SOUL believes that our faith calls us to the fight for justice for all, especially those who have historically been marginalized and oppressed. Our mission is to assist low-income people of color in the Chicago Southland to build power, then subsequently leverage that power to fight for their own interest and liberation. We achieve this mission by partnering with congregations, people of faith and local community groups, training them in disciplined organizing strategies, to build leadership, create public policy and foster legislation, engage in direction action, and hold their public officials accountable to the interest of their communities. SOUL is working to build a movement to create change. We have keenly listened to the communities that we serve to develop a shared vision. We are dedicated to the belief that all people deserve decent and affordable housing, access to healthy, nutritious food in every neighborhood, and a sanitary environment where people will be able to breathe clean air and drink clean the water. We are working to create a full-employment economy, so that everyone (despite the color of their skin, their economic demographic, prior criminal history, etc.) has the opportunity to work with access to gainful, sustainable, living-wage employment. We believe that good, quality public education is a right and not a privilege. And we are committed to ensuring that public funds are leveraged fairly, to invest resources in the communities that need them the most and not redistributed to keep local economies beholden to corporate greed.