The Northern Illinois Conference and Illinois Great Rivers Conference are teaming up with the Illinois Department of Health to provide 100 vaccination sites around our state by the end of May. This push toward helping get more people vaccinated is key to fully entering Phase 5 of the Restore Illinois plan. The best thing we can do to return to fully worship is to be vaccinated.
Read MoreA feeling of exuberance and loud “Amens" filled Barrington United Methodist Church's sanctuary on April 24 during a long-awaited, in-person service to ordain and commission the 2020 class. The ordinands and commissioning candidates had patiently waited nearly a year for their time after the COVID-19 pandemic cancelled the service two times in 2020.
Read MoreThe scriptures talk about God’s covenant with us from Noah to Jesus. God wants a relationship with us despite our many faults and failures. In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we know God’s love is unconditional. God loves us and invites us to respond to that love with an eternal commitment. The church is the guardian of this Good News and the community in which we live out our promise to God.
Read MorePraise be to God! The guilty verdicts in the Derek Chauvin trial are a crucial step towards rebuilding trust in our democratic system of justice that is celebrated around the world. Although justice has been served, my heart goes out to George Floyd’s family, as they will never have him back. We hope the knowledge that his death sparked an anti-racism movement with a demand for police reform may give them some solace.
Read MoreNIC Interim Bishop John Hopkins has signed a joint statement with the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago and the Metropolitan Chicago Synod, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, condemning the shootings in metropolitan Atlanta on March 16 that left eight people dead and one injured. They recognize these shootings are the product of a culture of violence, misogyny, and hatred against Asian American people—particularly Asian women—that has intensified over the last year.
Read MoreGeneral Conference organizers announced that the denomination’s top lawmaking assembly — long postponed by pandemic — must wait to meet another year. The global gathering is now scheduled Aug. 29-Sept. 6, 2022, in Minneapolis.
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