Orthodox Church in America (OCA), a denomination of more than 700 Eastern Orthodox churches across North America, seeks a five-year grant for partial support for its Thriving in Ministry Initiative 2018 program, an effort to strengthen the leadership practices of OCA clergy and equip them to be joyful, creative and thriving pastoral leaders for the parish communities they serve. Based on a successful pilot program started in the Diocese of Eastern Pennsylvania in 2015, OCA will establish facilitated clergy peer learning groups throughout the United States. Trained facilitators will guide priests through regular discussions around self-care, spiritual growth, vocational joy and leadership. Clergy spouses will meet with trained facilitators as well. To sustain this program, OCA will charge participants a fee and will ask each diocese to support their participating priests.
The Dakotas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church seeks a five-year grant to support its Higher Ground program. This effort seeks to support rural church pastors by helping them develop and strengthen healthy leadership practices that promote the well-being of congregations and church systems. By focusing on a pastor’s holistic health (spiritual, physical, emotional, financial, social), the conference’s clergy will be better equipped to lead healthier congregations. The conference will walk alongside clergy at key junctures in their careers to help them reassess their calling and leadership gifts, re-engage with their sense of vocation and passion for pastoral leadership, and renew and refocus their ministries. Clergy will begin the year of renewal and refocus at a six-day retreat and will continue meeting with counselors and coaches through the rest of the year in the program. Pastors will participate in individual and group coaching as they put together personal and professional development plans. To sustain this effort, the conference will cultivate individual donors with a vision to support pastors, incorporate elements into its operating budget and reallocate earnings from its endowment.
Pentecostal Theological Seminary seeks a five-year grant for partial support of the PTS Thrive program. This effort will provide coaching and mentoring for younger Pentecostal pastors and offer guidance and support to early and mid-career pastors who are facing challenging pastoral transitions or seeking to extend their congregations’ ministries into their communities. Program activities include: a new system for administrative bishops to coordinate placement of new pastors in Church of God congregations; the cultivation and preparation of mid- and late-career pastors to serve as mentors for their younger colleagues; the matching of younger clergy with seasoned mentors; and the facilitation of regular opportunities for pastors to engage one another in person and online. To sustain this program, the seminary will develop a fee structure for second and third year participants and increase the number of participating pastors to 300 by the final year of the grant.
Project Name:
Strengthening Foundations for Thriving in Ministry
Description:
Eastern Mennonite University seeks a five-year grant to support its Strengthening Foundations for Thriving in Ministry project. By enhancing continuing education opportunities and facilitating training for peer group coaching, Eastern Mennonite will connect local pastors, who serve as mentors and small group facilitators for seminary students, in a peer group with one another and provide training and resources for geographically scattered pastors to start up and facilitate their own peer groups. In addition, the project will create opportunities for more pastors to experience spiritual direction and participate in workshops that focus on thriving, professional transitions and peer group formation. To sustain this work, Eastern Mennonite will seek partnerships with key denominational constituencies and incorporate project activities into its operating budget.
Resilient Leaders Project at The Seattle School of Theology & Psychology strengthens the three streams of resilience — people, practices, and purpose — in the lives of Christian leaders. Over one year, cohorts of 8-16 church workers gather for four multi-day learning modules and monthly peer groups. Resilient Leaders Project provides clergy with opportunities to build relationships; practice spiritual, physical, and emotional fitness; and discern their vocational next steps to build generative communities. Leaders leave the program with deeper self- and other-understanding, expanded capacity to manage stress and change, and tools to create redemptive narratives from their personal and congregational stories. The project is committed to learning about the practice of pastoral resilience and its impact on congregations and communities. To sustain this work, The School’s advancement team will work with a development consultant to cultivate major donors interested in supporting this project.
Esperanza is launching Renovación Pastoral (Pastoral Renewal) a program funded by the Lilly Endowment. Esperanza is a faith-based nonprofit organization driven by the biblical mandate to “serve the least of these.” We strengthen our Hispanic community through education, housing and economic development, immigration legal services, job training and advocacy. Renovación Pastoral supports new pastors in their first years of service to the Latino communities of Philadelphia, Allentown, Bethlehem, Lancaster, and Reading. Through Renovación Pastoral we offer these pastors a sacred space to be affirmed, to learn, and to be nurtured through mentoring that is focused on both spiritual and practical matters. Esperanza connects pastors in their first years of ministry with active and retired long-term pastors who have demonstrated longevity and success in local ministry, helping the younger pastors to transition successfully into congregational leadership, while building a pastoral legacy for the well-seasoned religious leaders of the Latino communities of Southeastern Pennsylvania.