Hub Staff

A community Easter dinner, open to everyone, is being offered at the Living Hope Christian Centre, located in the Maple Square Mall, Port Elgin on Easter Monday, March 28 from 5pm to 7pm.

Pastor, Bob Cotie said that although the Easter dinner is new this year, the centre has, for 15 years now, provided a weekly Monday night by-donation community dinner September through May as well as a community lunch every Friday at 12 noon through the entire year. The Friday lunch will typically see 30 to 40 people and Monday evenings see approximately 120 people each week.

Pier Donnini, owner of Queen's Bar & Grill in Port Elgin will provide the Easter meal. Donnini currently provides one Monday dinner a month and the Friday lunch each week. “We normally don't do a dinner on a holiday Monday but Pier came to us and asked if he could sponsor an Easter Monday dinner,” said Cotie.

Donnini said the meal will consist of ham and scalloped potatoes. “Everybody's welcome, it's a community type dinner,” he said, adding that there will be Easter eggs for the kids. “No charge, just come and have an Easter dinner. Nothing needed, nothing expected, it's all donated by us and we have some volunteers that help us out.”

Donnini said there is a lot of people in need in our community. “Need takes different forms, it's not just monetary, sometimes it's loneliness or the elderly who don't have anybody. There's a lot of different way people need and everybody's more than welcome to have some Easter dinner with us.”

Sometimes people are surprised by the need in Saugeen Shores, said Donnini. “We're a very prosperous community but that doesn't mean the need is not there,” he said.

Cotie said all of their community dinners are open to everyone. “It's not a soup kitchen, it's not a dinner for those disadvantaged, it is a meet your neighbour, don't be lonely, community dinner,” he said. “We particularly want our senior population to know. There's many of them that end up eating alone so often. We just want to give people an opportunity to mix with others.”