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b'Today\\u2019s host(s): Scot Landry\\nToday\\u2019s guest(s): Andy LaVallee, Catholic businessman and owner of LaVallee\\u2019s Bakery\\nLinks from today\\u2019s show:\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\nToday\\u2019s topics: Profile of Catholic businessman Andy LaVallee\\nSummary of today\\u2019s show: Local Catholic businessman Andy LaVallee llives his faith 24/7, bringing his Catholic values into LaVallee\\u2019s Bakery Distributors, which provides high-quality breads to feed the poor and homeless; puts employees, customers, and vendors above the bottom line through Gospel values; and has now started a new initiative providing free nutritious bread to anyone who wants to fast for Lent (LiveTheFast.com). In addition, Andy helped found the Massachusetts Catholic Business Association, bringing together Catholics in all fields and walks of life to pray, learn their faith, and join in fellowship on a regular basis.\\n1st segment: Scot wished all the listeners a happy St. Valentine\\u2019s Day. He discussed today\\u2019s topic of living the social gospel in how we conduct all our affairs, including our business life. Our guest is Andy LaVallee, owner of LaVallee\\u2019s Bakery in Waltham, which gives its first rate bread to many of the food pantries in the area and how he has made the Gospel central to his work.\\nAndy said it\\u2019s a 35-year-old family-owned business. They bring in products from all over the world, cakes, cookies, breads and distribute them to top hotels and restaurants. Most of the products come from vendor partners all over the world. He grew up in Charlestown in the busing era. He found a job at a bakery to keep himself out of trouble. After about eight years, his wife was pregnant with their first son, so he bought a station wagon for a few hundred dollars and started delivering bread on the way home. LaVallee\\u2019s had a different vision of who they wanted to be, to have top-level service. Their breakthrough was delivering to the Ch\\xe2teau and Nocera restaurants.\\nAndy said you have to be totally committed if you\\u2019re self-employed and through the first 15 years he put in a lot of long hours. The turning point was in 1997, when he was leaving Mass and Fr. Rodney Kopp asked him to teach CCD to confirmation age boys. He promised to do it for one year and ended up doing it for 13 years. He learned a lot about Catholic social values and how to treat people. It transformed how he lead the company and gave him the idea of servant leadership. He said in the beginning, he went to Mass, but had no other faith life.\\nHe said he\\u2019s a Triple type-A personality so he attacked teaching CCD in the same way and wanted to make sure he was teaching these kids the right thing. Andy said the first thing to know is God\\u2019s love and how his grace and mercy works in us. He used examples from their own lives to explain the Church\\u2019s teachings. By recognizing how blessed we are by God and we are created with a purpose makes us want to reciprocate for what we have been given and to find out what our mission is.\\nHe wanted to be an example of these teachings, not just for the CCD classes, but also for his own family.\\nHe had an interview with a young man for a driver\\u2019s job. They\\u2019d had trouble keeping drivers working for them. At the end of the interview, he asked him why he wanted to work there. The man said God had told him he wanted him to go work at LaVallee\\u2019s. That told Andy that he wanted to run his company that way. Instead of living by the spreadsheet, they wanted to live by the truth of the dignity of every human being.\\nThe way that works is that you have to show the love of God through your actions in all your business dealings. Vendors and customers can then trust you. He also continually focuses his people on the values of the dignity of the human being. Be more concerned with the people first and everything else will happen if you live by the rules God gave us.\\nHe doesn\\u2019t call his drivers \\u201cdrivers\\u201d, they call them customer guardians. They set up a special program to teach them that their job is to watch over their customers, be the best teammate they can be, and be a step above everyone else delivering to business in Boston. That has led to double-digit growth in this economy.\\nNot everyone is Catholic. Only about 50% are. But they all understand the Christian values and know they are treated better than any place else. They pay their health insurance. They allow employees to bring their newborns to work with them rather than send them to daycare.\\nWhen you walk into LaVallee\\u2019s, you see the LaVallee\\u2019s logo and an portrait of Pope John Paul II, who is the example of servant leadership. Everyone in business wants to climb to the top of pyramid. But to be a success, you have to invert the pyramid. You have to support everyone who trusts in you and believe in you. How did Christ build the Church we are today? By being a servant-example to all. It\\u2019s so much easier to do it this way because you just live according to these teachings. When you finish a task, you say you\\u2019ve done the best you can and leave the rest up to God.\\nThere is a whole process in forming other managers in the company to this model. Lead by example and walk through the ideas with them on a day by day basis.\\nScot asked when Andy realized he had a responsibility to provide high-quality breads to the poor and homeless. Andy said in meetings with vendors, there would be cases and cases of product that get thrown out because they don\\u2019t meet a particular customer\\u2019s standards. They take that high-quality bread to shelters throughout Boston. On one Thanksgiving day, you would find the same exact bread on the tables at the Ritz Carlton as found on the tables at St. Francis House right out the back door of the hotel. Andy\\u2019s accountants complain about the cost, but they are building spiritual equity, not to mention gaining a positive response from others who want more of that bread.\\nA few years he founded with some others an organization called the CEO Council on Hunger to provide high-quality foods to the poor and homeless.\\n2nd segment: Andy has started a website called LivetheFast.com, which discusses breads created for fasting. He said bread and water is the best fast: water is cleansing and bread represents the Eucharist. But 90% of the breads in supermarkets would accelerate your appetite that would prevent you from completing the fast by making you hungry: sugars, preservatives, etc.\\nJesus fasted and taught his disciples to fast, but no one has tried this commercially. Families used to make their own breads at home to fast. They\\u2019re doing this commercially all-natural, whole wheat, unbleached, no preservatives, and providing nutrition to maintain the fast all day. He has selected from among 600 products for his best fasting bread.\\nIt is an artisan roll, handmade, but with different flavor profiles. The cranberry multi-bread pecan is good for breakfast. The ancient grain bread is a soaked grain so it\\u2019s easier. They have a nut grain and even a white/whole wheat mix for kids.\\nOnce you sign up for the Lenten challenge at the website, they will also provide some great books and other resources to help you live the fast. He learned through this discovery of fasting breads, during all the apparitions of Our Lady, she has recommended we fast and pray.\\nAndy was on a pilgrimage to Medjugorje a few years ago. In the middle of the night he heard some Italian women singing the rosary outside his window so he got up to pray with them. He had been fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays and the idea of fasting breads came to him and the idea stayed with him. He went back to Medjugorje five months later and researched their fasting practices. They use similar breads as he\\u2019s making. They use a spelt flour that\\u2019s hard to get in the US, but almost everyone fasts when they are there.\\nAndy intends to provide the breads to anyone who wants to live the fast. Got to LivetheFast.com, sign up for the Lenten challenge, and they will provide the breads throughout Lent. Put them in your freezer, take one out before going to work and heat it up in the oven for a few minutes, take a bottle of water and go.\\nWhen he\\u2019s fasting, his focus level is entirely different. He\\u2019d read that when you fast, you lose energy and look different, but he wanted to make the breads nutritious and not lose energy. But his prayer life remained focus and he doesn\\u2019t get too many lows.\\nIf someone signs up for the fasting challenge, people will be able to pick up the breads in various places and at different times. There will enough for a few weeks at a time, but you can come back for more for all of Lent. Cardinal Se\\xe1n recently called us to pray and fast with regard to the Health and Human Services mandate so this can be part of that.\\nScot asked if Andy has internal projections on how much they\\u2019re going to be giving out. Andy said they don\\u2019t have projections, but he\\u2019s hopeful it will be very popular.\\n3rd segment: Andy has been asked to speak at St. Mary, Waltham, after Masses about the value of fasting and he\\u2019s hoping they get a lot of parishioners who want to take the Live the Fast challenge.\\nA few years ago, Andy and some other Catholics formed the Mass. Catholic Business Association. Andreas Widmer is a friend and mentor to Andy and helped him found it. He got the idea while driving home one day from a Legatus meeting. He wrote a whole business plan for it and then presented it to Andreas. He said he\\u2019d been thinking of the same thing. The mission is to come together once per month, be centered around the Eucharist, and then have reflections after Mass and silence. They build the reflections around the liturgical calendar. It\\u2019s a great example of what they\\u2019re trying to do in the community.\\nScot said Legatus is also for Catholic businessmen, but it tends to be for CEOs and other\\u2019s running businesses, while Mass. Catholic Business Association is for everyone. Andy said they get guys in suits from the financial district and landscapers in jeans and boots, all praying together before the Lord. Their tagline is \\u201cWhere faith and business meet.\\u201d\\nThey\\u2019ll be meeting at St. Francis Chapel at the Prudential Center. They had more than 60 present at their last Mass and they meet after Mass at Champions. One of the priests from St. Clement Eucharistic Shrine will celebrate Mass. It was the OMVs who suggested the move from South Boston to the business center of Boston at the Prudential Center. When they moved last month, they had 12 new people. They consistently hear from them that they never thought they\\u2019d find an organization like this. Scot said you can feel lonely because you don\\u2019t know other people at your workplace who share your faith. The next meeting is March 7 at 5:45pm with Mass at 6pm, reflection at 6:30pm, silent meditation and then dinner and fellowship from about 7pm to 9pm.\\nAndy said the reflections are given by one of the members of the group. they give a School of Prayer, taking either the liturgical calendar or readings for the day and bringing into their daily lives, their work or family or community. There is no cost to be a member. It\\u2019s men and women and the ages range from college age all the way up to their 70s. There are great opportunities to mentor. And it\\u2019s everyone from the janitor to the CEO.'