Stop by Catholic Charities Maine’s food banks in Caribou and Monticello and you will likely see forklifts busily moving pallets of food loaded with everything from pasta to peanut butter to Pepsi.

Each month, Catholic Charities provides food to 28 pantries and 15 agencies across Aroostook County and in northern Penobscot and Washington counties, serving about 5,000 families. The total amount of food provided, much of it to seniors, is sizable, ranging from 120,000 to 165,000 pounds each month.

“The number of people in need has increased, and the people that were already in need have more need because prices have gone up. When your regular grocery bill was $200 a week, and now it’s $275, that $75 has got to come from somewhere,” says Jon Blanchard, director of Hunger & Relief Services for Catholic Charities Maine.

Blanchard says you can’t underestimate the importance of the service being provided.

“It speaks to the individual person’s human dignity,” he says. “What do you need to live? You need to have food. You need to have shelter. You need to have community. You need to have meaningful work, and you need to have God.”

The food banks are among 20 programs around the state operated by Catholic Charities Maine, which is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year. They include behavioral health services, dental care, Education Services for Blind & Visually Impaired Children, Parish Social Ministry, the St. Louis and St. Elizabeth’s Child Development Centers, services for seniors, the St. Francis Recovery Center in Auburn, and Freedom Place in southern Maine, a residential community for women.

Although the programs are varied, Catholic Charities Maine CEO Steve Letourneau says one thing ties them together.

“The heart and soul of our organization is our mission and our connection to fulfilling the Gospel,” he says. “I’m always thinking, ‘Is this something that Jesus would want from an organization that claims to fulfill His Gospel?’ That is what drives the agency.”

Letourneau says mission is what sets Catholic Charities apart from other social service agencies.

“Our role is not only to provide the service but to do it with the highest quality because we really want people to encounter Christ in that. So, when we’re providing case management and we’re doing it with compassion, we’re bringing Christ to that person. We’re doing it with respect for them as individuals. We’re not just checking off the box that this is our job,” he says. “That encounter with Christ might be the starting point for them having their own relationship with Jesus down the road, so we want their first encounter to be a positive one.”

Since its founding in August 1966, tens of thousands of such encounters have taken place. Established by Bishop Daniel Feeney, the agency was originally known as the Diocesan Bureau of Human Relations Services (DHRS) and was designed to connect the diocese’s social outreach programs. Its original budget was $50,000, with individual and family counseling the first services offered.

Programs have evolved over the years, as the work of Catholic Charities has grown. Among the significant additions is Parish Social Ministry, aimed at helping parishes meet the needs of their communities.

“A lot of people think of us as an extension of state government, but we’re not. We are an extension of the greater Church,” says Letourneau. “We are inspired by the Holy Spirit.”

With the Holy Spirit and Matthew 25:35-46 as its guide, Letourneau believes Catholic Charities is positioned well to serve the people of Maine for years to come.

“As long as we’re true to that,” he says, “I think we’ll always be successful.”