Community Church of Douglaston Hosts Souper Program

The Community Church of Douglaston is collecting canned soup and cash donations for a program that will fund classes for children with disabilities at Douglaston’s Alley Pond Environmental Center.

The church will host its ninth annual Souper Bowl Sunday Mission Project on Feb. 6, which is the same day as the championship game of the National Football League.

“It’s to raise money for hungry people,” said the church’s new pastor, Linden DeBie, of the program.

The Souper Bowl of Caring was founded in 1990 in Columbia, S.C and now annually brings together more than 260,000 youths on Super Bowl weekend. Under the program, youths collect canned soup and other foods for the impoverished in their own communities.

The Community Church, located at 39-50 Douglaston Parkway, is accepting cash canned soup donations for the drive.

All money raised by the church will go toward funding scholarships for classes of autistic and severely handicapped children, allowing them to visit Alley Pond Environmental Center, which is located at 228-06 Northern Blvd. in Douglaston.

It currently costs $60 for each class to visit the environmental center. State funding has been cut to allow the children to visit Alley Pond, so the Community Church has become the only institution supporting the scholarship fund, Castle said.

“For this specific niche of program, we are the sole source of funding,” said Sally Ann Castle, the church’s office manager. “The parents can’t afford to pay for the bus back and forth from Alley Pond. Because they are severely handicapped and autistic, they find that one visit doesn’t really help. It’s the second visit when the kids become more comfortable and play with the animals.”

Castle said the church has been hosting the Souper Bowl since 2002 as a means to allow the children to attend classes at Alley Pond.

“The state used to pay for it, but they’ve had zero dollars in their budget for the past few years,” she said. “We raise as much money as we can through our congregation and Sunday school.”

The church is also hosting a concert at 4 p.m. later in the day. Katherine Meloan will perform on the house of worship’s recently renovated Ralph and Alice Greenlaw Memorial Organ.

For more information and ticket reservations, call 718-229-2169 or visit the church’s website.