Project Directory

Hartford Seminary’s five year clergy grant program, Thriving in Poor Soil: Creating a Pastoral Innovation Network  of  New  England  (PINNE), is an effort  to  foster  and  sustain  clergy  excellence  by enhancing  the  creativity  and  leadership  skills  of  innovative  pastors. Younger clergy who are three to ten years into their ministry career and who are engaged in innovative congregation-based  ministries  will  build  and  sustain  relationships  with  peers  and  mentors  where  they  can  explore challenges  of  ministry  in  New  England,  share  creative  ideas,  and  receive  support  from  each  other. Through regular gatherings, coaching, ongoing virtual communication, and the voluntary undertaking of a project of congregational change this project hopes to increase the level of creativity and spiritual energy of participants while also disseminating the learnings to clergy and denominations across New England. In addition, PINNE will host two conferences, create a website, support a Facebook page and participate in judicatory events where we will share the most innovative ideas on thriving in ministry and vital approaches with other pastors throughout the region. To sustain this effort beyond the grant, the Seminary will seek denominational funding for participants and incorporate elements of the PINNE program into its doctor of ministry degree program.

Leadership Roundtable, a faith-based nonprofit that works within the Roman Catholic Church, seeks a three-year grant for partial support for its Latino Pastoral Leaders Initiative program.  This endeavor will assist Roman Catholic Latino pastoral leaders early in their careers to thrive in their vocations and thus strengthen their leadership skills and enhance the well-being of the multiethnic congregations they serve.  The program will provide 40 to 48 Latino priests and lay ministers with leadership and management training and resources, opportunities to engage with peers at the same stage in their ministerial careers, and support from coaches and mentors in their region.  Leadership Roundtable will integrate the program into its overall fundraising strategy to sustain this program.

The University of the South (Sewanee), affiliated with the Episcopal Church, seeks a five-year grant for its Thriving in Ministry Mentoring Network and Continuing Education Program. Based at the university’s School of Theology, the program seeks to facilitate effective collaborative mentoring for clergy serving rural communities, clergy in Latino ministries, clergy in African-American ministries, and clergy with nontraditional theological educations. The pastors will meet annually at Sewanee to receive training in the mentoring model and in topics of particular interest to the participants. Throughout each year, conveners in each group will facilitate ongoing group reflection on pastoral leadership through online discussions, conference calls and in-person meetings. Sewanee will establish and actively manage an online network to allow for further communication within and among mentoring groups between annual summits. To sustain this effort, Sewanee’s development office will solicit contributions from donors and charge participants modest fees.

Central Baptist Theological Seminary, an American Baptist school, seeks a five-year grant for partial support for its Formed for Flourishing: Mentoring Toward Effective and Healthy Leadership program.  This endeavor seeks to connect experienced pastors with new clergy and those transitioning to new ministry settings to help them understand their congregational contexts more deeply and strengthen their leadership skills.  The pastors will engage in mentoring for a two-year period to build relationships and sharpen each other’s pastoral skills: the first year in groups and the second year one on one. Beyond the grant cycle, Central will launch Formed for Flourishing into regional denominational partners utilizing program participants as leaders within their own congregational networks for both multiplication and sustainability.

Princeton Theological Seminary’s Iron Sharpening Iron program will equip women clergy with the capacities, agency, and savvy to negotiate challenging leadership contexts with a confidence that is born of competence. Its fundamental goal is to promote capable women to thrive in God’s calling in a way that has theological integrity and a sophisticated philosophy and practice. From the first group of disciples who gathered around Jesus, women have always been leaders in Christian communities. Yet women clergy are dramatically underrepresented in positions of leadership, and the church has made relatively little gain over the last decades in advancing gender equity among clergy at all levels of the profession, particularly at the most senior levels of congregational leadership. We will address this pressing issue by investing in gifted women leaders and providing access to cutting-edge leadership education. Princeton Seminary will convene faculty and practitioners from the church, non-profit, and business sectors to engage an interdisciplinary conversation about effective leadership and build a network of women leaders.

Omaha Presbyterian Seminary Foundation (OPSF) requests a three-year grant for its Pastoral Leadership Revitalization Program, an effort to recharge the spiritual energy of pastors with the overall goal of revitalizing congregations. The program is an integrated mentoring and spiritual regeneration initiative for ordained clergy and lay pastors in the Central Nebraska, Missouri Union, and Missouri River Valley presbyteries and will involve both Presbyterian Church (USA) and a diverse ecumenical mix of clergy who serve as local pastors and lay pastors in small rural and urban congregations. The pastors will have opportunities to receive mentoring and coaching from experienced clergy, participate in pastor peer-to-peer networks, engage in retreats and spiritual rejuvenation activities and benefit from targeted actions to support their families. To sustain this work, OPSF will solicit funds from new donors and seek foundation grants.