UPDATE on Partners:
Chicago Office (continued)
Finalists for the first annual Halo Award from Partners
were recognized at the closing of the conference.
The award recognizes outstanding achievement by a
house of worship leveraging its space for community
impact. The finalists, a diverse group of congregations
and parishes from the city and suburbs, have each
drawn on the gifts, talents, and time of their members
to find innovative strategies for using their space
to create a better life for those in their community.
Each congregation has healed lives through service,
one member at a time, one neighbor at a time, and
has strengthened the social, spiritual, physical – and
financial – well being of their communities.
The finalists for the first annual Halo Award are flanked by Gianfranco
Grande, Partners’ Vice President for Philanthropy and Business
Development (l.), and Robin Whitehurst, a principal at Bailey Edward (r.).
The messages of the morning were reinforced over lunch,
where attendees were able to mingle at a dozen vendor
booths set up in Quinn Chapel’s fellowship hall. Vendors
in attendance ranged from structural engineers to stained
glass experts, painting conservators to roofers. All vendors
were on hand to address specific concerns brought to them
by faith leaders, as well as provide more general advice on
maintenance, preservation, and renovation projects.
In the afternoon, a team of panelists helped take attendees
from inspiration to reality, providing practical advice
about how to best implement the lessons of the morning
lectures. The first panel, featuring leaders from Landmarks
Illinois, the City of Chicago, and experts in licensing and
legal issues related to sacred places, tackled the basics of
space-sharing relationships. The second, featuring funders
from the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC)
Chicago, The Retirement Research Foundation, and the
Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, advised attendees how to
identify and secure funding for their partnerships. Quinn
Chapel’s leadership, Pastor James M. Moody and his wife
(and Partners’ board member), Corlis S. Moody, sat on
both panels, providing critical insight into their successful
navigation of these issues during their recent fundraising
and renovation project.
13 • Sacred Places • www.sacredplaces.org • Winter 2013
The winner of the first annual Halo Award was St.
Pius V Parish in Pilsen, which was commended
for leveraging its budget and building in service
to the community, for its impressive halo effect,
and for being a highly significant resource to the
neighborhood.
With the presentation of the award, along with a check for
$1,000 to St. Pius V, the conference came to a close. \