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Students Serve Communities in Chicago on Jesuit Day of Service
In February, Loyola Academy students joined their peers from Christ the King, Cristo Rey and St. Ignatius College Prep high schools to participate in a special Jesuit Day of Service.
St. Ignatius hosted this year’s event, which began with Mass celebrated at Holy Family Church in Chicago. After Mass, students met peers from other Jesuit high schools and reviewed the mission statements of their service sites and their assignments for the day.
At Cornerstone Community Outreach (CCO), for example, students sorted donations and prepared and served food to those who reside at the center. CCO was founded in 1989 to raise the quality of life for low-income residents in the Uptown area of Chicago. Today, its programs have expanded to serve nearly 500 men, women and children daily.
Another group spent the day at Pacific Garden Mission, the nation’s oldest rescue mission on Chicago’s Near South Side. Founded in 1877, the organization meets the physical, emotional and spiritual needs of homeless and hurting men, women and children. Here, students changed sheets for over 1,000 shelter beds.
Breakthrough Urban Ministries in Chicago’s East Garfield Park neighborhood partners with those affected by poverty to build connections, develop skills and open doors of opportunity. The organization mentors over 580 urban youth and serves over 70,000 meals to the homeless every year. At this site, student volunteers prepared and served food and helped with cleanup projects.
Junior Jacob Jalloway visited St. Columbanus Food Pantry in the Park Manor and Greater Grand Crossing neighborhoods. “Our job was to prepare bags of groceries that would be distributed the next day,” Jalloway says. “It took 10 of us three hours to pack 500 bags, and it would have taken the man we were helping much longer had we not been there. I learned that seemingly small tasks can make a big difference.”
Grace Harlan ’18 performed service work at Our Lady of the Angels (OLA) in Humboldt Park. While her group spent most of the day outside cleaning up around the church, what was most meaningful to Harlan was the time spent speaking with the nuns who live and work at OLA. “They were so easy to talk to and they remarked on the neighborhood of Humboldt Park,” she recalls. “Even though it is considered a ‘bad’ neighborhood, everyone says hello to each other on the streets, something you don't see in many other places. I had an incredible experience on the Jesuit Day of Service, and hopefully I will get the chance to go back to OLA to serve the community of Humboldt Park and be able to speak with the sisters again.”
In total, 171 student volunteers worked at 12 service sites.
“The Jesuit Day of Service provided an opportunity for our students to live out the values of Ignatian spirituality—specifically, to care for the person and to be women and men for others,” says Loyola Academy Campus Minister Mr. Lyle Baier. “The day is about the relationships that are formed, whether it is from someone at a service site or a fellow student from one of the other Jesuit schools.”
After a full day of service work, groups returned to St. Ignatius College Prep where student leaders offered reflections on the experience and the impact of service work. The day ended with a closing prayer.
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