The Cassville Pantry is asking local residents with the ability to “bless your neighbor’s table” this holiday season.

Janet Mills, Cassville Pantry director, said difficult times for low-income residents have become more difficult due to economic factors.

“These are unprecedented economic times that our neighbors are facing,” she said. “Food and grocery prices have increased 13.5 percent more over where they were one year ago. In Barry County, demand has heightened to critical levels for food resources given the impact of inflation upon our neighbors.”

Mills said the hardship is particularly troubling upon the elderly and disabled who are living on fixed incomes.

“Forty percent of our Pantry visitors are on fixed incomes,” she said. “There is nothing they can do to change their circumstances dealing with the reduction in their buying power at the store, except to go without. Throughout the fall Cassville Pantry has served an average of 650 families comprised of 1,650 individuals monthly with a food box. This is the highest number of persons seeking food assistance we have witnessed compared to the last decade of operations.”

Cassville Pantry encourages the community to consider sharing the abundance that they enjoy in their lives with the food insecure community in need of assistance this holiday season.

Cassville Pantry is offering a special promotion seeking engagement of the public to provide holiday meals to the hungry in an effort to “bless your neighbor’s table.”

A $25 donation will put a holiday meal on a Barry county family’s table this Christmas. The Pantry has partnered with Shadow Bluffs Retreat and is offering a giveaway prize opportunity for donations.

Every $25 donated to Cassville Pantry through Dec. 23 has the bonus of entering into a prize drawing for a very unique giveaway. The winner of the drawing will receive a weekend getaway in a tiny house cabin at Shadow Bluffs Retreat which is located just one mile from Roaring River.

The tiny house cabin reservation can be scheduled sometime over the next several months with the timing of the booking date coordinated with the retreat host at Shadow Bluffs.

More information about the extraordinary atmosphere and experience to discover during a getaway at Shadow Bluffs Retreat can be found on their website, shadowbluffsretreat.com.

According to Mills, the spirit of giving is captured in the sharing of a holiday meal and illustrated in a lyric quoted from the song, “Peace Is Generosity,” by Shirley Erena Murray.

“Christmas calls the world to peace, life not death-defining in one baby’s human cry,” she quoted Murray. “Hope again comes shining when our hands are open hands, when we share one table. Then the new day’s morning star lights the Christmas stable.

“As we ‘share one table’ with each other experiencing the unity of love among our community, the food pantry seeks your help to ‘bless your neighbor’s table.’” Mills said everyone can give a gift of food, which will shine the light and hope of the Christmas star into the home of a Cassville family facing challenges.

Donate to feed the hungry and to the “bless your neighbor’s table” project online at cassvillepantry.com, via check mailed USPS to Cassville Pantry 800 W. 10th St. Cassville, MO, or can be dropped off in person at 800 W. 10th St. Cassville.

Winner of the weekend getaway prize will be announced on Dec. 24. More information is available by calling the Pantry at 417-846-7871.