She’s an angel on earth!
Doramise Moreau is a 60-year-old janitor who has been feeding more than 1,000 people in Miami weekly during the pandemic, Local 10 news reports.
Moreau is a widow who lives with her children, grandchildren, and nephew while working part-time as a janitor at a local technical school in Miami. When the pandemic hit, she decided to partner with Notre Dame d’Haiti Catholic Church, to single-handedly cook thousands of meals a week for those in need.
Moreau said her desire to feed the hungry goes back to when she was a little girl in Haiti. She’d sneak food from her parents’ kitchen to give to those in need. Despite her mother’s fury, Moreau persisted because it bothered her so much.
“Sometimes, when you’re looking at people in their face, they don’t need to ask you. You can see they need something…I told [my mother], ‘You can whup me today, you can whup me tomorrow, but I’m going to continue to do it,'” she recalled to reporters.
Now years later, Moreau is still feeding the hungry. She uses the church truck to buy groceries on Thursday and Friday, cooking the food by herself every week to give out on Saturday. The church relies on donations, and church volunteers serve or deliver the meals. Moreau doesn’t have a vehicle so she walks or takes the bus to work and prepares at the end of the week to feed between 1,000 – 1,500 people every Saturday.
“Americans, Spanish, Haitian, they come here. Even when I’m closing, they say, ‘Please, can I have some,’ and I give it to them because if they go home and have nothing, it hurts my feelings,” Moreau said.
Reginald Jean-Mary, a pastor at the church, said this isn’t Moreau’s first time stepping in to lend a helping hand. She also sends food back monthly for her family and friends in Haiti. Since the start of the pandemic, every morning before work, Moreau lays out a table with hot teas and other homeopathic remedies for church staff, police, and community leaders to inhale and drink to help strengthen their immune system. She even offered to clean the church for next to nothing a few years ago when they couldn’t hire a full staff.
“She takes care of everybody from A to Z. She’s a true servant. She goes beyond the scope of work to be a presence of hope and compassion for others,” Jean-Mary said.
As a result of Moreau’s good deeds, community leaders nominated her to receive a brand new car. The Toyota Corolla was purchased by the Martin Luther King Economic Development Corporation through a grant, and Moreau will only have to pay $125 monthly for three years before she can own it. It was just a small token of appreciation for a woman who does so much.
“I can keep all the money for myself and never give anyone a penny. But if you give from your heart and never think about yourself, God will provide for you every day. The refrigerator will never be without food,” Moreau said.
Thank you for your service Ms. Doramise! Because of you, we all can!
Photo Courtesy of Marta Lavandier/Associated Press