The oldest church in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood celebrated a major renovation and marked the start of a new future on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Wicker Park Lutheran Church raised more than $1 million to upgrade its space \u2013 making it more accessible to everyone. Located on the corner of Hoyne Avenue and LeMoyne Street, the 120-year-old church has been a constant for the community.<\/p>\n
On Sunday morning, its members, neighbors and donors gathered to celebrate the renovation, which the pastor called transformational. <\/p>\n
“It really was at a place in the early 2000s where we were going to close as a congregation, the city wanted to condemn the building,” Pastor Jason Glombicki said. “To come from that to the largest renovation improvement of $1.4 million is incredible.”<\/p>\n
The church is now ADA compliant, featuring a new entrance, elevator and accessible bathroom, making the space open to all.<\/p>\n
“We\u2019ve had individuals miss weddings, baptism, members who couldn\u2019t get into the building,” Glombicki said. “Even people who have temporary disabilities, they break a leg or something like that.”<\/p>\n
The church’s windows were also upgraded, and stunning stained glass \u2013 a focal point \u2013 was completely restored.<\/p>\n
“To make sure that window was stabilized and restored was just so important, because not only can you see it from the inside, but it makes such a difference to the community, people walking by,” said Tammi Franke, president of Wicker Park Lutheran Building Friends.<\/p>\n
Church members raised over 50% of the money for the upgrades, surpassing the goal of $1.4 million dollars.<\/p>\n
“It\u2019s been a long journey, but we made it, such a success to complete our fundraising goals,” Franke said. “It\u2019s just been amazing.”<\/p>\n
A place for worship and weddings, concerts and summer camps, the church now stands as a refreshed cornerstone of the community.<\/p>\n
“We couldn\u2019t be more happy to be with people and be a place for all,” Glombicki said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The oldest church in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood celebrated a major renovation and marked the start of a…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":803758,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5124],"tags":[960,5386,1818,15657],"class_list":["post-803757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chicago","tag-chicago","tag-il","tag-illinois","tag-wicker-park"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116592252489231131","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=803757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803757\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/803758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=803757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=803757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=803757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}