Project Host Beginnings

A cohort of Project Host volunteers when the Soup Kitchen first began.

It all began in 1978 with a troubling observation. Mary Moore Roberson, a Christ Church parishioner, watched as people pulled food that had been discarded by Christ Church Episcopal School students out of a dumpster.

Feeling a deep sense of urgency and distress about what she had seen, Roberson brought her concerns to Christ Church leadership and fellow congregants, and a group was formed to address the issue of hunger in Greenville.

The group first consisted of other Christ Church parishioners, but it soon grew into an interchurch committee that took a formative trip to St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Atlanta. St. Luke’s had been running a soup kitchen for years (which has since grown into Crossroads Community Ministries) and the community was able to walk the committee through the mechanics and logistics of running a soup kitchen. But it was the spirit behind St. Luke’s work, as expressed by then-director Bill Bolling, that drove things home for the Greenville-based group:

“It is as important how you feed people as it is that you give them food,” said Bolling. “We don’t require our guests to accept prayers or sermons. We believe that our work is understood as ministry because of this church setting, but more importantly, because of the manner and spirit in which we receive people and serve them.”

Upon the committee’s return, it was expanded to include lay and clergy representatives from all seven Episcopal churches in Greenville. Financial support and volunteer responsibilities were shared across the churches, and St. Andrew’s Church agreed to house the soup kitchen in its parish hall. And so it came to pass that on January 5, 1981, Project Host opened its doors for its first service.

The project was dubbed Project Host because of the experimental, joint nature of the undertaking—no one at the time seemed to imagine the longevity of this joint endeavor to address hunger in Greenville—and for the dual meaning of the word host: “It tells what we are: hosts to the needy; and that we, too, are served by our Lord as represented by the Host in Communion.”

The underlying principle behind Project Host was that anyone who came would get fed, no questions or qualifying restrictions. A sign outside read, “No sermons. No singing. Just soup and sandwiches. Free.”

At first, only around 25 people a day came for the lunch service. But within three short months, that number had nearly tripled, and the committee was eager to press forward, convinced of the importance of their mission. An early evaluation of the project stated:

“We’ll never know the total impact of this ministry. Our hospitality is changing people’s lives. These changes might manifest themselves in a day or a year or five years or never. Host is the one place in Greenville where people are accepted without being forced to conform to standards or pass through a gauntlet of judgments.”

Volunteers, too, were so deeply affected by those first few weeks of service, that they wanted to see Project Host sustained long into the future. One volunteer commented:

Volunteers and guests at St. Andrews.

“The need to continue Project Host on a permanent basis is evident by the great number of guests (average 50) who depend on the lunches we serve daily. Working one day each week has given me the opportunity to see firsthand the less fortunate and needy people in our community. I have met many who literally live in the streets, sleep in tents, and have no source of income or food. We have no color barriers [at Project Host], and the atmosphere of love and concern extends from guests to volunteers — to the community… One cannot visit Project Host without realizing that our work is appreciated by all ages, all colors, and all social classes… Project Host must be a permanent home for all who need us.”

Guests at St. Andrew’s.

Another noted simply, “As a volunteer, I am gaining so much more than I am giving.”

Now, 40 years later, Project Host has withstood the test of time and proven its relevance in the Greenville community. The location, staff, and volunteers have changed and the organization has grown—topics for later stories—but the model is still the same: lunch from 11am-12pm, Sunday through Friday, no questions asked. And what these founding members and volunteers observed about Project Host after just a few weeks of service still holds true, both the bad and the good.

Hunger hasn’t gone away in Greenville, and some of the same challenges that existed then persist. Helping people out of homelessness and cycles of poverty remains a challenge, and nonprofits still struggle to get information and help to those who need it most.

Forty years ago Rev. McCreary observed, “People who need the most help are the least informed [of what services are available] and the hardest group to inform.” The same sentence is likely uttered by social workers today. Barriers in the form of access to information technologies, transportation, and even the confidence to interact with agencies abound.

Volunteers at Project Host in January 2021, 40 years after the Soup Kitchen began service.

On the brighter side, however, the positives noted about the Project Host Soup Kitchen 40 years ago also hold true. Volunteers from churches and beyond still come with open hearts to greet and serve guests, hosting them much in the same way as when Project Host started out. Bonds and friendships are formed across all sorts of social barriers, leaving everyone who crosses the Project Host threshold better off for having come. And when crisis hits and people fall on hard times, as so many have unexpectedly during the COVID pandemic, they know where to turn to receive a hot, nutritious meal, and an opportunity to weather the storm.

Today, as when Project Host began, “It is the one place where regardless of who you are, love and respect and care are handed to you across the counter, free.”

By Claudia Winkler