Request for Heart to Heart Lending Closet Donations
Wheelchairs Needed
The Heart to Heart Lending Closet is looking for donations of wheelchairs, transport chairs, and rollators to loan to those in need.
If you know of anyone no longer using this equipment, please contact Laurie Hasbrook at the Lending Closet office at 773.973.5464.
Heart to Heart Ministry Mission Statement
In 1986, social worker Mary Ann Collins and a few other women from St Gertrude parish realized that their older Edgewater neighbors needed broader community assistance with grocery shopping and getting to/from medical appointments and procedures. Thus, the Heart to Heart Seniors Ministry was born.
The mission of Heart to Heart is to provide screened and caring volunteers who assist older adults throughout the Edgewater/Rogers Park neighborhoods so that they can remain independent and connected to our community for as long as possible. This contact with our staff and volunteers also reduces feelings of isolation and loneliness which so many of our seniors are experiencing. Additional volunteer services can now include visiting seniors, making well-being telephone calls to them, and sending greeting cards celebrating important events in their lives. When needed, we also make referrals to supportive services and/or public agencies on behalf of seniors who need them.
All Heart to Heart staff members and volunteers have completed VIRTUS training, a program created by the Catholic Church and monitored by staff of our Archdiocese to protect vulnerable populations such as Seniors. Additionally, our volunteers and staff must also complete ongoing monthly VIRTUS trainings to maintain compliance with this program. Each volunteer and staff member has received all COVID-19 vaccinations currently available.
Our volunteers thus enrich their own lives by sharing their abilities and talents to make a real difference in the lives of the seniors they serve.
Ministry of Prayer
Help Needed from Our Homebound and Physically Restricted Parishioners
Did you know that there is a special and valued ministry that needs participants, particularly our homebound and physically-restricted parishioners? There are no meetings or dues required, yet the members have a valued connection to parish life by enriching others and themselves through their own dedicated, daily prayer time!
It works like this—we provide our committed participants with a prayer book and a monthly guide sheet reflecting some of the prayer requests taken from St. Gertrude Church’s Prayer Wall. Our prayer angels become an unseen blessing for so many! We welcome anyone’s interest in this caring ministry.
Call 872.296.2537 for more information.
