Episcopal Church Foundation Vestry Papers - for leading congregations

Dear Friends,

The act of reimagining is a bold one. It holds in it a dream to transform, to grow and to be new. It is a process where we strive not just to continue to be relevant, but to inspire and effect good change in our communities and the world. In this second issue on Reimagining Assets (find the first issue here), we hear from leaders who are deep in the work of reimagining our church, from a place of abundance, from a place of sustainability and from a place of justice and love.

What could sustainable part-time ministry look like? In Serving Congregations Sustainably, Cathie Caimano describes the fundamentals of how small changes to an established model can be life-giving, transformative and hopeful.

In Critical Missions: Stabilizing and Supporting Small Congregations, Lee Curtis tells the story of the Diocese of Rio Grande and their work with ECF and the Lilly Endowment “Bridges to the Future” grant, which enabled them to ask challenging questions and explore solutions that invigorate ministry, halt chain reactions, and move to a place of sustainable thriving.

How can the church make a difference in creating just economic systems? In Managing Assets to be Stewards of Humanity, Sandra Montes leads a conversation with Steven Lee, Bishop Matthew Heyd and Miguel Escobar as they discuss our moral imperative as Christians to help liberate those in economic bondage, particularly in the context of credit unions.

In The Gifts of God for the People of God, Alex Montes-Vela draws on his childhood memories, and on words that we all have spoken innumerable times, to explore the concept of abundance in our lives, communities and faith. This article is available in English and Spanish.

In keeping with our focus reimagining assets, the ECF team has recently begun working with leaders in our communities to reimagine ECF Vital Practices and consider how we can evolve to serve our audience better in this changing church and world. To give ourselves over to effective discernment, we have made the decision to pause our monthly publication Vestry Papers and channel our time and resources to this reimagination process.

Vital Practices will still be live and available to you, and we will be posting resources, blogs and tools as usual. We ask for your patience, prayers and encouragement as we go into this process of discernment. If you would like to make a donation to support this work, please donate here.

To learn more about ECF and our vision, please visit our website.

Faithfully,

Charis Bhagianathan
Editor, ECF Vital Practices