Leonidas Dos Reis used to cook for weddings and restaurants, but nothing gives him more satisfaction than preparing meals for the homeless at Hotel Grace at Ascension Church in Worcester.
“This is way better,” he said.
Hotel Grace operates as a 24-hour shelter for up to 50 homeless people from Nov. 1 through March 31. Volunteers cook dinner each night for what the shelter calls “guests.”
Mr. Dos Reis, his wife Ana and more than two dozen others from Holy Family Parish in Worcester take turns cooking the dinner each Tuesday and one Saturday a month.
Mr. Dos Reis, 39, used to work as a chef for the Naked Fish in Westborough and Vinny Testa’s in Shrewsbury, but he’s currently an executive for Corporate Chefs in Haverhill. He no longer cooks for a living. Now he cooks for a cause.
Mr. Dos Reis said he’s not usually emotional, but he almost cried when he cooked and served the homeless for the first time.
“I was looking at all these people coming through the line and I was thanked at least 20 times,” he said.
Some of the guests joked with him. Mr. Dos Reis remembers one saying, “This is the best chicken soup since I left jail.”
Holy Family parishioners used to also serve their meals, but since the pandemic hit they’ve dropped them off at the church.
For Thanksgiving Day this year, Holy Family parishioners prepared a turkey dinner with all the fixings and apple crisp. Last year when St. John Church housed the shelter and before the pandemic hit, they cooked and served dinner on Christmas Day.
“I’m a professional chef,” Mr. Dos Reis said. “I love cooking. In my private conversations with Jesus, I’ve always said, ‘I want to cook for you.’ But he’s not a person, he can’t eat. He tells you, ‘If you cook for my sons and daughters, it would be the same as me eating it.’ And that’s why we do it.”
Four years ago, Rev. Richie Gonzalez, a Pentecostal minister and founder of Net of Compassion; Father John F. Madden, pastor at St. John Church; and Rev. Aaron R. Payson, pastor at Unitarian Universalist Church of Worcester, founded Hotel Grace, a shelter that began in the basement of St. John Church for 35 men and 15 women on cold winter nights.
After the pandemic hit last year, Hotel Grace also opened at Ascension Church and North High School, staying open through the end of June. In November, Hotel Grace reopened only at Ascension on Vernon Street. The former parish, which merged with St. John in 2008, no longer holds Masses and has plenty of room for the 50 guests.
Deacon Thomas Creamer of Sturbridge leads a small group of people who cook three-course meals with dessert on Saturdays.
“Going there and serving there,” said Deacon Creamer, “is as close to Christ as we have ever come and will come perhaps.”
He pointed out that Jesus often spread his word by sitting down to dinner with people.
“Many of us pray while we’re cooking,” Deacon Creamer said, “so we can make sure what we do has Christ in every part of what we’re doing. So it’s an incredible feeling of great satisfaction to know that we’re feeding Christ and that’s how we look at it, that we’re feeding Christ.”
Sandy Meindersma, also a volunteer, is in charge of finding dinners for 150 nights each winter. She also cooks occasionally. She belongs to a non-denominational Christian church called Worcester County Church of Christ.
Mrs. Meindersma, 56, of West Boylston hasn’t served a meal since the pandemic, but when she did, she tried to learn the names of the guests.
“If you’re in an emergency homeless shelter,” she said, “you’re kind of on your own. You need somebody to be kind and you need somebody to respect you and you need somebody to meet you where you’re at and say, ‘We can get you a better life.’”
Ten years ago, the Rev. Gonzalez founded Net of Compassion with his wife, Elizabeth, and other volunteers to feed people in need. Father Madden belongs to the board of directors at Net of Compassion.
The Rev. Gonzalez said the number of volunteers for other services at Hotel Grace has plummeted because of the pandemic so those who deliver meals are appreciated.
“It’s amazing the burden they lift up from us by doing that,” the Rev. Gonzalez said.
“It’s our call as Christians,” Father Madden said. “These groups are really terrific in their constancy. It’s so helpful and it helps build relationships, which in the end is what it’s all about.”
St. John’s Food for the Poor chef Patrick Harrington prepares breakfast on weekdays for Hotel Grace and McDonald’s donates breakfast on Sundays. Hotel Grace makes its own breakfast on Saturdays and has contracted a restaurant for lunch each day.
The governor has promoted social distancing and limited the number of people who can congregate in public indoors, but the Rev. Gonzalez expects Hotel Grace to remain open and possibly expand to more sites as it did last winter.
“My goal is to keep these people alive until a miracle happens in their lives,” he said. “We don’t have all the services they need, but we at least make sure they have a warm place to sleep, clean linen, and that they’re treated like human beings and they get a good meal.”
The Rev. Gonzalez said Net of Compassion volunteers are not trained social workers, but they are people who care and who try to help find the guests employment and substance abuse treatment.
The Rev. Gonzalez was homeless in Puerto Rico at age 7 and on and off for 26 years his life consisted of substance abuse, mental health issues, and stays in prison and state hospitals. He’s spent the last 10 years in recovery so, he understands the needs of the Hotel Grace guests.
“That’s where the compassion comes from,” he said.