Fishes, Loaves, and Burritos

Philanthropic strategy sounds new but the story of how Jesus fed the masses with fishes and loaves proves that it isn't.

Many are called to give, but some are blessed with the ability to make more out of what they give.

Enter the Burrito Project whereby two guys from L.A. recognize they can feed a lot of hungry folks with beans (a 99 cent pound of dry beans expands to four or five times the size when you add water) rice (same amazingly economic ratio) and tortillas (30 for 99 cents at the bodega on my corner.) Artfully combining them into a universal delight, these guys cycle their goods around town to put a hurtin' on hunger.

While folks can and have fed the hungry through similar means for eons, these truly new age do-gooders also added a dollop of Internet when they made a home for the Burrito Project on My Space and it began to expand like you know what. Now their website lists related efforts in nine cities including Damascus, which adapted the concept to a Falafel Project.

According to an article in Forbes, the Burrito Project was the overwhelming choice of MySpace members to receive the site's first $10,000 Impact Award. I bet they got Jesus' vote too.

Susan Herr