest newsletter discussed a Feeding America landmark study that showed how many families in eastern Massachusetts are going without regular meals. The meal gap is huge, and what is most significant is that 47% of people in need are not able to receive government benefits such as food stamps (now called SNAP benefits). The reason for this is that their household incomes are above the federal poverty level. "From our numbers, it's clear that hunger has permeated the middle class. The concept of hunger is no longer synonymous with poverty," said Catherine D'Amato, President and CEO of The  Greater Boston Food Bank.

One of the statistics that often takes people by surprise is that approximately 2/3 of the clients who come to us for food have at least one person in the household who is working and in many cases there are two people working. They just don't make quite enough to cover the cost of living here. In 2017 we provided food to over 9,300 clients and distributed 72,512 bags of groceries and 29 tons of donated clothing."