Chicago’s Christian leaders know their congregations may be feeling hopeless and beaten down.
Many of them are planning to address that feeling in their Easter Sunday sermons, urging hope and optimism in the face of fear, anxiety and uncertainty.
“We live in a world today where people experience so many different challenges and obstacles and all kinds of other things, and the message of Easter is all about hope,” said the Rev. Ed Howe of St. Hedwig Church in Logan Square. “It’s about looking past right in front of us to something greater.”
As Christians prepare to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ on Sunday, some priests and pastors have identified similarities between the darkness felt when he was crucified on Good Friday and modern-day heaviness.
But as the Rev. Michael Pfleger, pastor at St. Sabina Catholic Church in Auburn Gresham, plans to remind his congregation Sunday, darkness can be followed by light — just as the crucifixion was followed by the resurrection.
“There was that Good Friday that we can’t ignore, where it seemed hopeless and it seemed like the skies were dark, and fear and hopelessness and had paralyzed people, and it looked like it was all over,” Pfleger said. “But you know that was not the end of the story that Sunday came and it changed everything.”
Mass federal layoffs, the war in Gaza, an economic downturn sparked by President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs, mass deportations and the administration’s crackdown on diversity, equity and inclusion are all examples of the “darkness” weighing on believers, but Pfleger and others are urging them to fight back.
“If we keep our eye just on what we see in the world, we do get overwhelmed,” Pfleger said. “But faith gives you the spiritual vision that’s beyond the world. Faith is what tells you this isn’t the end. Faith is what tells you this doesn’t win. Faith is what tells us that darkness and death don’t have the last word.”
In his sermon, the Rev. Marshall Hatch at New Mount Pilgrim Church in West Garfield Park is planning to focus on the simple message “do not be afraid.” Hatch acknowledged mass layoffs in the federal government and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s admission that she and others are afraid to criticize Trump, stirring anxiety and fear across the country.
In that context, he’ll remind parishioners to lean on one another.
“And so I want the congregation to know that even in the midst of it all, you know, we still have each other,” he said. “We have the church. Christ is risen and somehow we’ll get through this together; do not be afraid. God is with us.”
In the Rev. Michael Nabors’ sermon titled “It’s Just Like the Women Said” at Second Baptist Church in Evanston, he’ll draw parallels between the women who discovered Jesus’ empty tomb and the women who have fought to break barriers in the modern era — specifically, the ones who ran and lost in their bids for the U.S. presidency. Women are under threat of losing their rights, Nabors said, referring to the SAVE Act, a bill that was recently passed by the Republican-controlled House that could make it harder for married women who have changed their name to vote, and the 2022 overturning of Roe v. Wade, which protected the constitutional right to an abortion.
“I will say if we had heeded Hillary Clinton, if we had heeded Kamala Harris, then it could very well be that we would be on a different road leading to a new and brighter day, just like the resurrection, instead of being on a road into the unknown,” he said.
At St. Clement Catholic Church in Lincoln Park, parishioners attending the Rev. Brett Williams’ Mass can expect to hear a resounding call to take the joy and energy from Easter Mass and spread that feeling far beyond Sunday.
“It is our hope that we live as Easter people,” Williams said. “That we take the joy of the resurrection into our own personal lives and relationships and families and friends and colleagues, but also that we, in some way, make sure that the good news of Jesus risen from the dead is spread to our community.”
Williams pointed to the strength and resilience of Pope Francis, who continued his work despite kidney failure and pneumonia that left him hospitalized this year.
“I think his service is inspiring for us Catholic Christians throughout the world that even frail and infirm, he makes an effort to serve. We’ve always [been] called to serve,” Williams said.
For Pfleger, the main message he wants his parishioners to take with them is simple.
“Decide they’re going to live out of their faith and get up on Monday morning and fight like hell.”