Sister Mary Maloney Retires from Park Slope Soup Kitchen and Shelter after 26 Years and Appoints Denise Scaravella as new Director.
Sister Mary Maloney came to Brooklyn in the late 1980s—after 14 years of missions in Africa and South America— to become director of Park Slope Christian Help (known as CHIPS) on Fourth Avenue.
The soup kitchen had only $300 in the bank and was renting the ground floor, but Sister Mary brought with her a love for the poor and organizational skills that tied the community together, built resources, brought in donations and grants to help feed the hungry, the homeless and the poor and was able to buy the entire building.
And now, although donations are still needed, CHIPS has become an institution in the neighborhood and needs to raise $30,000 each month to help fund the soup kitchen and shelter. The kitchen, between Sackett and Degraw streets, feeds about 200 people a hot, nutritious meal six days a week, and the shelter upstairs, the Frances Residence, which has been operating for 13 years, houses nine young women in their last trimester of pregnancy and women who have just given birth in studio apartments.
But after 26 years of being the director, Sister Mary Maloney retired from CHIPS, which began as part of St. Francis Xavier Church over 40 years ago, on Wednesday, March 27. “I’m sad to leave, but I love working with the poor,” Sister Mary said, who is 80 years old and commutes from the Franciscan Sisters of the Poor residence in upstate New York everyday. “However, it’s time for younger people to take over and for me to pass the torch.”
And who will fill Sister Mary’s shoes? Denise Scaravella, who has been working at CHIPS for the past year, will replace Sister Mary as director. Read more...
Read about it on the New York Nonprofit Press.
