Letter from the Bishop of Chicago
May 23, 2024
Dear People of God in the Diocese of Chicago:
I am writing today to share an update about one of the significant projects that awaited me when I became your bishop in 2022: the sale of our diocesan headquarters at 65 E. Huron Street in Chicago.
For many months now, the Very Rev. Lisa Hackney-James, the cathedral’s provost, and I have been leading the Bishop and Trustees of the diocese and the Cathedral Chapter in conversations about how we might move forward together, healing the wounds of the past and envisioning a shared future for our ministry at the corner of Rush and Huron and across our entire diocese. I am grateful to each of the leaders who has given time and energy to this process of discernment.
I am glad to say that we have reached a hopeful stage of this long process, and we now anticipate that St. James Cathedral will purchase 65 E. Huron from the diocese in the coming months. We have agreed on a letter of intent which is not final or binding, but is a good faith agreement to negotiate a sales agreement.
If a sale of the property results from the next stage of our deliberations, the proceeds that the diocese receives would be placed in a fund that would function like an endowment and be governed by the Bishop and Trustees. This fund would support the ministry of our congregations for decades to come by helping to assure the diocese’s long-term financial viability.
As you may remember, the Bishop and Trustees announced their decision to sell 65 E. Huron in September 2020 and listed the property for sale in June 2022. You can read all of the previous updates about this project on our website. As we reach future milestones, we will share them with you via email and on the website.
We ask your prayers for our work as we continue to discern how God is working through our diocese and our cathedral to make all things new.
Faithfully,
The Rt. Rev. Paula Clark
Bishop of Chicago
Letter from the Cathedral Provost
May 23, 2023
Dear Friends in Christ,
It is my privilege and my joy to announce, on behalf of the Cathedral Chapter and leadership of St. James, that we have taken an important and exciting step on the path to securing our historic Cathedral, its vital ministries, and the integrity of the physical campus that has served for more than 175 years as the sacred space from which this historic congregation has lived out God’s mission in the world.
This week, the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago accepted our Letter of Intent (LOI) to purchase 65 E. Huron, the modern building that adjoins St. James Cathedral, and in which our administrative offices and parish gathering spaces currently sit. Our preliminary agreement to purchase the building marks an important commitment to our parishioners, neighbors, and the wider diocesan community—affirming our physical presence in the heart of Chicago to minister to all who are need of the hope and support our faith calls us to provide.
We now enter a period of further negotiation with the hope and expectation that the transaction will reach its final form in the coming months. This agreement is also a tribute to a renewed spirit of cohesion and fellowship with Bishop Clark and other diocesan leaders with whom we have worked closely for the past two years in a commitment to mutual accommodation and stewardship of generational resources. The proceeds we raise will provide much needed support for the good work of the entire diocese.
Buoyed by this development, our capital campaign will now move into a new chapter of focused planning and expanded outreach that will support the purchase of the modern building, as well as fund the separate structural and functional restoration previously envisioned for the historic Cathedral building.
You have often heard me tell the story of St James’ founding families who stood in the ashes of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 looking on the hollow shell of the majestic church they had just weeks earlier completed and dedicated, brought to ground except for the bell tower which remained. Many of them, their homes also wiped out in the catastrophe, vowed to rebuild their church – and they did. In four short years they rebuilt what had previously taken them 20. In October 1875, the people of St. James reconsecrated the structure in which we are blessed to worship to this day.
Our buildings are their legacy, and now our founders’ resolve has been reborn in all of us, with an LOI that represents a new landmark in our history as we work to pass on to future generations the gift that we have received from generations past. Facing the uncertainty that the sale of 65 E. Huron cast upon the future of the Cathedral and its ministries, our congregation and its leaders met the moment again, marshaling the will, the vision, and the initiative to chart a way forward that allows for the mutual flourishing of both cathedral and diocesan community alike, and which continues to welcome both the faithful and the seeker through open doors.
I look forward to sharing more about the path forward in the months ahead. I also ask you to join me in prayers of thanksgiving for this moment, and in ongoing prayers for our Cathedral’s faithful lay leaders, and the success of our efforts to bring our vision to life.
The Very Rev. Lisa Hackney-James,
Provost of the Cathedral
