- The monthly brunch of “Widening Our Welcome,” the Fourth Church LGBTQIA group, this Sunday, April 28
- A Prison Ministry information session also this Sunday, April 28
- An exhibit of Chicago Fair Trade household items as part of World Fair Trade Day this Friday, May 3
- A “Champions for the Great Lakes: Conserving and Restoring the World’s Largest Fresh Water Resource” program this Friday at Cornerstones (registration required by Wednesday, May 1)
The calendar, which is also accessible from the home page of our website, makes it easy to add these and other events to your calendar as well!
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Sunday, April 28:
Second Sunday of Easter
8:00 a.m. Communion
Lucy Forster-Smith preaching
9:30 a.m.
Shannon J. Kershner preaching
11:00 a.m. Confirmation
Shannon J. Kershner preaching
4:00 p.m. Jazz Communion
Joseph L. Morrow preaching
This Sunday will be a particularly special Sunday for many in our community!
During the 9:30 and 11:00 a.m. services, we will be
presenting Bibles to fourth graders.
Also as part of the 9:30 service we will be
recognizing volunteers who gave of their time and talent in 2018 to support the work of Fourth Church.
Then at the 11:00 service we will
welcome the eighth-grade confirmands into the wider life of the congregation.
Afterwards, at 12:15 p.m., children and their families—particularly second graders and their parents—will gather in Buchanan Chapel to learn about the Last Supper and then take part in a brief
Family Communion service.
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If you would like to sing John Rutter’s
Gloria with Tower Brass and the Fourth Church Choral Society, please join us for rehearsals on the next three Thursday evenings!
All singers are welcome to join this community choral group as we prepare for a May 17 concert featuring organ, brass, and choir.
Thursdays, through May 16 | Rehearsals
7:00 p.m.
in Buchanan Chapel
Friday, May 17 | Concert
7:30 p.m.
in the Sanctuary
Freewill donations received at the door
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To all who helped with Holy Week and Easter...
...from ushers to choir members to Sunday School teachers to cider servers to greeters and hosts to those who set up at the beach and those who prepared the Sanctuary, those who planned services and those who streamed worship, and every single person who was involved in the myriad details that go into our Holy Week and Easter observances, thank you!
To all who volunteered with Fourth Church in 2018...
...making our mission and ministry possible through your generous gifts of time and talent, thank you! (The list of those who served as volunteers at the church last year numbers more than 1,000!) We will be recognizing you during the 9:30 a.m. service this Sunday, April 28, and during all the morning Coffee Hours we will be celebrating your contributions.
To all who submitted questions and topics...
...for our “Big Questions” sermon series, we are grateful! Thanks to you, we have a robust list of topics to consider in May and June. What will those be? Keep reading to learn more!
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Earlier this year we invited you to contribute a topic or biblical story to our “Big Questions” collection. Was there something you’d always hoped would be addressed in a sermon, we wondered.
Many of you replied with thought-provoking questions. We have compiled those responses, identified some recurring themes, and are ready to launch our two-month sermon series next week at all four services!
Our first questions, on Sunday, May 5, will be “Why care about creation? Isn’t God in control?”
The following week, May 12, we’ll consider “Are we saved?” And then on Sunday, May 19 we will wrestle with “How can we be church with differing political views?”
Come think about big questions with us!
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Prague; Luther sites in Germany, including Wittenberg and Eisenach; Dresden; the Terezin Memorial; Geneva—all are on our October Reformation trip itinerary.
If you or someone you know would like to explore these places with trip leaders Lucy Forster-Smith and Judy Watt, be sure to sign up soon!
Registration closes in May.
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Come learn with us! We have a variety of new classes and presentations taking place this Sunday and next.
Meditating on the Psalms
Sundays, April 28–May 12
9:30 a.m. in Room 5E
Over the next three weeks, Stephen Hall will lead us in studying different types of psalms, exploring how both praise and lament contribute to an overarching spiritual theme through unique poetic expressions. Come join us as we dig deeper into the “Prayer Book of the Church.”
Marilynne Robinson
’
s
The Givenness of Things
Sundays, April 28–May 12
11:00 a.m. in Room 5E
Considered by many to be one of the foremost cultural and theological voices of our time, Marilynne Robinson is a Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist and a superb essayist. With the help of Jeff Doane, this spring we will dive into four of her essays from her collection
The Givenness of Things—“Reformation,” “Value,” “Experience,” and “Limitation”—essays that help shift our focus from often polarizing interactions to the faith-based values that underlie our current social realities.
Why We March: Stonewall to Today
Sunday, May 5
12:15–1:10 p.m. in Buchanan Chapel
This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, an event in New York City in 1969 that sparked the gay rights movement and international Pride Parades. On the last Sunday of each June, our church marches in Chicago’s Pride Parade. Why is that, and what does it mean to our community?
Come hear the stories of congregants, clergy, and staff from Fourth Church as they reflect on the meaning of Stonewall today as well as our participation in the Chicago Coalition of Welcoming Churches.
Claire Mukundente on Refugees and Aslyum Seekers
Sunday, May 5
12:15 p.m. in Borwell Dining Room
Next Sunday the World Mission and Social Justice Committee invites you to a presentation by Claire Mukundente, a refugee from Rwanda. She will tell her own story as well as talk about her ministry with other refugees and asylum seekers in Chicago.
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As people of God we believe we are called to lovingly care for the world with which we’ve been entrusted. That commitment is something we live out in a variety of ways—whether it is seeking to learn more about how we can be better stewards of the earth or working to make choices that heal and sustain the world in which we live.
This coming Sunday, April 28 we will have opportunity to
view the film
Climate Refugees at 12:30 p.m. in the Bumpus Room. Hosted by our Care of Creation Committee, this screening invites us to consider the impact that climate change has on people forced to leave their home because of drought, desertification, and destruction caused by weather-related events.
The following Sunday, May 5, is
Care of Creation Sunday, when we will have a special focus on earth stewardship. As part of that focus we will be piloting a project to use compostable materials during Coffee Hour.
On Saturday morning, May 11, we will again partner with Working Bikes to sponsor our annual Bike Drive to
collect used bicycles and bicycle parts. These bicycles and parts can be dropped off at the Delaware entrance to the Gratz Center between 9:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. on May 11. The repaired bikes will then be sent on to Africa and Latin America as well as neighborhoods of Chicago, where they will offer a means of transportation to those who might not otherwise have one.
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Next week our May concerts begin with two Friday performances: a free Noonday concert consponsored by Musicians Club of Women followed by a ticketed evening concert by Apollo Chorus with the Chicago Community Chorus as special guest performers.
Friday, May 3 at 12:10 p.m.
in Buchanan Chapel
Elizabeth Start, cello
Friday, May 3 at 7:30 p.m.
in the Sanctuary
Apollo Chorus
Friday, May 10 at 12:10 p.m.
in the Sanctuary
Thom Gouwens, organ
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Death
We give thanks to God for the gift of life eternal.
Lois Schmidt
March 31, 2019
A memorial service will be held
Tuesday, April 30 at 3:00 p.m. at the Clare (55 E. Pearson, at Rush)
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Fourth Presbyterian Church | 312.787.4570 | www.fourthchurch.org
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