It is our mission to celebrate the work of God’s Spirit among us
Through Christian fellowship and service throughout our community,
Practicing a welcoming spirit, honoring each person,
And challenging one another to seek God’s purpose in the world –
With the promise of joy, renewal, and spiritual growth.

— Mission Statement, adopted in January 1996

A Brief History of Hyde Park Union Church

Hyde Park Union Church has a long and distinguished history. The church was organized as the First Baptist Church of Hyde Park in 1874. The founding of the University of Chicago sparked a period of rapid growth in the church as President William Rainey Harper and a long list of early faculty figures joined and took prominent roles in the affairs of the church. By 1894 the church had committed itself to a location at 56th and Woodlawn close to the University; in 1904 the church renamed itself Hyde Park Baptist Church when Hyde Park was annexed into the City of Chicago; and in 1906 it dedicated the impressive sanctuary in which we still worship. In 1926 the older Christian Education wing gave way to the present four-story structure.

During the first half of the twentieth century the church was blessed with the long pastorates of three beloved ministers. Charles W. Gilkey served from 1910 until he became Dean of Rockefeller Chapel in 1928, and Rolland W. Schloerb served from 1929 until his death in 1958. The tenure of Norris L. Tibbetts, from 1923 to 1942, overlapped with the other two. Under their leadership and that of distinguished church members who taught at the University of Chicago, including President Harper, Gerald Birney Smith, and Shailer Matthews, Hyde Park Baptist church was a leading center of liberal Christianity. In the early years of the century the central problems confronting the main Protestant denominations were those of reconciling their Biblical and theological teachings with the flood of critical scholarship on Biblical times and of defining a moral position for the churches that would confront world problems of modern age. The liberal leaders met this challenge by approaching many traditional doctrines with a tolerant skepticism, and by emphasizing the practical teachings of the ministry of Jesus as an approach to social problems. Emblematic of this spirit in our church was the decision in 1926 to receive all serious Christians into membership without regard for mode of baptism or other tests of belief.

As the church faced the second half of this century, however, the critical problems, both for our local church and our national denominations, had shifted. Instead of seeking freedom of belief in a predominately Christian nation, the church faced a need to affirm its saving faith in a resolutely secular society, while at the same time resisting movements to either side that denied the possibility of combining faith with social conscience. The pressure to choose between social action and traditional religious teachings became especially strong in the 1960s, but our church chose to maintain a traditionally Biblical ministry while continuing to emphasize our social conscience. Accordingly, our pastors since 1958—E. Spencer Parsons (1959-1965), Robert G. Middleton (1965-1971), Edgar A. Towne (1972-1975), David L. Bartlett (1975-1979), W. Kenneth Williams (1981-1984), and Susan B.W. Johnson (1985-present)—have combined their respective theological stances with a continued liberal position and activism. In 1963, the church affiliated with the United Church of Christ and, in recognition of its dual association, changed its name to Hyde Park Union Church.

For more than 40 years the church has participated as a congregation in theological education and pastoral formation. In 2000, the church expanded upon its role as a “field education” site for area seminary and the University of Chicago Divinity School students and became a “teaching church” in the Lilly Endowment’s Transition into Ministry program for new pastors. This dedication to the future of ministry expresses our church’s continued commitment to both biblically-based and practical theology.