Project Second Century:
Called to Love and ServeA bold initiative to facilitate the expansion
of programming at Fourth Presbyterian Church
Important Congregational Meeting
All members are encouraged to attend!Sunday, September 19, 2010
at 12:00 noon
The Session of Fourth Presbyterian Church has called
a special meeting of the congregation for September 19.
The purpose will be to hear and act on a report
from the P2C Steering Committee.
Upcoming Meeting
Media Coverage of P2C
P2C Steering Commitee Presentation: June 27, 2010
Gensler Design Presentation: June 27, 2010
Programming Document by Gensler
Updates
Introduction
Background
Contacts
Media Coverage of P2C
Blair Kamin in the Chicago Tribune
August 16, 2010:
“Fourth Presbyterian Ready to Unveil Design for a Five-Story Addition”
August 23, 2010:
“An Expansion Plan Done Right:
Fourth Presbyterian Plan Strikes the Right Balance between Old and New”
Chicago Sun-Times
August 17, 2010
“Landmark Comes Back from the Drawing Board”
Chicago Skyline
August 18, 2010
“Plans Met with Applause at Community Meeting”
P2C Steering Committee Presentation: June 27, 2010
Presentation made by the Project Second Century Steering Committee
at the June 27, 2010, congregational information meeting.
Gensler Design Presentation: June 27, 2010
Building design as presented by the architect, Gensler,
at the June 27, 2010, congregational information meeting.Programming Document by Gensler
Building recommendations and guiding principles,
as well as a detailed overview of Fourth Church’s programmatic space needs,
based on in-depth interviews with program committees and staff
conducted winter/spring 2010.
Updates
December 2009In the spring of 2009, Fourth Presbyterian Church completed a strategic planning process, called Refreshing the Vision, which looked at the entire life of our congregation with a view to the future to which God calls us.
That planning process looked at everything this church does here and in the world and identified the central and immediate need for Fourth Church as more space—additional, well-designed, efficient space:
- Classrooms for our growing Sunday School and youth programs, which have dramatically outgrown our current facilities
- Seminar and classrooms for adult education
- Meeting rooms for the many church and outside groups that meet here
- A versatile chapel space for worship, lectures, and recitals
- A dining room and kitchen facilities and a spacious, welcoming hub, a gathering place, for our growing congregation
So the Session and Trustees established a committee to address those needs and named the project Project Second Century (P2C), marking this congregation’s second century here on Michigan Avenue, which will begin in 2014.
The P2C Steering Committee established three subcommittees—Building, Finance, and Communications—and they went to work. On Tuesday, December 1, 2009, those committees made a very exciting progress report to the Session and Trustees and presented basic concepts for a new four-story, 80,000-square-foot building on the west side of our property where the parking lot, Counseling Center, and Westminster House are now located.
Other immediate needs include the rebuilding of our magnificent Aeolian Skinner pipe organ, treasure badly in need of an overhaul; the replacement of the nearly 100-year-old sanctuary roof; and the need to add to our endowment to support the new building and the programs that will go into it.
The total estimated cost is a big number: $48 million. We have $16 million in the bank from Project Light five years ago. So the challenge is approximately $32 million. In the time immediately ahead, we will be having the preliminary planning and strategic conversation with church leaders necessary to launch a capital campaign later in 2010.
We will be choosing an architect in the weeks ahead, and our intent is to develop final designs and plans for the new building during the second quarter of 2010, to be brought to Session and Trustees and the congregation in June 2010.
This progress report and the recommendations of the P2C Steering Committee were unanimously and enthusiastically approved by the Boards, and we will continue to keep all of you apprised of developments as we boldly move forward into this congregation’s second century on Michigan Avenue.
There are exciting and challenging days ahead for Fourth Presbyterian Church. I welcome them and ask for your prayers for this important and faithful initiative.Faithfully,
John M. Buchanan, Pastor
December 2009
Project Second Century: Called to Love and Serve is underway and gaining momentum here at Fourth Presbyterian Church. This project is our congregation’s initiative to expand our programs, service, and presence in the city. It is an undertaking committed to realizing the congregation’s vision to expand our facilities to address the space needs we see year round as our building bursts at the seams with lively activity. And it also an undertaking committed to furthering our mission of hospitality, proclamation, and service, to be a light in the city expressing Christ’s love.
Many dedicated volunteers and staff members are working long and hard on Project Second Century. “P2C” as we have come to call it (Presbyterians never saw an acronym they didn’t love) grows out of Refreshing the Vision, the long-range planning process in which more than 150 church members participated last fall and spring, sharing hopes and dreams for Fourth Presbyterian Church. The project—our vision for our time—takes its name from the anniversary, in 2014, of Fourth Church’s presence on Michigan Avenue, the beginning of our second century. It represents our hope to express our congregation’s sense of call to love and serve—here, on this busy intersection and around the world.
Nearly forty Fourth Church members are currently working on Project Second Century, under the leadership of the Steering Committee led by Beth Davis. Refreshing the Vision chairs Juli Crabtree and Andy McGaan are members of the Steering Committee, as well, as are David Crawford, Lloyd Culbertson, Doug Grissom, and Maggie Lewis. Beth Davis also chairs the Building Committee, which is conducting a thorough examination of space requirements, leading to a design for an expanded facility on Michigan Avenue. Doug Grissom chairs the Finance Committee, assigned to identify financial requirements to provide physical expansion and sustain new programs in new and expanded space. A Communications Committee led by Maggie Lewis will work on providing timely information about the project for members, friends, and neighbors.
As we approach the close of our first century on Michigan Avenue and plan to live faithfully and boldly into our second century, these are busy and exciting and meaningful times, ensuring that the wonderful light in the city will shine brightly in all the years ahead.Faithfully,
John M. Buchanan, Pastor
Summer 2009Background
Project Second Century: Called to Love and Serve“There is no church at all, unless it has a sense of mission.” That was a favorite phrase of Elam Davies, who served as Pastor of Fourth Presbyterian Church for more than two decades. That sense of mission has been alive since Fourth Church opened its doors on Michigan Avenue nearly a century ago and is today as real and vital as ever. It can be seen and experienced in so many ways: an inspiring message from the pulpit on Sunday morning; a warm meal served to a hungry person who’s come in off the street; the light in a child’s eyes as she shares a moment with her longtime tutor in the church basement; the joyful noise coming from a youth choir or a crowded Sunday school class; the connections made at the community garden in the Cabrini-Green neighborhood and on the mission trips that send Fourth Church members out into Chicago neighborhoods as well as around the world. All of it is done in an effort to reflect Christ’s inclusive love.
That vision of love and service is alive and growing at Fourth Church—growing so much, in fact, that it is creating unique and wonderful challenges. Teachers in those crowded Sunday school classes can’t hold circle time because there’s not enough room to make one. More space is needed to hold the Bible studies and classes, meetings and counseling sessions, that nurture people in the faith journey. The desire to expand such social services as free meals and tutoring faces the limits of what a nearly 100-year-old church can accommodate.
So, inspired by its heritage and embracing the challenge to be a light in the city for another 100 years at the corner of Michigan and Delaware, Fourth Presbyterian Church has launched a bold initiative to expand its programs of service and its presence in the city. Project Second Century: Called to Love and Serve is a response to this congregation’s vision to grow physically and therefore to expand our ability to be a welcoming and serving community that embodies Christ’s love and compassion.
While our collective response to God’s unconditional love is typically expressed in actions—worship, prayer, service, and education—a careful and intentional congregation-wide visioning process clearly identified that in order to do all that, in order to carry out our call, we need space. We will not be able to provide for our current needs—let alone fulfill the vision of expanding our programs—if we do not address the urgent need for more space. Project Second Century: Called to Love and Serve is organized to enable us to do that, to expand our mission and build on the important legacy handed down to us.
In a very real sense, Fourth Presbyterian Church grew up with the city of Chicago. Our first worship service was held on October 8, 1871, the day of the Great Chicago Fire. The conflagration consumed the church building, but like the city itself, the congregation quickly rebuilt, grew, and thrived. Later, in 1914, the congregation moved into a majestic new building on North Michigan Avenue, proving to be a vibrant and vital part of the growing city. Fourth Church has always been a part of the fabric of the city, feeding the hungry, serving the underserved, ministering to the sick and lonely, and inspiring so many through word and deed.
During World War II, it was Fourth Church that opened its doors to provide a worship space for Japanese-Americans who had nowhere else to turn, with the Pastor at the time, Harrison Ray Anderson, literally standing guard out front to ensure the worshipers would not be impeded. At the height of the civil rights movement in the turbulent 1960s, Fourth Church, under the leadership of Elam Davies, expanded its outreach to the surrounding community rather than turn inward, launching the Tutoring program and Day School, among other programs. Toward the end of the century and into the new one, the church’s mission of social justice and inclusion only grew, with the congregation doubling in size under John Buchanan and expanding the role of women as clergy and in important lay roles. Dr. Buchanan also extended a relationship with a nearby synagogue and led an emotional and meaningful interfaith worship service with Jewish and Muslim leaders following the September 11 attacks on the United States.
Today the work of Fourth Presbyterian Church continues to take many forms and tell many stories. There is the couple who was married at Fourth Church and later moved to London but returned to have their first child baptized here, in this faith community that is still home to them. For them and for so many, Fourth Church is part of their family. There is the young woman from a disadvantaged background who heads off to college after spending years in the Tutoring program. There are Fourth Church pastors who visit the sick and lonely, and there is the former Deacon who, in retirement, serves in a health clinic in Cameroon providing vital services and helping stem the tide of AIDS in Africa. There is meaningful preaching during Sunday morning services that motivates parishioners to effect change, and there are concerts and nontraditional services that stir the soul.
Much of the Fourth Church outreach and service is facilitated through Chicago Lights, which oversees the Tutoring program, the Center for Life and Learning, the Center for Whole Health, and the Elam Davies Social Service Center. Chicago Lights also helps run programs of literacy and arts at grade schools on Chicago’s Near North Side and at the Nancy B. Jefferson Alternative School, which serves juvenile detainees. Each year Chicago Lights serves more than 27,500 healthy meals; provides more than 23,000 hours of tutoring and mentoring for children from economically disadvantaged neighborhoods; offers more than 1,700 people health and wellness services; serves more than 7,000 people and brings together more than 1,000 volunteers, who are uplifted by serving.
The goal of Project Second Century: Called to Love and Serve is to ensure this service not only continues but grows and that the church remains a relevant and thriving part of the city. A thorough examination of space requirements, which will lead to an expanded facility on Michigan Avenue, is already underway. This effort also includes study of the financial requirements not only for a physical expansion, but also for what is necessary to support and sustain new programs, including adding to the endowment. Further, full examination of all options related to the asset that is the Chicago Avenue property owned by Fourth Presbyterian Church is underway. This includes articulation of a compelling strategic vision for the urban mission that may be based there and the sequencing and timing of the implementation of that vision, including funding requirements.
The form of the new facility on Michigan Avenue is not yet known. What we do know is that our response to God’s call to love and serve is one we faithfully take up from our predecessors, who recovered after the devastation of the Great Chicago Fire and later had the bold vision to meet great need by building a new church. In turn, we build on their actions and work to continue the story for those who will hear their call long after we’ve made our response.
Questions and comments about Project Second Century can be directed to the P2C committee chairs, Beth Davis, Doug Grissom, and Maggie Lewis, or to Rob Holben, Director of Business Administration (312.274.3821).