First Educational Outreach to Local Community on Community Garden and Care for Creation Initiative

Yesterday Bill Linhares, John Kerr, and myself met with 35 persons at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church in Altoona, PA, to begin creating a vision for a possible community supported garden and care for creation center at our property in St. Bernardine's, PA. The meeting was attended by a nice mix of persons: old and young, master gardners and novices, and those with a great interest in the spiritual dimension of the proposal along with those who were more focused on the organic gardning aspect. All in all it was a good first step toward starting a "pilot project" community supported garden and care for creation center for this coming summer. A number of persons volunteered to help with such a garden this summer. We determined that we would need some additional persons in order to have the number of volunteers needed to work the garden without overburdening any one person or persons. In order to "recruit" more volunteers, those who attended the meeting were encouraged to spread our vision to others in the community and urge them to attend a planning meeting to be held on March 2nd at St. Bernardine's. May God continue to bless this initiative with interest, enthusiasm, and many more persons to share in the growing vision! Pat, TOR