OUR PURPOSE

To partner with mission-driven people and organizations across Cook and Lake counties.

To witness a message of mercy and hope to a world in need through service.

Improve lives and nourish spirits by meeting human needs in a faith-based community of courageous compassion, solidarity, and joy.

Strengthen and empower people, families, and communities by building programs that inspire hope through meaningful and measurable impact.

Create and share opportunities for living out our faith and values through service and accompaniment, community building, dialogue, and debate.

What Compels Us to Serve

The status quo is not ok – growing wealth inequality within the developed economies over the last 30 years is not a sign of human progress.

As humans, we are called to love and care for one another. Each of us is equally cherished and beloved by the Creator of all Life, whom we call God. We are born into families, having been “knit together in our mother’s womb.” (Psalm 139)

Throughout our lives, we each hunger to belong. We are called to community. As Henri Nouwen, a Dutch priest, has written, “Community is first of all a quality of the heart. It grows from the spiritual knowledge that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another.”

At Catholic Charities, we believe that . . .

• Human progress only comes when we work together.
• Money is meant to enable us all.
• The purpose of power is to create positive change, not entitlement and inequality.
• Real progress is slow and hard, but worth the work.
• The time is now.