Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization Information

The Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO) is a multi-issue national ecumenical agency, which was founded in 1967 by progressive church leaders and activists. For more than four decades, the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO) has assisted hundreds of community organizations and public policy groups - by providing technical assistance, training organizers, making and administering grants, and using our global network of grassroots organizers, clergy, and other professionals to advance the struggles of oppressed people for justice and self-determination. For nearly half a century, IFCO has assisted the poor and disenfranchised in developing and sustaining community organizations to fight human and civil rights injustices. This work includes education about the realities of the poor in the US and the third world and to organize and to assist local communities who are organizing around issues of racial, social, and economic justice. IFCO's mission is to support the disenfranchised in developing and sustaining community organizations to fight human and civil rights injustices. In pursuit of this mission, IFCO promotes, funds and coordinates domestic and international community development efforts - programs designed to improve people's own communities. The first national foundation directed and controlled by people of color, IFCO has acted as a bridge between predominantly mainline churches and community groups conceived of and run by people of color; as a broker for the channeling of interdenominational support; and as a resource bank supporting the work of congregations and organizations engaged in the work of community-building. IFCO has acted as a monitor, supporting self-determination by the poor, the hungry, and the exploited and insuring that their needs are not sacrificed for the priorities of the privileged in American society. IFCO has acted as a catalyst and a conscience in the movement for social justice.