Pilgrim Lutheran Church was recently accepted into MNIPL’s 2026-27 Resilience Hub Community of Practice cohort.

As our Caring for Creation Group and our congregation learn more about what this means for us and for our next year, we thought we’d tell you what we’re headed into. Other MN ELCA congregations have participated, so it’s not like we’re unique -- and yet we are! Congregations are all preparing and responding in their own unique styles. We’d like to introduce you to Resilience Hubs and mention how you may want to be involved, as they evolve throughout the state. We’ll all be meeting together, online mostly, once a month until May. When we’re not meeting, learning, and collaborating, we’ll be internally looking intently at Pilgrim’s 7 Core Values and matching them up with goals, objectives and actions we can accomplish – all in service of helping parishioners, the church, and the wider community more resilient as we encounter, well, what Buff Grace describes below. We plan to use MNIPL’s Amazing 3-Legged Stool of Action** and set ourselves up to be (even more) neighborly and helpful.

Congregation Resilience Hubs with MN Interfaith Power & Light (MNIPL), by Buff Grace, MNIPL Director of Faith Networks

Picture this -- an intense rainstorm dumps inches of water in a few hours.  Basements are flooded, thousands lose electric power, roads washed out, normal services cannot reach the disabled and shut-ins.  Or this-- a week-long heat wave sweeps your city at the same time wildfire smoke blows in from Canada.  People have to close up their homes to breathe, but some homes don't have A/C or filters.  Or this-- A derecho rips through town destroying homes and stores, downing power lines and knocking out cell service.  Where do you go in these situations to reconnect with loved ones, get accurate info about what is happening, check on the most vulnerable, and get help to those who need it most?

As weather events increase in intensify and frequency, more and more congregations are asking themselves, "What can we do to support people in time of need?"  Minnesota Interfaith Power & Light, a long time resource to congregations on environmental issues, has become a leading state resource for faith communities and nonprofit organizations responding to weather emergencies. Partnering with national leaders in the growing field of resilience, and creating relationships with county and regional emergency management staffs, MNIPL can help your congregation be ready with best practices for helping neighbors in a weather disruption.

We know congregations cannot do it all, but we also know people of faith are passionate and loving volunteers.  By planning ahead and the right community partnerships, faith communities can play a vital role in times of emergencies, complementing services that already exist through government and other means. Faith communities have one of the most critical strengths necessary-- community trust and community relationships.  A building can have all the technology bells and whistles, but if people don't know about it, don't trust it as a safe place, or don't have a relationship there, they are not likely to see it as a life line. Many congregations are already serving people whether with meals and food, children's programs, eldercare, immigration services, or other needs. MNIPL can help your congregation prepare and plan for how to keep a service like this running in times of weather disruption.

MNIPL offers three main resources for those interested in resilience hubs:

1-- a monthly webinar on resilience hub topics

2-- an online curriculum that you can explore on your own

3-- a Community of Practice of congregational leaders implementing resilience hub practices in their context who meet monthly to learn and share together (September through May)

Find out more on the MN Interfaith Power and Light website at: https://www.mnipl.org/movement-building/resilience-hubs/

** MNIPL 3-Legged Stool of Action – Practical Action, Advocacy/Systemic Action, and Spiritual/Relational Action