JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- 180 teenagers from around Jacksonville spent Saturday volunteering at various charities, and will collect donations Super Bowl Sunday at area worship services to fight hunger.
It is all part of this weekend's Souper Bowl of Caring. About 150 local churches will be holding collections for the Second Harvest Food Bank.
1n 1990 a South Carolina minister in Columbia, South Carolina was watching the Super Bowl and thought if everyone watching the big game gave $1 it would make a huge impact on hunger. He put a soup pot outside the church after services and collected money for the hungry.
It has evolved 22 years later into a nationwide event and includes volunteer service. The Jacksonville teens participated in the Jacksonville Service Blitz. One group of teenagers volunteered at the City Rescue Mission, sorting and cleaning donated items that will later be sold to support the mission's effort to help the homeless.
"It is a blessing," said Valerie Koran, manager of the City Rescue Mission store on Normandy Blvd. " We only have a staff of 7 so these volunteers helping us today can do what it takes us 3 weeks to do. They can do it in three to four hours."
The teens will then collect money and food on Super Bowl Sunday at worship services at their various churches.
"Tommorrow our youth will be outside the worship area and invite people to participate by putting in donations," said Vicar Kristen Phillips of the Shephard of the Woods Lutheran Church. "Every donation given in this community, stays in this community. So the money we receive at our congregation will go to the Second Harvest Food Bank , every dollar raised will stay in Jacksonville to fight hunger. And every dollar given will provide seven meals."
Last year, 13,000 organizations collected over $ 9.5 million dollars. More than 14,000 congregations , schools and civic clubs are participating in this nationwide effirt on Sunday.