While the New England Patriots and the St. Louis Rams battle in the Super Bowl in New Orleans on Sunday, local food banks and charities will score big, thanks to a national campaign to help the needy.

        The “Souper Bowl of Caring,” started in 1990 by a Cincinnati native, is a national campaign encouraging congregations, schools and other groups to collect money and canned goods using the national football championship.

        Super Bowl Sunday “is for all practical purposes a national holiday,” says the Rev. Brad Smith, 39, the Columbia, S.C. minister who launched Souper Bowl.

        “It's also a day many of us worship. I wondered, "What would happen if people would even give $1 apiece?'”

        Last year more than 50 Tristate congregations joined the 12,500 nationwide that collected $3.6 million. All donations were distributed locally.

        At Bethel AME Church in Lockland, the congregation, averaging 85 on Sundays, donated nearly $100 to Habitat for Humanity last year. This year, members of its youth group are standing at the door with big soup bowls for donations.

        “We let people in (without donating); we just don't let them out,” jokes youth adviser Marcia Butler.

        Manna Food Pantry in Price Hill received donations last year and already has heard from three churches planning to give this year.

        “It's a wonderful idea,” says Mary Palmer, coordinator of the center, which fed 264 adults and 337 children in 2001. “People like to get together to watch the Super Bowl. If they can do something like this for the needy, it's doubly nice.”

        In the late 1980s, the Rev. Mr. Smith prayed, “Even as we enjoy the Super Bowl football game, help us be mindful of those without even a bowl of soup to eat.”

        It stuck in his mind, and he pitched the idea of a Souper Bowl to the youth group at Spring Valley Presbyterian in Columbia, where he was a pastoral intern. Twenty-two area churches participated the first year. It went national four years later.

        The Souper Bowl campaign has raised a total of $13.5 million.

        The next goal for the program, says the Rev. Mr. Smith: Getting NFL team owners and players to match contributions.

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