The tiny dynamo of Tuba City               

Sister Frances Vista barely tops five feet in height, but tiny as she is, she knows her way around a forklift. She has to, since the St. Jude Food Bank that this Daughter of Charity runs in Tuba City, Ariz., started out of a garage 10 years ago and now distributes more than 90 tons of food annually throughout the largest community on the Navajo Reservation. 

The food bank’s clients include Hopi, Navajo and Southern Paiutes who struggle to feed their families in this northwestern part of the Gallup Diocese, one of America’s poorest. The name Tuba City derived from “Tuuvi,” a chief of the Hopi tribe whose land is surrounded by the larger Navajo reservation.

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Sister combines her monthly Catholic Extension salary subsidy and assistance from her religious congregation to pay expenses, including gasoline to pick up the discounted food supplies she secures at various scattered locations. 

Government commodities are a staple on many reservations, and the steady diet of cheese and refined flour products contribute to the epidemic of obesity, diabetes and other consequences of poor nutrition. Sister Frances has resolved to curb those health problems by promoting nutrition education programs and providing healthy alternatives to families, especially those with young children.

The “Healthy Native Box” (HNB) Sister developed provides a family more than $75 worth of nutritious staples for a price of $20. The HNB program has spread to other local churches and agencies.  

Sister also launched a community garden and local Farmers’ Market. Last year, the“Weekend Snack-Pack” program was started to send first- and second-graders home with healthy food to share. She enlists volunteers to help pack the boxes, including junior high students who learn by her gentle example the idea of service to others. Her youngest “packer” thus far has been a second-grader.

“We don’t preach when we serve people,” Sister Frances says simply. It’s hard to hear over a growling stomach, anyway. “We feed them first. It’s a basic need. And the rest will follow.”