Fourth Church Youth preaching and leading worship

The worship bulletin is available to download and print

In person and streamed from the Sanctuary on our YouTube channel: www.bit.ly/fpcvideos

Audio available by phone (toll free) by calling 888.916.9166

We look forward to Fourth Church youth leading us in worship this Sunday morning!

Due to the increased COVID risk level in Chicago, and consistent with the advice of city health officials, we are recommending, though not requiring, that individuals wear masks during worship and elsewhere on the Fourth Church campus.

in Buchanan Chapel

Rocky Supinger preaching

The worship bulletin is available to download and print

We will welcome Amantha Barbee, Senior Pastor of Oakhurst Presbyterian Church in Decatur, Georgia, as our guest preacher on Sunday morning, June 5.

A leader in the PC(USA), Amantha Barbee sits on the Board of Trustees for Montreat Conference Center as well as the Strategy Team for NEXT Church and is the chairperson of the PC(USA) General Assembly Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Relations. She holds a Master of Divinity from Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond, Virginia, where she earned the E.T. George Award for Excellence in Homiletics and Worship.

We hope you will mark June 5 on your calendar and plan to join us, whether in person or online, for worship with Amantha Barbee!

Several of our ministries are in need of volunteers to make the work of our congregation and Chicago Lights possible.

Fourth Church Jail Ministry is looking for additional volunteers to take part in our Jail Ministry. Those who are interested are invited to attend an informational meeting this Sunday, May 22 at 11:15 a.m. in Room 4F or email jailministry@fourthchurch.org.

For the first time in three years, Fourth Church Youth are taking mission trips this summer, and adult chaperones for the summer trips are urgently needed. The trips are June 26–July 1 (junior high youth to St. Louis) and July 9–16 (senior high youth to Memphis). For details, see www.bit.ly/chaperone4youth; if you are interested in volunteering in this role, please contact Katie Patterson as soon as possible.

As we look to open the Sanctuary on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday afternoons for those seeking a place of respite and prayer as well as those curious to learn more about Fourth Church, we are in need of Sanctuary hosts (five to six per afternoon) to commit to being a welcoming presence. If you can help make this opening possible by volunteering, please contact Tiffany Holmes or sign up for “Sanctuary Opening” via VOMO at www.bit.ly/fpcvolunteers

The Chicago Lights Social Service Center is seeking volunteers to unload food trucks on the second and fourth Monday every month. Volunteers are needed from 8:00 to 10:00 a.m. to transfer food from the Greater Chicago Food Depository truck onto food pantry shelves. If you can lend a hand, please sign up via Vomo or email Jill Keiser.

Our World Mission and Social Justice Council is recruiting volunteers to assist sponsored refugee families coming from conflict areas around the world. Also needed will be some items to help these families settle into a new home. Those who are interested in helping are asked to email refugeeproject@fourthchurch.org.

Fourth Church Shower Ministry and Chicago Lights Social Service Center rely on donated items from Fourth Church members and friends to support their work with guests of these two programs.

Here are their current wish lists:

The Chicago Lights Social Service Center is in particular need of the following items, either new or gently used:

Donations can be dropped off at the church reception desk (enter via the Chestnut Street doors) or shipped, if ordered online, to Chicago Lights Social Service Center, c/o Theresa Thornburg, 126 E. Chestnut St., Chicago, IL 60611.2014.

Fourth Church Shower Ministry is in need of the following unused hygiene items:

Donations can be dropped off at the church reception desk, to the attention of “Shower Ministry.”

Fourth Church offers a variety of ways to connect with one another and this community of faith. Here are just some of those opportunities!

For more information about any of the following, email Simon Crow.

Women at Fourth meets in person this Sunday morning, May 22 at 11:15 a.m. in Room 5G for a time of crafting with the Benevolent Guild while working on projects to support area dementia organizations and HelloBaby. Beginning crafters are especially welcome! For details or to register, go to www.bit.ly/waf0522

Knitting and Crocheting also meets in person this Sunday morning, May 22 at 11:15 a.m. in Room 5B and will include opportunity to pick up yarn for the next project. Knitters and crocheters will then meet again, this time via Zoom, on Tuesday, May 24 at 4:00 p.m.

Benevolent Guild—which has counted among its projects making stuffed animals and taggies for children in the hospital—meets in person this Wednesday morning, May 25 at 10:00 a.m. in Room 5B. If you plan to attend, please email Simon.

Cornerstones, a group for adults fifty and over, will meet via Zoom on Friday evening, June 3 for an interview with Morgan Simmons, former Fourth Church organist, who will reflect on his tenure at Fourth Church and the history of this congregation over the past fifty years. For details, register at www.bit.ly/cornerstones622

Books by Women will meet via Zoom to discuss Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo on Tuesday, June 14 at 6:00 p.m. For Zoom details, email Simon.

The Adult Education Committee invites you to join them for two upcoming opportunities.

In her book The Luminous Web, Barbara Brown Taylor explores the dialogue between science and faith, describing her journey as a preacher learning what the insights of quantum physics, biology, and chaos theory can teach a person of faith.

This four-week class led Lucy Forster-Smith and Jim Ford will discuss and expand on these topics, including why scientists sound like poets and why physicists use the language of imagination, ambiguity, and mystery also found in scripture.

11:15 a.m.–12:15 p.m.

In person and via Zoom

Register online (including for Zoom details) at www.bit.ly/luminousweb22

In her new book, Fortune: How Race Broke My Family and the World—and How to Repair It All, Christian activist Lisa Sharon Harper recovers the beauty of her heritage, exposes the brokenness that race has wrought in America, and casts a vision for collective repair.

Fortune helps readers understand how America was built upon systems and structures that blessed some and cursed others, allowing Americans of European descent to benefit from the colonization, genocide, enslavement, rape, and exploitation of people of color.

Join us as we welcome Ms. Harper for an evening of provocative and insightful discussion.

7:00 p.m. via Zoom

For the Zoom link, register at www.bit.ly/firsttuesday0622

Died February 2022

Died May 1, 2022

As we return to more on-site programming, Fourth Church and Chicago Lights have implemented a new safety and security practice.

Anyone present on the Fourth Church campus is required to wear a campus badge while on site, except on Sundays and for other worship opportunities, concerts, and Meals Ministry meals.

Anyone who does not already have a campus badge when they enter (except for those exceptions noted above) will be asked to pick up a single-day badge at the 126 E. Chestnut reception desk. Reusable badges are being issued by some programs with regular, ongoing weekly programming, such as Chancel Choir. These reusable badges are only available from the staff of those programs, not from the reception desk. Anyone who does not bring their reusable campus badge will be able to pick up a single-day badge.

To facilitate this process—as well as for safety and security reasons—all access to the building is through the 126 E. Chestnut entrance only, except on Sundays and for other worship opportunities, concerts, and Meals Ministry.

Our ongoing commitment to the safety and security of all on our campus undergirds this practice, which was been under discussion since prior to the pandemic. (Implementation was set aside while the campus was largely closed.)

The campus badges and single-entry access point were strongly encouraged by our safety and security consultants and advisors and are also consistent with practices at other large, spread-out, multi-use buildings with spaces and uses like ours. The badges enable us to know who is in the building throughout the day. (Previous unlimited access has at times resulted in unknown individuals hiding in corners of the campus.) The badges also ensure that should we ever have to evacuate the buildings, we will know who was on site and needs to be accounted for.

As a congregation, we value radical hospitality and welcome for all, and we believe an integral component of that is our care for the well-being of those who are present with us. This safety and security practice is but one expression of that. For those who will be joining us on site as programming on campus continues to expand, we look forward to seeing you!