What is the Pilgrim Fellowship?
PF is an organization sponsored by First Congregational Church, UCC of Des Plaines for the high-schooled aged students of the church and community. While being faith-based, we are open to anyone who wishes to participate in our activities, and have traditionally had a large contingent of members who are not affiliated with First Congregational Church itself. We do activities of amazing variety, all with one goal in mind - to nurture each individual spiritually, physically and mentally with friendship and love. PFers are accepted for who they are, and not who they might think they are "expected" to be.

PF Membership Requirements:

The PF and it's activities are open to anyone who wants to participate. There are 3 perks to actually being a member of the PF.

1) You get to attend the spring and fall retreat, and the summer trip
2) As seniors, you get the PF cross presentation
3) As graduates, you get college care packages

Currently the membership comprises:

1) All those who were on the PF Church list and attended at least 2 events during the year
2) Anyone in the current confirmation class at FCC
3) Anyone who was active (3+ events) in Junior PF last year, is now in high school, and wishes to continue to be a part of this group.

PF is not a closed group. We encourage everyone to bring friends to events and introduce them to all of us. Visitors will be considered for membership on an individual basis, using the following criteria:

1) They must have attended at least 3 PF events
2) The PFer who brought them as a visitor/guest must be comfortable with having them in the group
3) The prospective PFer and his/her parent(s) must meet with the one of the co-youth group leader and be interested and comfortable with joining the PF

Events

There are a lot of events scheduled throughout the year. Some have dates assigned already, others will be scheduled later. These are split into three major categories: fun activities, service activities, and fundraisers. There is generally no cost associated with service activities and fundraisers, but there is a nominal fee with some of the fun activities. These fees offset the cost actually accrued during the activity, and are set as reasonably low as possible for each one.

We try to play approximately two Senior PF events a month throughout most of the year. Occasionally there will be multiple events in a week, and some times (such as finals or beginning of school) when we won't schedule any PF activities. Some of these events are held jointly, either with Junior PF or the Post-PF (PFers who have graduated from high school in the past 7 years), but most of them are Sr. PF only.

Financial Aid

Please not that there is scholarship money available for ALL activities and trips. The goal is to ensure that any PFer who wishes to participate in any event is able to do so, without worrying about finances unnecessarily. Just speak to Matt Cameron or Christopher Grice, or any other Program Staff at the church. All scholarships is kept confidential.