St. John's Family Center

06/16/2026

Another great few weeks at our community sit -down supper at St. John's Family Center. Last week our neighbors were blessed with an amazing meal and personal care bags courtesy of the girl scouts. This week we served 89 hot meals with thanks to Christ Episcopal Church Stratford CT. Ken, Cheryl and Bruce made delicious trays of ziti with meat sauce, ricotta and mozzarella(that came with Bruce's great jokes and sense of humor). We also served our infamous salad bar, fresh fruit and many other treats for dessert. We call the meal our "family time hour"... the guests and volunteers are one big happy family, sharing love, dignity and true human care for each other!

05/20/2026

Another great community supper in the books at St. John's Family Center. Lots of moving parts to this meal. Thanks to Christ Episcopal Church Stratford CT for sharing Cheryl, Ken and Bruce with us to make amazing ziti with meat, tomatoes, ricotta and mozz! We served over 77 neighbors this evening. Our new salad bar is a great hit with our guests. We were joined by three bar mitzvah students from Congregation B'nai Israel. Dylan, Garrett and Henry did a great job, welcoming our neighbors with a smile. Thanks Meryl for bringing the boys to help. Carson made delicious fish chowder that was enjoyed by all. We appreciate our loyal volunteers from St. John's Episcopal Church, St Paul's Episcopal Church, Fairfield CT andTrinity Episcopal Church Southport, CT and the many other friends who join us to make our hour long sit down meal special and dignified for so many facing daily food insecurity. Last minute shout out to OWEN who stepped up to create a delicious bean cabbage and mushroom stew for one vegetarian guest. Although our time together is short, our neighbors and volunteers are one extended family during our supper.. So many amazing blessings

05/06/2026

We are glad to give thanks!! Once again... we shout out to St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church in Fairfield and Helene Daly for an amazing gift for our neighbors in need at St. John's Family Center. The second graders of St. Thomas Parish are making their first communion. They made a retreat to prepare for this sacrament. One part of this event was dedicated to community service. They made and bagged 500 turkey and cheese sandwiches. We were fortunate enough to be included as one of the recipients of their hard work. We distributed 125 sandwiches yesterday in addition to our community supper. Everyone benefits from this type of collaboration especially when teaching our youth "giving back" at an early age. We hope this will begin a life-long love of helping those who are in need. Kudos to St.Thomas!

04/27/2026

THANK YOU to our amazing community who came out to purchase and donate food staples for our weekly food bank, which currently serves 200-220 families who face daily food scarcity and insecurity. The synergy of volunteers and those who came to help us was great. We offer our sincere thanks to Stop & Shop Villa Avenue for allowing us this privilege and gift.

04/24/2026

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0C4AAFA623A0FAC34-58481646-feeding #/

We are looking for more volunteers to help with our food drive tomorrow Saturday April 25th. Please consider giving us a few hours of your time to help those so desperately in need of food. Please click the link to sign up. 

St. John's Family Center's will be participating in the annual "Feeding Our Families" food drive in collaboration with Stop & Shop and CT Foodshare at the Fairfield - Villa Ave Stop & Shop location. Food, hygiene products, and funds raised will benefit the families who attend our weekly food pantry,...

04/16/2026

SJFC will be participating in the annual "Feeding Our Families" food drive in collaboration with NBC/Telemundo/Connecticut Foodshare/Stop & Shop at the Fairfield - Villa Ave location. This event takes place the 25th of April and runs from 8-6. You can sign up for a 2-hour shift at the link below. Food, hygiene products, and funds raised will benefit the families who attend our weekly food pantry, diaper bank, and community supper programs. Great and fun way to help us out! Please sign up here:

St. John's Family Center's will be participating in the annual "Feeding Our Families" food drive in collaboration with Stop & Shop and CT Foodshare at the Fairfield - Villa Ave Stop & Shop location. Food, hygiene products, and funds raised will benefit the families who attend our weekly food pantry,...

04/15/2026

Another great community supper at St. John's Family Center. This evening we received our blessing bags, generously donated by our incredible support network led by Carole Stagnato Canzoneri. We also had a great dessert surprise for our neighbors. Thank you Erika Portanova Songer, Realtor and George O'Connell for bringing and serving pie and ice cream. Great to see our volunteers meet and offer yet another nutritious and delicious sit down supper, at St. John's Episcopal Church May you all continue being a blessing to strangers and to those you know and love.

04/10/2026

Our numbers are up at St. John's Family Center! Usually this is a good thing. Our weekly food pantry continues to serve more families each week. This year, we are supplying food to an average of 200-220 families each week(almost 18% increase). While we work diligently to procure the best food for our neighbors, we have made changes to our food pantry to accommodate this growth. Thanks to St. John's Episcopal Church, we have moved our clothing closet upstairs to create more room so our pantry will be able to handle this increase . We adopted a "shopping" model whereby our guests come in and get to shop for their needs. We won't hand a family a bag of food that might not suit them. This makes our food distribution more efficient and MOST IMPORTANTLY, gives our neighbors a sense of dignity by using a shopping cart to get what their family needs. We need to purchase 5 more shopping carts to accommodate our additional demand. If anyone feels compelled to help, the cost is $725 for 5 carts. I thank you all for your past support. Please PM us if you would like to help us reach our goal.. TIA..

04/08/2026

BOARD MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: We welcome Suzanne Mount who has been an amazing supporter of our outreach as our new treasurer. Suzanne brings an amazing financial background from her many years operating her own bookkeeping business. Our entire board welcomes Suzanne and her financial expertise to guide our small but mighty organization. Suzanne says "It's truly and honor to work with the other members of St. John's. Compassion, respect and resourcefulness radiate from each member. As a Christian, I'm grateful to have a way to give as Christ emphasized. St. John's has a system that works".

03/31/2026

Tons of gratitude at our weekly community supper at St. John's Family Center. Our meal was delicious and enjoyed by over 70 neighbors. Carole Stagnato Canzoneri and her amazing corps made turkey and stuffing, chicken leg/thigh quarters, mashed spuds, peas & carrots, home made dinner rolls, gravy and desserts and snacks. Rave reviews on the food. We were joined this evening by members of the St. Patrick's Day Parade of Greater Bridgeport, CT. Their energy and genuine care for our hungry guests was very apparent. Thank you Liz Gilbert DeFeo for brining this great group to help us pay forward blessings we all take as "the norm" in our every day lives