The Eastern PA Conference’s Toiletry Bowl campaign to provide basic necessities to incarcerated persons went from high-tech to high-touch on August 30. That’s when over 2,300 toiletry items—soap, toothpaste, deodorant and hand cream—ordered by donors online from Amazon.com were bagged and handed personally to residents of the sprawling Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility in Philadelphia.
About 83 donors—both individuals and churches—purchased toiletries from June to mid-August that were delivered to Grove United Methodist Church, in West Chester, PA. The Rev Marilyn Schneider, Coordinator of EPA’s Prison Ministry & Restorative Justice (PMRJ) ministry, led a six-member team August 30 to deliver the toiletries to Curran-Fromhold, the largest of six correctional facilities. They were welcomed there by the Rev. Carmelo Urena, head of chaplains in Philadelphia’s prisons, where he serves the religious and spiritual needs of about 8,000 prisoners.
Urena had requested toiletries for the prisoners because the ones they receive when they arrive do not last long, and many do not have resources needed to purchase more from the expensive prison commissary. EPA has also responded generously to his previous requests for donations of much-needed undergarments for incarcerated men and women.*
Joining Schneider were the Rev. Dawn Taylor-Storm and Eric Drew—Connectional Ministries directors of the Eastern PA and the Greater New Jersey conferences, respectively—along with EPA Conference Lay Leader William Thompson Sr., and the Revs. Allen Keller of Project Restoration and John Coleman of EPA&GNJ Communications.
The team worked with Urena to fill about a hundred zip-lock bags with toiletries, men’s underpants and devotional booklets, under the watchful gaze of a small portrait of Martin Luther King Jr. Urena then led them to the Intake Unit where new arrivals are quarantined for medical clearance and other preliminary steps before joining the regular prison population.
Team members learned in conversations with Urena and guards about the prison’s operations and many complex challenges for the prisoners and staff. Then they greeted prisoners, inside and outside their cells, and handed them bagged toiletries while offering words of support and blessing.
The donated toiletries totaled: 1,070 bars of soap, 538 tubes of toothpaste, 550 deodorant sticks and 284 tubes of hand cream. To add interest to the campaign Schneider and her PMRJ team made it a bowl competition among brands, ending just as pro football’s preseason was underway. They welcomed donations from Eastern PA and Greater New Jersey conference members.
The “winning” brands were Colgate toothpaste, Ivory Soap, Degree deodorant and Curel hand cream. “But the real winners,” said Schneider, “are those who will receive these needed toiletries as they enter incarceration in the Philadelphia prison system. Our generosity is a reflection of God’s love and care for them at a very difficult time in their lives.”
story by John W. Coleman, Director, Communication, Eastern Pennsylvania Annual Conference
This story represents how United Methodist local churches through their Annual Conferences are living as Vital Congregations. A vital congregation is the body of Christ making and engaging disciples for the transformation of the world. Vital congregations are shaped by and witnessed through four focus areas: calling and shaping principled Christian leaders; creating and sustaining new places for new people; ministries with poor people and communities; and abundant health for all.
