Alabama Baptists are among those continuing to comfort victims of the Sept. 11 terrorists attacks on the United States.
Southern Baptist relief teams from North Carolina set up food lines at the Pentagon, and the Alabama State Board of Missions (SBOM) dispatched a team of chaplains to New York to help those affected by the destruction of the World Trade Center.
Tommy Puckett, director of men’s ministries with the SBOM, said a team of five chaplains left for New York Sept. 27, planning to be there for a week.
“That was the immediate call, for us to put together a group of chaplains,” Puckett said.
The team includes Jerry Brown, a police chaplain in Mobile; Glenn Bynum, a state trooper chaplain from Birmingham; Bill Barnes, a state trooper from Birmingham; Ronnie Brock, a certified pastoral counselor from The Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham; and Ray Baker, corrections ministry coordinator with the SBOM.
The chaplains will minister to the relief workers and people in the area as well as the families and friends of those killed in the attacks.
Southern Baptist Disaster Relief volunteers from North Carolina were among the first to arrive in the south parking lot of the Pentagon the morning after the terrorist attack there. They set up food lines for walk-ins and supplied meals to American Red Cross workers in golf carts for delivery to those unable to leave the site.
They call it Camp Unity, the place where hundreds of workers seek relief, comfort and sustenance.
But they have since been joined by others to set up what amounts to a no-charge food court in this high-security enclave, making good food at least one bright spot. The Salvation Army is there, and a Christian group from Louisiana called Christ in Action provides Cajun fare. Also on hand are McDonald’s, Burger King, Outback Steakhouse and barbecue chicken from Tyson Foods.
But while the restaurants offer the sizzle, it is the Southern Baptists who provide much of the long-term volume and stability that comes from their role as the acknowledged leader in this sort of operation.
“We provide the comfort food,” said Gaylon Moss, Disaster Relief director for North Carolina Baptists and supervisor of the Pentagon operation. “The novelty wears off after awhile and you start wanting salad and vegetables, chicken and dumplings and things that you eat at home more often.”
Mobile kitchens such as this are the core of Southern Baptist Disaster Relief efforts in the wake of the terrorists attacks, with four additional units set up at three separate locations in New York providing similar services there. Their work is based on a unique partnership with the American Red Cross (ARC) that results in the vast majority of ARC meals coming directly from Southern Baptist kitchens.
“It’s a marvelous relationship,” said Thomas Brown, Red Cross mass care officer at the Pentagon site. “We depend on Southern Baptists for their production capability. They’re good at it, and we’ve worked together for many, many years.
“There’s a lot of trust involved,” he added. “We know that Southern Baptists are going to operate under the Red Cross protocol, and they know that the Red Cross is going to operate under the Red Cross protocol. So it just makes it a lot easier.”
At the Pentagon, those efforts have resulted in more than 32,000 meals for the workers, with Southern Baptist crews working around the clock in two shifts.
The routine can be difficult. The volunteers sleep on Sunday School room floors as guests of Columbia Baptist Church in nearby Falls Church, Va. At the site, they might be cooking up to 40 gallons of blackeyed peas at a time, washing food containers and pots according to carefully prescribed procedures, serving food or wiping tables. But periodically the reality sets in, and the volunteers realize their unique place in supporting what has become a national war effort.
“The work itself isn’t glamorous or anything like that, but then you look up and realize where you are and the people around you, and really it’s overwhelming,” said Angela Bivins, a member of Providence Baptist, Cary, N.C.
The workers coming through the lines run the gamut, from office workers directly assigned to assist with the response, to workers in white hazardous materials containment suits, to black-uniformed officers and agents sporting an alphabet soup of abbreviations for their respective agencies.
“There are some who come in with machine guns,” said James Curlee, a volunteer from Franklin County, N.C. “They just sit here and eat with them.”
But throughout Camp Unity, there is a spirit of gratefulness and cooperation. Tables are graced not only with fruit and snacks, but with special cards of appreciation from schoolchildren.
Volunteers issue verbal encouragement, talking with workers when they have opportunity.
“Our best time with the relief workers is at the midnight meal,” Moss said. “Things are a little slower; you have more time to just say hello.”
They share the hope found in Christ when opportunities arise, but more often they recognize theirs is a ministry of serving and listening.
“It’s a matter of planting the seeds,” Moss said. (TAB, BP)
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