Delta Sigma Theta Sorority’s embrace of Kamala Harris at their recent conference is all part of being a member of the Divine 9

Last week, an army of thousands clad in red descended upon Philadelphia with a mission that was an equal mix of social justice and socializing.

It was the 54th Eastern Regional Conference of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc., one of the largest historically Black sororities, where more than 5,000 women attended and several thousands joined virtually. Before ending the conference on Aug. 18, the sorors made certain that their impact had been felt not just in the city’s cash registers, but also in several community recreation centers.

The sorority exists, explained Delta Sigma Theta’s regional director, Rosie Allen-Herring, so that there can be “a better quality of life for women and children” in the cities it visits. Allen-Herring is also president of United Way of the National Capital Area, a nonprofit that aims to improve health, education, and economic opportunities for those living in the Washington metropolitan area.

The Deltas also spent the conference spreading their message on the importance of voting.

A public meeting, billed as a discussion on economic impact, became more like a sermon on the sorority’s VOTE Initiative — Visualize, Organize, Trailblaze, and Empower — and the urgent need to help increase turnout at the polls in November.

While reiterating that they were nonpartisan, there was little mystery as to which candidate members favored.

It is the influence of the country’s nine Black Greek fraternity and sorority organizations — colloquially called the Divine 9 — that Vice President Kamala Harris is tapping in her effort to defeat former President Donald Trump in November. Harris is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, another African American sorority, which she pledged in 1986 as an undergraduate at Howard University in Washington.

A recent poll found that Harris has pulled ahead of Trump in Pennsylvania and two other critical battleground states.

» READ MORE: Harris now ahead of Trump in Pennsylvania and two other battleground states, according to new NYT/Siena polls

While she can’t be endorsed by the sororities, her campaign is embraced by the nonprofit National Pan-Hellenic Council, the formal name of the Divine 9, with its 2.5 million active members, who have made a lifetime pledge to social action, civic involvement, and to each other.

“The Divine 9 will always be my family,” Harris wrote on X last summer. In her speech at the Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority national convention this year in Houston, Harris said that “once again, our nation is counting on you to energize, to organize, and to mobilize; to register folks to vote and get them to the polls.”

Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, founded in 1913, started its organization fighting for women’s right to vote and against lynching. The initial founders broke away from the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority to focus on national issues and not just campus concerns. Its philosophy is grounded in Christian principles.

The upcoming election is as critical an issue as any, and the solution includes spiritual help.

“We have two months to decide whether to live or die,” said the former Delta National president, the Rev. Gwendolyn E. Boyd, who emceed the public session.

“I can’t tell you who to vote for but the Bible says: I have set before you life and death and God said choose life,” Boyd said, referring to an Old Testament warning in the Book of Deuteronomy. “I would do what God said if I was you.”

Before the conference officially opened, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority hosted a Community Impact Day for its Safe Haven Project. Sorors fanned out to five recreation centers across the city that have been heavily impacted by gun violence, including the Marian Anderson Recreation Center in South Philadelphia. Each of the selected centers was in predominantly African American communities where half of the families live below the poverty line.

At the Marian Anderson Recreation Center, the sorority helped paint, fix a leaky roof, repair air conditioning units, and clean up the playground. At the four other centers, they donated games, sports equipment, and created reading nooks.

“It is not a one and done,” Allen-Herring vowed, promising that sorors would be checking in on the recreation centers during the year.

Delta Sigma Theta Sorority has more than350,000 members and more than 1,000 chapters globally, including Germany, South Africa, and the United Kingdom. It also has a long history of accomplished women.

Philadelphia’s Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander, who is both the first African American to receive a doctorate in economics and the first African American woman to earn a University of Pennsylvania law degree and to be admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar — was the group’s first national president, from 1919 to 1923.

The long list of famous women who are also sorority members includes Shirley Chisholm — a groundbreaking congresswoman from New York who was also the first African American to seek a presidential nomination from a major political party — and award-winning actress Sheryl Lee Ralph of Abbott Elementary fame.

Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, who pledged as an undergraduate at Lincoln University, is also a member. “Never stop being a sisterhood called to serve,” she said in a videotaped message to her sorors.