With strong conference support of the Emergency Solidarity Fund, $60,000 was distributed in three rounds of assistance to 20 Hispanic/Latinx churches and ministries, helping meet urgent needs such as rent, food, transportation, and legal expenses. This generous response reflects the Northern Illinois Conference’s commitment to stand with immigrant siblings in Christ, embodying hope through compassionate action.
Read More"When Fear Knocks, the Church Shows Up: A Chicago Story” tells the stories of how immigrant communities in Northern Illinois struggle to continue working, attending worship, obtaining groceries and other needs, and sending their children to school, and how conference churches have reached out to help.
Read MoreThe Commissions on Religion and Race of the Northern Illinois and Illinois Great Rivers Conferences are partnering to host a Pilgrimage Journey Through the Heart of Illinois, June 25–28, exploring sites that reveal the state’s complex history of racism and resilience. Beginning with an optional Chicago tour, the pilgrimage will visit key locations including a Lincoln-Douglas debate site, the El Paso Voting Rights Museum, Springfield, East St. Louis, and Cahokia Mounds. Designed as both an educational and spiritual experience, the journey invites participants to reflect honestly on the past in order to shape a more just future together.
Read MoreOn Feb. 17, we lost a civil rights icon in Rev. Jesse Jackson. He was a pivotal figure in the history of civil rights organizing in Chicago, but also a global ambassador for racial justice within a fabric of economic opportunity and equal protection under the law.
Read MoreA call went out this week for clergy to come to Minneapolis and protest what is taking place in the Twin Cities. I have given it a great deal of consideration and decided that I need to stand with Somali people and other immigrants to send a message that it is not the actions of bad people that are most damaging; it is the silence of the good people.
Read MoreOver 300 people gathered at Trinity United Methodist Church in Mount Prospect on Jan. 18 for the conference's annual Martin Luther King Jr. celebration, where they affirmed that King’s words and life are still relevant to our Christian witness today.
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