Our Commitment to Social Justice
Agape invited Radical Disciples – women and men who helped create extraordinary programs to help others – to speak to our community during the seasons of Advent and Lent. They shared their passions with us, and we are sharing our resources with them.
friends of imiliwaha
For Advent 2022, Agape worked with Friends of Imiliwaha to raise funds that would provide health insurance for 20 faculty and staff members of two elementary schools in Tanzania, in East Africa.
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As the world continued to face the Covid-19 pandemic, it was important that we provide healthcare to all parts of the world. We found the schools and their lack of health coverage through a community member who belongs to the Friends of Imilwaha, a group in the northwest Chicago suburbs that has supported the nuns who founded the schools. Agape is proud to have raised enough money to provide health coverage in such a critical time.
Lasagna love
During Advent 2021, Agape worked with Lasagna Love, a nonprofit movement that delivers homemade lasagna to families in need. Thanks to our talented community of top culinary chefs and homemade bakers, we were able to show our love through food to those in need.
To learn more about Lasagna Love, visit www.lasagnalove.org.
Salt and Light Coalition
Dr. Izabel Olsen, the founder and CEO, started this unique program in 2017 to help survivors of sex trafficking recover from their traumas, finish their educations and obtain employment. Dr. Olsen, who grew up as the daughter of a political prisoner in Brazil, began teaching yoga to female inmates in the Cook County jail system while she was pursuing a doctorate at Northwestern. She met so many women who had been forced into trafficking as young girls that she decided to devote her career to helping them.
Salt & Light now works with cohorts of young women called ‘Thrivers,’ helping them move on from past abuses into confident new lives. You can meet them, and Dr. Olsen and her staff, on the Coalition’s website: saltandlightcoalition.com
Dr. Izabel Olsen
The Fred Outa Foundation
Susan Vaickowski and Fred Outa
In 2004, before Susan Vaickauski became a womanpriest, she and a daughter traveled to Kenya to do volunteer work in that African country’s largest slum. There, they met Fred Outa, who had been a poor local orphan when an American couple befriended him and brought him to the U.S. for an education. Fred returned to Kenya, where he started a school and Susan founded the Fred Outa Foundation in 2005 to assist him.
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Today, that school serves 450 elementary-aged children. Outa is serving in the Kenyan senate, and the Fred Outa Foundation has evolved into helping outstanding Kenyan girls continue their educations through high school and college. You can learn about sponsoring a girl or make other donations through their website: fredouta.org
Just Haiti
Kathy McGourty was a master’s student at the Catholic Theological Union in 2009 when she discovered KDB, a program that connects coffee growers in Haiti with U.S. supporters. She introduced KDB to her local church, then traveled to Haiti herself to meet the coffee growers and their families. In response to the devastation wrought by recent natural disasters, Kathy and other Just Haiti board members launched a university-level scholarship program for children of members of the coffee growers’ association. Early recipients are using their new skills to help rebuild their country. You can support them by ordering fair trade Haitian coffee or by making a donation at https://www.justhaiti.org/
Kathy McGourty & Haitian Coffee Grower
Journeys | the road home
Beth Nabors
Beth Nabors, executive director of Journeys, an organization that serves the homeless of the 37 towns in north and northwest Cook County, is overseeing the construction of a building to provide services for all the area’s homeless. When completed, the two-story building in Palatine will contain a healthcare center, offices for other support services and apartments for temporary shelter and, in some cases, permanent homes.
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Although the pandemic limited Journeys’ options, the organization continued to serve our neediest residents throughout the long COVID months. For more information or to make a donation, check out their website at journeystheroad home.org
The Greenlining Campaign
The goal of Richard Townsell, the executive director of the Lawndale Christian Development Corporation, is to reduce the inequity in home ownership for Black people. For centuries, Redlining – designating areas of Chicago where Black families are denied mortgages – has prevented them from building the equity in their homes that white homeowners take for granted. To counter this, Townsell’s LCDC, United Power for Action and Justice and a coalition of religious organizations launched a campaign they called Greenlining: a program to build affordable single-family homes within the city that working class Black families can purchase.
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Chicago agreed to release 1000 city lots in Lawndale to the project, and the first two houses are finished; permits for two more have been granted. The Lawndale Christian Development Corporation’s website tells more at https://lcdc.net
Viator House of Hospitality
Corey Brost
Agape’s frequent presider, Father Corey Brost, has been the executive director of Viator House of Hospitality since its founding in 2017. Viator House’s unique mission is to offer a safe and supportive environment for young men who have come to the United States seeking asylum from violence in their own countries.
Once they reach age 18, young asylum-seekers are placed in adult detention facilities where they can spend months, or even years, waiting for an official ruling on their fates. Viator House, in Arlington Heights, provides an enriching alternative by offering a place to live, opportunities to learn about American culture, a path to finishing their educations and a way to cultivate jobs skills. So far, Viator House has served over 70 asylum-seekers from 19 countries and four faith backgrounds. The two newest arrivals came from Afghanistan. To learn how to volunteer with, or donate to, Viator House, see viatorhouseofhospitality.com
Warm Hearts
Intentional Eucharistic Community
At Agape, we take tithing seriously. We make sure we donate to those in need on a regular basis. Recently, the Agape community recently purchased 17 new, warm winter coats for the Community Crisis Center in Elgin.
Advent 2022
Learn the prophesy. All our lives we've heard that the birth of Jesus was predicted by the Hebrew Prophets of the Old Testament. Who were these prophets and what can we learn from them to help us celebrate Christmas today?
Kenneth Seeskin, emeritus Professor of Jewish Civilization and former chair of the Philosophy Department at Northwestern University will introduce us to these remarkable (and annoying!) men.
Teen and Family Donation Event
The Holy Family was forced to leave its homeland and travel to a foreign land. Had it not been for the kindness of others to provide food and shelter, Christmas may never have happened.
Today, more than 100,000 unaccompanied young children arrive in our nation each year, and the Viator House of Hospitality provides food, shelter, clothing, case management, and spiritual support to help young immigrant men to develop the talents needed to contribute to society.
We hoped to provide enough gifts for 30 young men, wrap them out of the dignity of the human person and deliver them by Christmas.
On December 23, we gathered in person to assemble donations, write handwritten notes for each recipient, wrap them out of dignity, and pray over the bags while enjoying hot chocolate, coffee/tea, and cookies.
