Baseball player and priest fight hunger
''I do think God gives people gifts. Do I think God wanted Sean Casey to be a baseball player? I think that's quite possible. And then the question is, with any gift, the way you measure anything you're doing is whether you are using the gift well. It's very simple to autograph some things for charity. It's very simple to be associated with a charity, but to actively do something creative and significant, that's the challenge."
That challenge was embraced when Father O'Brien came to his friends, a circle that included Sean Casey and Conan O'Brien and Mike Toth, whose Concord-based Toth Brand Imaging made household names out of J Crew and
Tommy Hilfiger, and Father Paul's brother, Dan O'Brien, a management consultant, and Conan's brother, Luke, a lawyer, and some other talented and committed people. Their idea was simple: Attract young people, the necessary commandos in their battle to draw attention to their cause, with these T-shirts that turn the labeling in society on its head. They wanted to show that behind ''addict" and ''homeless" and ''prisoner" and, yes, ''jock," said Casey, displaying one such T-shirt, there are human beings far more complex, and needy, than the names we attach to them. The idea took hold. Street teams of teens sold the T-shirts to their friends and neighbors; Casey, who could have just written a check, did that, but also said, ''I want to be on a street team," which is why the cubicles of his Reds teammates all seem to have at least one T-shirt from Labels.
Website of Labels are for Jars
Labels Are For Jars provides money to feed the hungry through Cor Unum in Lawrence, Massachusetts.
Lawrence is the poorest city in Massachusetts and one of the poorest in the United States. In Lawrence, 21 percent of the people, and an overwhelming 31.7 percent of children, live below the poverty line. Approximately 75 percent of school-age children in Lawrence are at risk of hunger. A number of food and meal programs work to feed the hungry in Lawrence, but the needs of the hungry are much greater than current resources are able to address.
The Cor Unum Meal Center was established to provide hot meals three times a day, seven days a week, to anyone and everyone who is hungry in Lawrence. To build the meal center and to undermine the negative labeling that exists in our society, a dynamic group of young professionals started the innovative Labels Are For Jars project.
Our group merchandises T-shirts printed with different societal labels on the front and "Labels Are For Jars" on the back. The shirts are cleverly packaged in clear plastic jars with a coin slot cut into a plastic screw top. Buyers are encouraged to fill the jars with donations from family, friends, co-workers, etc, and to send the funds to Cor Unum in order to keep feeding the hungry.
