NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. — Saturday morning New Life Community Gospel Church welcomed residents to the first LGBTQ+ friendly food pantry in the area.

It’s a partnership with Messengers of Hope Mission, a nonprofit that provides food in their mobile unit to residents across Pasco County.

What You Need To Know

  • Messengers of Hope Mission is a nonprofit organization that helps feed the hungry in Pasco County with their mobile food pantry

  • The nonprofit partnered with New Life Community Gospel Church for an LGBTQ+ food pantry

  • Church leaders want to create a space where residents feel safe and loved to get food they need

  • The initiative will take place every second Saturday of the month

For the church’s Associate Pastor Randy Meadows, it is a chance to connect with residents in his community.

“We have a lot of LGBTQ people that don’t feel safe to come to certain areas for whatever reason so we just wanted to make sure that they knew that they had a place to come that we could give them the food that they needed,” he said.

It’s that reassurance of safety and support why Stephanie Stuart went to the pantry Saturday.

“I do visit other pantries and they’re very sweet people at the church, but it’s always in the back of my mind I wonder if they’d be that sweet if they knew the whole truth,” she said.

Having support from church leaders is a sense of relief for Stuart, who has struggled to make ends meet being an entertainer in the area.

Leaving with a cart full of food but also love, she is grateful for the variety the pantry provides.

“I got girl scout cookies, thin mint, but yea, this is going to help me for probably the next two weeks,” said Stuart.

For Meadows, seeing the smiles in his community is how he knows they’re making a difference.

“Jesus said to John, feed my sheep and that’s what we’re trying to do is feed the sheep for the lord and whoever goes through this parking lot I want to love on them,” he said.

This pantry will be held every second Saturday of the month.