(Dec. 18, 2014) The NOEL Community will host its annual
Christmas Day dinner at
St. Paul’s by-the-Sea Episcopal Church, located on Baltimore Avenue and Third Street, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
on Dec.
25 for
those homeless, unemployed, underemployed,
shut-in, and who are alone.

“We are serving
breakfast meals in
the morning,” said Katie
Coffman, chairwoman of the NOEL planning committee.

There will be breakfast
sandwiches, donuts and coffee
available in the parish hall. The dinner will come pre-cooked in a bag. Dinner includes ham,
potatoes, macaroni and cheese,
veg- etables and rolls. Tables will be set up in
the parish
hall for visitors to enjoy
their meals, where there
will also be music, decorations and Santa Claus. All are welcome to join the NOEL Community for this holiday
celebra- tion.

In 2013, the group held its 16th annual
NOEL Community Dinner in memory of Father David Dingwall.
The organization came together
to provide food and companionship on Christmas
Day despite the tragic fire
on Nov. 26 at Saint
Paul’s by-the-Sea and the Shepherd’s
Crook Food Pantry that took the life of Dingwall.

With the community’s generous donations and efforts, NOEL distributed 400 cloth shopping bags each
packed  with  pre-cooked  items
 for three meals, 100 cloth shopping bags with
sandwiches for two meals, 200 breakfast sandwiches, 200 donuts, and 65 meals for the
public service workers. More than 1,600
meals/sandwiches were distributed from City Hall on Third Street, located
across the street from the church, to those in need of food on Christmas.

NOEL stands for Nothing
Other than Eating and Loving.  The
organization provides services to the community including preparing and serving meals, working with
local pantries and collecting food donations.

“We had leftover food one
year to do a lunch in January
and years
later we had enough food…to do a few lunches in January,” Coffman said.

Now, the NOEL community
provides lunch every Saturday and several weekdays during the year. Volunteers actively work with the local
food pantries, shelters and social service
groups to identify what is most needed
by
the individuals and families.

The  Noel  Community
 prepared lunches with leftover food
and funds from Christmas last year. These meals
were served at St. Paul’s by-the-Sea
or distributed as carry-outs
from Shep- herd’s Crook. The group of volunteers
prepared breakfast and/or
lunch on

63 days providing more than 6,600 meals in 2013. The Noel Community also served 90
meals/carry-outs at The Atlantic Club in West Ocean City in March and
prepared 100 sandwiches for the Surfer’s Healing event in Ocean City in
August. The Noel Community
pro- vided 100
bags of food for the Home- less Census in January, packed
120 toiletry kits for a food pantry in Berlin in
July, prepared 120 baskets for a food pantry in Snow
Hill at Thanks- giving, and assembled
50 toiletry
kits for the Community Resource Day in
Worcester County in December.

The NOEL Community is asking
for monetary and food donations.
Checks can be mailed to: 302 North
Baltimore Avenue, Ocean
City, Md.,

21842.
Donations of non-perishable food and toiletries
from individuals and
organizations will be accepted on Wednesday, Dec. 24 from 10 a.m. to noon at St. Paul’s by-the-Sea.

NOEL
organizes events throughout the year. One is the gLOVEs
drive in February.
The gLOVEs drive is Valen-
tine’s Day themed, and NOEL asks the
public to open their hearts and share the
gifts of warmth and love by donat-
ing new gloves, hats, socks and blan- kets to those in need. For more information about the NOEL Commu-
nity
or the Christmas
dinner, contact the parish at 410-289-3453