Every first and third Saturday of the month, the S.S. Morris Community African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church food pantry ministry provides a variety of free grocery items and hygiene products to those in need in the greater Madison community. In the past few years, it has really begun to grow and serve more people.
“It’s mind-blowing to me how beautiful this pantry has been and how God has just orchestrated this. It started as a simple conversation of how we could do this and within two months, we were doing it,” Lili Milton, a minister at S.S. Morris Church, tells Madison365. “It’s been amazing to see the community that it brings and just watching people at the church say, ‘I want to help.’ Everybody needs help. We all need help with something, and it’s been fun to watch people show up and find out that helping others is really the blessing.”
The food pantry is in the basement of S.S. Morris Church, located on Milwaukee Street on Madison’s East Side, not far from Woodman’s Supermarket.
“We have meat and we have protein sources. We have all the usual food pantry staples. Because of the Boys and Girls Club of Dane County, we were blessed with plenty of the Dove [personal care] products donations,” Milton says. “So we have personal hygiene, stuff for babies, Pampers [diapers], wipes, formula. We try to keep in cleaning supplies. That’s probably our biggest challenge sometimes. We try to have milk and eggs when they’re available through Second Harvest [Food Bank], along with fresh produce and fresh bread. We also have some of those creature comfort foods … the good snacks. Everybody loves a sweet treat every now and then.
“We are set up for people to come in and select their own items. We don’t tell them what to get,” Milton adds.
Milton has been in charge of the food pantry at S.S. Morris for the last four years, she says, starting in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“When I came on board, it was at the tail end of COVID requirements on food banks. Many of the local food banks had closed. They were like, ‘We can’t do this,'” Milton remembers. “What impressed me about SS Morris was that they figured it out. They had certain rules where they had to make bags and run them out to people’s cars, so there was no contact.
“Once those restrictions got lifted, one of the first things we did was figure out how we could go back to a full-service food pantry where people can shop for their own items, versus us giving them what we have, kind of the staples, but not really knowing what their individual needs are in their lives,” she adds. “Everybody is different.”
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Milton says that it’s important that people at the food pantry can shop with dignity and is amazed how the pantry continues to grow.
“We went from not knowing pantry to pantry if we were going to have enough food to being an overflow situation,” she says. “We just added a back room for storage and put in new shelving to accommodate the blessings that we are receiving.”
Milton says that the biggest thing that has happened for the S.S. Morris Food Pantry in the last couple of years has been partnerships and has enjoyed working with Bishop Godrey Stubbs at End Time Ministries and Rev. David Hart at Sherman Church.
“Obviously, we work with Second Harvest Food Bank, but we also work with some other pantries, so when they have extras of something, they’re moving it to us. When we have extras, we can move it over to them. We’re filling the gaps with each other,” Milton says. “Starting right before the holidays, the UW Language Science Department has been collecting items within their department and bringing us pantry donations every month to every six weeks, too.
“To me, this is worship, because we worship God when we reach out to those in need, whatever the need is … it can be food. Oftentimes, people come in for food, but they’re there for other things, too. There are so many times people have come in and they’ll just share what’s going on and we let them know that they are loved. The symbol is the food, but the act is the love.
“I’m so proud of the congregation at S.S. Morris Church. They are there faithfully serving their community without missing a beat,” she adds.
The food pantry not only provides food to hungry community members along with comfort and camaraderie, but also helps them obtain information and resources for other things in life.
“We have done referrals for energy assistance. We have helped people with babies … we might not always have the exact formula they need, or the right size Pampers, or we’re limited sometimes on how much we can give them, because that might be all we have, but we can put them on to other resources, be it another food pantry or other churches that may have something that we don’t have,” Milton says.
“We have done some emergency deliveries to people who can’t get out, but they need help. We can share information with rental assistance and mental health resources,” she adds. “We are a church and oftentimes we’ve had people come in and they feel like God’s forgotten them because of their circumstances in life. And we can, through providing the food, but then also with just listening to them, reassure them that’s not the case at all.”
Beyond the difference that the S.S. Morris Church food pantry has made on the greater Madison community, Milton enjoys the inspiration it has provided for the church parishioners.
“We have young people who come and help us. Our youngest one is in first grade. She has a brother in seventh grade and the whole family comes to every pantry to serve and the kids help us stock the shelves in the pantry and help people carry their items upstairs,” Milton says.
“It’s beautiful to see all of the volunteers from the church. Just watching people say, ‘I want to help,'” she adds. “I’m so blessed and proud of SS Morris Church, the whole congregation. They are there for every pantry. They are faithfully serving without missing a beat.”
If you would like more information regarding the S.S. Morris Church food pantry, feel free to message the church today or call 608-249-4555. To donate to the pantry, drop off at S.S. Morris Church, 3511 Milwaukee Street, Madison, WI.
