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Posted: February 26 2025 at 05:20 AM
Author: Diana Davis, HEAL Well Leadership Team member
The Northern Illinois Conference’s HEAL Well initiative is an innovative project addressing food insecurity and environmental sustainability through faith and action. HEAL Well’s mission is to unite faith communities and local stakeholders to create a more sustainable future by planting trees and volunteering in community gardens in urban neighborhoods. Its vision is rooted in trust and care for God’s creation, fostering relationships that sustain the earth and its people.
On Aug. 27, members of Northern Illinois Conference’s Black Healing Collective visited community gardens in Chicago’s Austin neighborhood to learn about food insecurity and opportunities to make a difference. They identified a critical need for volunteers to maintain the gardens and shared their findings with the Conference Committee on Religion and Race. In response, HEAL Well (Helping Everyone Access Life Well) was born.
HEAL Well opens opportunities to identify concrete deserts and food deserts and to increase tree cover and support healthy eating options to a variety of communities in northern Illinois. It’s a participatory initiative wherein volunteers learn about gardening, sustainable living, and community engagement.
In the growing season, HEAL Well hopes to engage with and develop a core group of at least 25 high-school students (paid with a stipend) who will be the primary planters and maintainers of trees in their communities. In addition, HEAL Well hopes to engage at least 25 United Methodist volunteers who will work at community gardens at least one day per month for a minimum of two hours each time.
During the off-season, HEAL Well will focus on knowledge and relationship-building with nonprofit organizations and the communities the group hopes to serve.They are holding monthly online learning sessions to illuminate the contexts of the neighborhoods where they will work.
HEAL Well is a part of CCORR’s Advocacy Partners subgroup, working with the conference’s Net Zero Team and Board of Church and Society. Their six-person leadership team has been meeting since October. In summer 2025, they will partner with Faith in Place to help learn how to plant trees, the Austin Garden Collective to learn and work in their more than 25 community gardens, and Olivet United Methodist Church in Chicago’s Austin neighborhood to plant trees on their property. Other partner organizations include Rising Sun Missionary Baptist Church, My Block My Hood My City (which introduces underprivileged youth to diverse cultures, cuisines, careers, and communities), and Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary. It receives support from the Midwest Methodist Foundation and other grant partners. The team is delighted to have church partner volunteers and individual volunteers.