The compassion shown by a Perth-based man and his band of volunteers is resulting in needy people in the Fair City being fed every Saturday.
It was 11 years ago that Keith McKeown set up the Still Waters ministry.
At that time, it used about 14 loaves of bread every Saturday.
Now that figure has mushroomed and many people have been the grateful recipients of the care shown to them by Keith and his volunteers who now number around 20.
They are men and women of all ages, some being in their 70s.
One of the team leaders is John Jack, who explained: “We have four sets of volunteers who feed the hungry on a round-robin basis.
“I lead the red team and there are yellow, blue and green teams.
“We get the use of the kitchen at the Church of the Nazarene to prepare the food and then take it to three different locations.
“We start at the Thimblerow car park near the City Mills Hotel at 4.30pm, then it’s Greyfriars Hostel at 5.30pm and the Matalan car park at 6.30pm.
“The number of people coming for free food is increasing and some folk have told us that if it wasn’t for our feeding station they wouldn’t have anything to eat that day.
“We’ve even had families coming.
“A number of folk talk about their problems. People want to share and we provide a listening ear as well as food, tea and coffee.
“We have prayed with some of the folk and some of them have accepted invitations to attend Christian fellowships.
“We have our regulars and there are some who get their lives back together and who are doing OK.
“Our volunteers provide some of the food and make the soup. We are also in the fortunate position of having food retailers in Perth backing us by giving us supplies. Anything we don’t manage to give away we donate to the homeless hostels at the Skinnergate and Tayview House.
“We have about 50-60 customers on Saturdays and although they are well behaved we have had one or two hairy moments.
“However, faith and prayer has seen us through.”
