New Haven Independent

Perry is a member of the Love Center Deliverance Ministries of Hamden, which launched its first “Big Give” on Monday. The 300-member church raised $5,000 over the last month, through efforts such as Perry’s (on the left in the photo). Then members contacted three area supermarkets, all on Dixwell Avenue, to get permission to give away a third of the amount in each store to Thanksgiving shoppers in need of a helping hand to make ends meet.

“Our church decided,” said Dr. Kim Carmichael (on the left, with Bishop Frankie Carmichael), “that this year we were not going to preach God’s word but do it.”

So they came to the area supermarkets, starting with C-Town in the morning, where Rita Mebana was delighted to receive a $50 Visa card. She said she lives across town in the Annex, but things were very tight this year and she came wherever the bargains were best. At C-Town, she bought a ham, turkey, pie shells, rice, makings for sweet potato pie, and collard greens. The total bill: $47.98. With the gift card, she got $2.02 back, and thanked Perry, Helen Little, and a line of Love Center parishioners standing in front of the paper towels beyond the registers.

“Jesus loves you, bless you baby, have a happy Thanksgiving,’ said parishioner Helen Little to Mebana. Then she added. “We get more out of giving than receiving, that’s for sure.”

The idea of The Big Give derived in part from projects seen on Oprah, said Kim Carmichael, and from the example of another pastor in another city. Even before Oprah there was the motivation of the Bible. “Our true inspiration,” Carmichael said, “is John: 3:16: ‘For God so loved the world that he gave …’”

Mebana said she is a religious woman and grateful for the gift as a modest kind of divine intervention to help her feed her three kids and ten participants at the family table. Andrew Lyons isn’t particularly religious, he said, but just as grateful. He bought a turkey, pumpkins, cranberries, and, as he put it, “all the fixins.” The total came to $150. With the $50 gift card that young church member Ronald Huggins gave to him, Lyons outlay was reduced by a third.

There was a touch of evangelizing going on in front of the paper towels as recipients gave and received thanks and wheeled their purchases out. Members had their eyes out for the elderly, for those people with large families, and in particular need, and they were going to stay there until one third approximately of their $5,000 was expended. “We refuse to let our church participate in this recession,” said Perry. “Why? Because the word of God tells us that in a time of famine his people will be satisfied.”