Emo (Ont.) Christian Reformed Church has been hosting a pancake breakfast during its town’s Spring Fever Days for 40 years. Cherished as a way to raise funds for missions, or community projects, the yearly outreach was first run by the church’s program for girls, then called “Calvinettes.” Helen Cates, a former Calvinettes leader who is still involved in organizing the breakfast, said the girls did it for 20 years before the Dorcas Ladies Society took over the fundraiser in 2005.
This year’s event was April 18, with a noticeable change in the kitchen, Cates said. “Our kitchen is now off limits to any female interference as it is overtaken with approximately 10 to 15 good-looking men who have replaced the dainty hand-held mixers and pretty glass bowls with power-tool cement mixers and 5-gallon industrial pails.”
Cates said they served about 300 breakfasts of pancakes and sausage and raised over $2,000 for the Emo Library and a Riverside Healthcare fund to purchase an MRI machine. Besides the men working to mix and flip pancakes, a crew cooked “sausages, sausages, sausages” the afternoon before “and set up the fellowship hall for Saturday morning’s influx of community family and friends.” Sunday school children helped to serve drinks, deliver pancakes, and clean and reset the tables between diners, Cates said.
Cates said four women are still very active in the Dorcas society, which began with about 20 women 65 years ago with the “intent of reaching out to our mission fields.” Over the years they have raised thousands of dollars, she said. “But on Emo Spring Fever Days they raise $2,000-$3,000 for local worthy causes by serving up to 300 meals and relying on a free will offering.”
Emo CRC is currently pastored by Gerald VanSmeerdyk, a minister who previously served the congregation from 1995 to 2001. “Thirty years ago Pastor Gerald put the shovel to the ground for our new church (building),” Cates said. “Now he and his wife have honored us by returning to Emo. Once again they put the shovel to the ground, but this time to build their retirement home here.”