PRACTICAL WISDOM FOR LEADING CONGREGATIONS
The Courage to Be Counter-Cultural by Melissa Spas, Managing Director of Education & Engagement
Tuesday, July 24, 2018
As people of faith, when we are too enculturated to the norms of our society, it is very difficult to imagine doing things differently. Untangling cultural expectations and assumptions from religious beliefs and practices can feel nearly impossible if the message of faith has been shaped by and accommodated to the world, making it palatable and familiar in the day-to-day lives of practitioners. We might have inherited simplistic interpretations of scripture, or find that our own discomfort causes us to avoid difficult questions that arise about responsibility, community, and inequality, feeling powerless to resist the dominant culture that celebrates affluence and blames the poor for their poverty. Reading religious texts with fresh eyes and embracing religious teaching in a spirit of openness to being changed may well lead us away from some of the dominant values of our culture. Specifically, we may find that our culture’s preoccupation with material security, accumulation, and financial wealth are directly incompatible with the messages about money that come from a close reading of scripture or the prophetic messages about human worth embedded in our religious traditions.
Addressing the theology of money shaping our community’s religious life can challenge us to truly examine our individual relationship with money and stuff, and leaders may be surprised by the difficulty of undertaking this examination personally, and particularly when leading around this topic in community. We are talking about something deeply personal when we ask people to engage in a conversation about money, and we will bump against cultural norms and expectations about what is conventional, comfortable, or “the way we’ve always done things.” Lay people may get excited to have a new conversation about money or they may get irritated.
Sometimes religious communities prefer that clergy stick to “comforting the afflicted” and not “afflicting the comfortable.” However, when religious leaders reject messages that conflate net worth with self-worth when deciding to invite their people to live in God’s economy, not the economy of the world, then anything is possible.
Religious leaders can lead with confidence knowing that this is one important dimension of human social life requiring discernment and careful consideration by people of faith, even when it conflicts with the dominant expectations of our society or institutions.
When religious leaders embrace the challenge of leading an authentic conversation about money in the context of their community, there are a variety of ways in which they are acting against the norms of the dominant culture. This is work that can allow for positive change in our organizations, and in the practices of the people connected to our communities, but that doesn’t mean it will be easy. Talking about money is often considered impolite in the broader American society and within the culture of most American religious communities. Money talk is taboo. Leading counter-culturally means breaking the taboo, and religious leaders may get into trouble by doing so. And of course, this kind of counter-cultural leadership stands also in a long tradition and is affirmed by religious teaching. As Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.” By courageously addressing difficult topics, including questions related to money and worth, religious leaders invite discernment and encourage the deepening of faith, which is at the heart of what it means to care for the well-being of a faith community.
Emerson's Non-Conformity
Ralph Waldo Emerson addressed the graduating students of Harvard Divinity School in 1838, and he addressed a spirituality that was clearly out of line with the cultural expectations of that context; so much so that he was banned from the university for 30 years. He writes about the abundance of nature as a source and sign of divine promise, and this essay can encourage religious leaders in the long American tradition of counter-cultural nonconformity, for which Emerson was famous. He writes: “The corn and the wine have been freely dealt to all creatures, and the never-broken silence with which the old bounty goes forward, has not yielded yet one word of explanation. One is constrained to respect the perfection of this world, in which our senses converse. How wide; how rich; what invitation from every property it gives to every faculty of man!”
The Center for Progressive Renewal
The Center for Progressive Renewal seeks to renew Christianity by training entrepreneurial leaders, supporting the birth of new congregations, renewing and strengthening existing churches, and growing a network of progressive ministries that support and nourish each other and bring about a more just and generous world. They have many learning opportunities to help you gain insights from industry experts and stay up to date with the issues and challenges of modern ministry.Learn more about CPR
FULFILLING the PROMISE
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Faith & Leadership
Start a conversation about givingMONEY, STEWARDSHIP & FUNDRAISING
David P. King: Start a conversation about giving
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Don't just give another stewardship sermon. New research into religious giving indicates that Christian leaders should broaden the conversation and talk to people about the meaning of their life and work, says the director of the Lake Institute on Faith & Giving.Despite declining religious affiliation, religious giving continues to hold steady, even among members of the millennial generation, according to “Giving to Religion,” a special report from Giving USA Foundation.
Researched and written by the Lake Institute on Faith & Giving at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at IUPUI, the report notes a number of key findings, including:
People who are religiously affiliated are more likely to make charitable donations.
Although the percentage of people who give to religious congregations is declining, those who give to religion are giving at steady rates.
Contrary to popular belief, younger generations do give to religion, and those who give are doing so at a similar rate as earlier generations did at the same point in their lives.
This should encourage Christian leaders to engage people about giving, not just to the church itself but also more broadly, said David P. King, the Karen Lake Buttrey Director of the institute.
“Don’t shy away from teaching and talking about these questions. Faith is an important factor in people’s giving. Questions of vocation, work, justice, the economy -- all these questions are ripe for exploration,” he said. “Those entrusted to our care as religious leaders are hungry for conversations about these topics.”
King spoke to Faith & Leadership about the report, as well as the launch of a new study on how congregations and other organizations actually manage and spendthe money they receive. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: From your perspective, what do you think are the most important takeaways of your report?
I think it does substantiate what the research on religious giving and philanthropy have shown for a long time, which is that religious giving is a significant leading indicator of the motivations for why people give.
Despite the rising levels of disaffiliation and declining levels of attendance, religious giving continues to be strong. And the fact that that continues to be the case despite these other factors that we’ve demonstrated is a significant finding.
Q: So giving is staying the same, but religiosity is declining. Why?
We don’t know for sure, but a hunch we have is that we think the rise in un-affiliation are those who were sort of on the edges of our religious communities before. So as culture has changed over the last few decades, it’s much more feasible for someone who said they were affiliated as a Presbyterian or as a Protestant but may have gone to services once or twice a year -- it now feels more honest saying they’re “nothing.”
What we know about the way religious giving works is that the more connected someone is with the faith community -- oftentimes, we measure that through worship attendance, but we can look at it through service, volunteering, spiritual formation, small groups -- they are going to be more inclined to engage with that community and give.
Q: So the big givers are that core that’s still affiliated?
Right. So in the short term, we’re not seeing a drastic difference. The question’s going to be what happens in a couple of decades, as particularly the younger generations -- millennials and to an extent Xers -- are disaffiliating in higher percentages.
I think that could have a drastic effect on giving.
Q: Talk a little bit about your findings regarding generational giving patterns.
So we know that a greater percentage of the “greatest” and “silent” generations continue to give to religion than other generations.
Boomers, however, give the largest annual amounts to charity and to religious giving, because they’re in that period of life where they are oftentimes either working or newly retired and have the most resources to give.
Through other studies, what we are finding particularly about those younger generations, the X and millennial generations, is that on average, they don’t give as much across the board, and they don’t give as much to religious giving in particular.
While there may be fewer of them giving and therefore fewer donors, those who do give, even among those millennials, are giving at significant levels.
Q: Are there other influences on the generations?
I think not only socioeconomic but cultural factors are having a major impact on how this new generation might give, and how they are conditioned and cultivated to be givers.
Part of it is the formal way that we define giving. I would suggest that religious leaders or religious institutions need to expand their imaginations and how we talk about giving.
For many millennials, it means informal giving -- helping a friend with a Kickstarter campaign, loaning them some funds, letting someone sleep on their couch -- as much as it is making a tax-deductible donation to a religious institution or charity.
Q: So what are the lessons for Christian leaders? How does the information in this report translate into action for folks who are in positions of leadership?
One of the most dramatic takeaways is that religious affiliation matters. So whether it’s Protestant, Catholic or Jew, those with a religious affiliation give more than twice as much as an individual without any religious affiliation.
Despite the trends and the headlines of decline and change, it’s really important for religious leaders, Christian leaders, to recognize how important faith is as a motivator for people’s giving.
Think of that as a strength and an asset -- to really engage those individuals entrusted to your care in conversations about giving.
We also know that religious intensity is the second-best measure for how people might give. We oftentimes look at attendance. We know attendance patterns are continuing to change.
What are the other ways we can imagine engaging with individuals around their faith lives -- inside or outside our religious institutions -- as touch points for how they can engage in community?
Don’t shy away from teaching and talking about these questions. Faith is an important factor in people’s giving. Questions of vocation, work, justice, the economy -- all these questions are ripe for exploration. Those entrusted to our care as religious leaders are hungry for conversations about these topics.
While they may not want to hear another stewardship sermon, they do want to engage with you on what it means to live a just life and what the meaning of their life and work might be.
Take those assets and start conversations around them.
Q: So not just asking people to donate to the church but engaging them in a broader conversation?
Exactly. We are operating on a fairly narrow definition of religious giving -- basically, to congregations, denominations, missionary societies and religious media.
But there is a dramatic number of faith-based nonprofits or even secular nonprofits that people give to because of their faith that are outside the realm of this narrow definition of religious giving. And in fact, that continues to grow.
When we ask individuals to think about how their faith motivates their giving, a majority of Americans will say that their religious commitments are one of the key motivators for their giving.
Individuals may not be giving in the same ways to their religious congregations, but that doesn’t mean they’re not engaged out of their faith to give and volunteer more widely.
And we think conversations about these topics will be conversations that actually cultivate generosity and giving for individuals broadly. And for the most part, that’s going to be a rising tide.
The other thing I would say is that people are more strategic with their giving. They want to see impact and change. Congregations in particular have trailed far behind other nonprofits in demonstrating why they’re the best recipient of a gift.
They lack transparency, accountability and demonstrated success, impact and outcomes. Congregations in particular, but religious institutions in general, can learn a lot from other nonprofits in how to tell their story.
We talk a lot at Lake Institute when we work with religious leaders about this sense of general trust the congregations have operated out of. It’s assumed that they’re at the center of civic life in the community and that they’re a trusted resource not only for the care of the resources they’ve been given but also in the use of those resources in the community and more broadly.
Now we see most individuals operating much more out of a sense that that strategic trust has to be earned and demonstrated. Congregations are beginning to clearly see that they have to make that case.
It doesn’t mean you have to shift your mission. It’s clarifying what makes your organization unique and what kind of impact and outcome you’re having. It really centers on being clear about your values and how you tell your story.
So often, we don’t tell those stories that are right in front of us, because we assume that everybody knows them.
Q: We’ve talked about this report, which looks at individuals and giving. But you are launching a study to look at the other side -- what do the religious institutions do with the resources they receive? Explain a little bit about the new study.
It’s hard to get good information on giving from congregations, in particular because, unlike other nonprofits, most congregations are not filing 990 forms with the IRS.
So we’re working with the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB) to collect the data from within denominations for that purpose.
What we’re really interested in in this study is actually getting for the first time in a number of years a really important, reliable foundation of what’s happening with congregational finances.
And beyond simply how much congregations receive, which is really important data for us in thinking about how individuals give (the bulk of it is congregational), but also how congregations manage and then spend those resources.
Q: So that ties back to what you were saying about making the argument and telling the story for impact.
Yes. We don’t know much about how congregations create their budgets and what part of the leadership is involved in those conversations.
One thing that we find a lot is the religious leaders have taboos around money and their own understanding -- how they preach and teach about it.
They also don’t know much about the inner workings of the finances of their institutions. This is in contrast to what an executive director of any nonprofit would know. They would know their donors; they would know if their budget was in the red or the black. Oftentimes, we outsource that information within a congregation to a small finance committee.
We have questions about what is happening within congregations -- not simply how they manage their finances, that transparency and accountability, but also how they talk about it.
What type of teaching and training are congregations doing with their members? If a congregation offers financial literacy courses and talks about how much is enough -- addresses questions of consumerism with youth and children and adults and Christian education classes -- does that make a difference in their giving and how they manage their resources?
And then also, where do those resources go? How much do they then give to the denominations? We know that story’s changing. How much of that goes to global missions and service around the world?
From a number of studies, like the National Congregations Study (NCS) and others, we know about how congregations are important players within the local economy or local community.
So for us, it’s not simply how much money comes in to congregations but how they receive, manage and then spend or send those resources around the world.
Q: When are the findings expected to be available for this study that you’re starting?
This national survey will begin in early 2018, so we would hope to have initial findings by the fall of ’18.
We’ll follow up with a number of the congregations with further interviews and even observations, spending time in those congregations, interviewing laypeople and clergy, observing services.
Because an important point for us is not simply getting at the number of how much money comes in and goes out of congregations, but it’s those deep, theological, cultural, contextual conversations.
And that’s really something that Lake feels strongly about -- that there are theologies of money and how we preach, teach and talk about it that are essential to how we receive, manage and spend those resources.
So what are those theological or cultural orientations around money that are oftentimes shaped within our congregations?
We’d really like to raise awareness of how these economic issues are an important aspect of considering the future of American religious life, and particularly American religious institutions, as far as what those institutions will look like -- past, present, future -- and even how that actually impacts the practice of religious leaders and those that are entrusted to their care.
Read more from David King »
Faith & Leadership
Crowdfunding offers new opportunities to expand congregational giving MONEY, STEWARDSHIP & FUNDRAISING
Adam J. Copeland: Crowdfunding offers new opportunities to expand congregational giving
Crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter and GoFundMe offer congregations a chance to reach beyond their usual network of church donors, expanding the congregation’s focus and impact, says Adam J. Copeland.
Initially popularized in the arts community as a way to raise money for specific projects, crowdfunding, or “crowdsource funding,” is part of the rapidly changing landscape of charitable giving, with important implications for the church, Copeland said.
“Usually, congregations are supported only by members of the congregation -- typically, only a subset of the congregation,” said Copeland, who teaches practical theology at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota. “But many folks support intellectually the mission of our congregations,” he said. “Crowdfunding offers the opportunity to expand giving beyond those who attend worship.”
As the director of Luther Seminary’s Center for Stewardship Leaders, Copeland studies trends in religious giving and financial stewardship. Earlier this year, he wrote a free, downloadable booklet, “Crowdfunding for Congregations and Faith-Related Nonprofits,” available at his website.
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Copeland has a B.A. in religion from St. Olaf College and an M.Div. from Columbia Theological Seminary. He is pursuing a Ph.D. in rhetoric from North Dakota State University, with a focus on new media and religion.
He spoke recently with Faith & Leadership about crowdfunding for congregations and the changing nature of church stewardship. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: First, give us some background about crowdfunding in general.
Crowdfunding, in its mainstream, online form, developed in 2008-09 out of the arts community, with artists asking for support for particular artistic ventures. They had an idea and they wanted to see it come into being, but they didn’t have the funds, so they asked their fans and others to help make the project happen.
Since then, it’s expanded to many different areas beyond the arts community.
I define crowdfunding generally as goal-based fundraising ventures conducted by groups or individuals using the internet to seek small contributions from a large number of people.
There are many different types of crowdfunding campaigns, and different types of goals and approaches.
Nonprofits have long used what we call peer-to-peer fundraising, basically inviting their supporters to raise funds on their behalf -- historically, through in-person contact. The CROP Hunger Walk, for example, historically was a peer-to-peer fundraiser that emphasized cash and checks.
But now, through the power of the internet, folks are fundraising on behalf of nonprofits or other organizations by setting up a website and inviting friends through different areas of social media.
Q: What does the development of crowdfunding mean for the church?
Crowdfunding offers several opportunities for the church to learn and to engage.
First, the church can learn by looking at successful campaigns and appreciating what gets folks engaged and excited to give. Crowdfunding campaigns have an incredible relational quality to them. Folks share their ideas and open their hearts and invite others to give to projects that they’re passionate about.
Stewardship in the church can become overly intellectual, divorced from actual relationships and mission. Crowdfunding campaigns, when done well, have a delightful relational, personal quality.
Second, the church can learn from crowdfunding by exploring it and giving it a shot. Crowdfunding won’t support a church’s general budget, but it may help with a project or an idea that the congregation has always wondered about.
They can use crowdfunding as a sort of discernment tool by saying, in effect, “We think this is a great idea. We would like to see this exist in the world. But to do that, we need the support of the whole community.”
Then, by launching a crowdfunding campaign, the church discerns what the Spirit is doing in that community and whether there’s support for that particular project.
Q: You’ve said that the church budget is a “macro” goal and that crowdfunding works best for “micro” goals -- some specific project or vision.
Yes. Crowdfunding works best when it’s focused on a particular goal that has a clear outcome and a potential that can be imagined and realized.
When churches do budgeting overall, we think in broad, macro terms.
In describing our mission, we might try to focus in on particular instances of how God is working in our communities.
But crowdfunding takes that to the extreme by narrowing in on a particular goal. It uses the principles that are in the acronym SMART -- ideas that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound.
That specificity and particularity can be inspiring. Crowdfunding campaigns tend to have a tangible, focused outcome with a very clear calendar in mind, so you’re not giving to support a cause forever and ever. You’re giving to bring a particular idea into the world.
Q: You suggest in the booklet that crowdfunding can be about more than raising money -- that it offers opportunities for a church to expand its focus, audience and reach -- part of a shift in how we even think about stewardship. Tell us about that.
Often, when congregations talk about financial stewardship, we start with the notion that all of creation belongs to God. Then we talk about giving to the church, but we disregard the fact that our people are making giving decisions not only about our congregation but also about nonprofits.
Certainly, God is working in the church -- and God is working beyond the church. So I encourage the church to help members think about how to give beyond the congregation in ways that are important because of our faith.
When applied to crowdfunding, that approach can help us think of new possibilities for expanding the audience for congregational giving. Usually, congregations are supported only by members of the congregation -- typically, only a subset of the congregation.
But many folks support intellectually the mission of our congregations. Crowdfunding offers the opportunity to expand giving beyond those who attend worship. We can do this by focusing on shared values and offering a compelling vision for a particular mission that appeals to people in the congregation, their friends and acquaintances, and others outside the congregation who share those same values and ideas and mission.
We’re also in a time of many shifts in how folks think about religious giving and giving in general.
In the old paradigm, religious givers gave out of moral obligation or a sense of duty. They gave to the church because it was expected; it was what people have always done. Also, there weren’t that many other ways to give.
But now, we’re moving to a paradigm that emphasizes donor cultivation. It invites people to be partners in giving and help establish giving priorities for the congregation. It embraces giving to a particular mission.
Giving is understood as creating change. It’s about furthering a particular idea or project rather than simply giving to the church budget because there is a trust in the institutional church and that its budget priorities are the right ones.
Crowdfunding reflects this newer paradigm of giving to particular projects, of giving as a sort of experimental act that invites folks to help create the change they want to see in the world.
At the same time, the number of places where folks can give has grown. The enormous rise of nonprofits, the growth of charitable giving to colleges and universities and other non-profits, has significantly expanded the possibilities for people to make charitable donations.
The church, for better or for worse, is in a place where the conversation about charitable giving is much broader than just congregational giving. And crowdfunding helps frame these new realities through a multiplicity of giving options.
Q: You’ve written that “crowdfunding supporters don’t give away money; they midwife dreams.” What do you mean?
Crowdfunding supporters catch onto a dream.
The founders of Kickstarter, one of the leading crowdfunding platforms, talked about crowdfunding campaigns as folks who tell the world, “I’ve got this idea; I think it’s pretty cool; I want it to exist in the world.”
Then they ask the world if it agrees and will help the idea come to fruition.
This develops a sort of partnership. You’re not giving to an anonymous institution; you’re giving to help create this particular dream.
It uses very inspirational language. It’s about creating new life. It’s about helping. It’s about supporting folks who have an entrepreneurial spirit and an exciting vision for supporting community, coming alongside them and saying, “I want to see the fruits of your ideas in the world, so here’s my support.”
And by doing that, the people who support crowdfunding campaigns aren’t outside observers. Instead, they become part of the action. They get updates through the platforms. They often receive rewards or perks that connect back to the campaign. They become collaborators and partners in the venture rather than just making a one-time gift.
Q: How does this process work for a congregation? What would they do?
Many congregations and nonprofits have launched successful crowdfunding campaigns.
Often, what happens is an entrepreneurial individual or a forward-thinking committee has an idea that isn’t supported by the church budget. Maybe it’s something they always wanted to do but couldn’t because of other giving and budget priorities.
So crowdfunding can become a type of experiment or discernment process to see if the congregation and those beyond it support this new project.
Successful campaigns tend to have a small group of committed individuals in a congregation working together. Campaigns that are launched by only one individual tend to be less successful.
Fortunately, congregations are already set up for group decision making and shared work. Our existing committees or stewardship teams or generosity initiatives can incorporate crowdfunding.
Q: What else makes for a successful campaign?
Crowdfunding is still relatively new, so the marks of successful campaigns are still developing. Even so, we can see some similarities.
Good campaigns have a video on their crowdfunding page. The video can be short with basic production values. It communicates a sense of the passion of the folks who are asking for the gifts. It helps color in the vision and put a person behind the idea.
Successful campaigns also have very specific goals that are measurable and that folks can appreciate as attainable.
And then, they have this tricky intangible that appeals to folks both in the congregation and beyond. Crowdfunding campaigns get their momentum from people already connected to the people who are launching the campaign. For congregations, that’s members and their friends and family. Once momentum picks up, then the audience expands.
Q: So you’re pitching the potential audience a dream. You’re pitching them your vision, your idea for doing whatever it might be.
Absolutely.
And one of the challenges and opportunities for congregations in thinking about their audience is the question of what language to use that both reflects our values and faith and also invites those with slightly different values, and maybe different faith claims, but who support what we’re doing and want to help us reach our goal.
The challenge for congregations is to think about who beyond their walls might be excited and join the passion of the campaign.
Q: What campaigns and congregations have done well? What models do you point to?
The most creative I’ve seen -- and it’s mentioned in the downloadable PDF -- is Radical Hospitality and the Rooster Soup Company in Philadelphia.
This was one of the most expansive and creative crowdfunding campaigns out there. A congregation, Broad Street Ministry, has a related nonprofit, the Hospitality Collaborative, that serves people in Philadelphia who are homeless. They partnered with local restaurateurs who were interested in starting a new restaurant, the Rooster Soup Company, which would generate proceeds that would go to support the ministry.
They had a goal of $150,000 but raised nearly $180,000 from 1,587 backers. The funds helped cover the startup costs.
It’s a great example of expanding an audience beyond the congregation. The campaign supporters were fans and customers of the restaurateurs.
Q: How does crowdfunding affect other forms of congregational giving? Does it negatively affect the stewardship campaign?
For congregation members who are already regular givers, crowdfunding offers an opportunity to give beyond their usual support. Congregations shouldn’t worry that regular givers will stop so that they can support a campaign.
In fact, it may even strengthen their relationship with the congregation and increase their generosity.
That said, many congregations are surprised when they realize how many of their people don’t regularly give. So this could be an invitation to a first gift or an opportunity to give in a way that particularly connects to their passions or claims new possibilities for how they see the church at work.
A crowdfunding campaign might be a first step in a long journey of financial stewardship to the congregation.
Q: How does a church know whether crowdfunding is right for them? What do they need to think about?
They need first to have an idea that can generate excitement around it. That’s the starting point.
Crowdfunding campaigns are less likely to succeed if the goal is something that the congregation has put off doing because there’s no will to do it. Replacing the heater is not going to be an exciting campaign.
But ideas with clear passion, exciting vision, and innovative or entrepreneurial spirit are the ones that can catch fire.
Once folks have developed that idea, then they can begin to figure out a plan to implement the campaign. A common mistake is thinking that your work is done once the campaign is launched.
That’s an important step, but so is supporting the campaign while it’s live. It’s social media shares, putting out a press release, putting it in the church newsletter and sending it to any folks who have a connection with the project. Building momentum is an important part of the campaign.
Finally, that discernment piece is often a win-win for congregations. Even if the campaign is not successful, they’ll learn something about how to ask for gifts, how the congregation supports innovative ministry, and even about what God is doing or calling them to do.
When it comes to crowdfunding, perfection is the enemy of the good. I would invite folks to take a leap of faith and go for it, and see what they might learn about the Spirit’s work.
Read more from Adam Copeland »
Faith & Leadership
Building an institution to carry on a legacy of giving
King spoke to Faith & Leadership about the report, as well as the launch of a new study on how congregations and other organizations actually manage and spendthe money they receive. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: From your perspective, what do you think are the most important takeaways of your report?
I think it does substantiate what the research on religious giving and philanthropy have shown for a long time, which is that religious giving is a significant leading indicator of the motivations for why people give.
Despite the rising levels of disaffiliation and declining levels of attendance, religious giving continues to be strong. And the fact that that continues to be the case despite these other factors that we’ve demonstrated is a significant finding.
Q: So giving is staying the same, but religiosity is declining. Why?
We don’t know for sure, but a hunch we have is that we think the rise in un-affiliation are those who were sort of on the edges of our religious communities before. So as culture has changed over the last few decades, it’s much more feasible for someone who said they were affiliated as a Presbyterian or as a Protestant but may have gone to services once or twice a year -- it now feels more honest saying they’re “nothing.”
What we know about the way religious giving works is that the more connected someone is with the faith community -- oftentimes, we measure that through worship attendance, but we can look at it through service, volunteering, spiritual formation, small groups -- they are going to be more inclined to engage with that community and give.
Q: So the big givers are that core that’s still affiliated?
Right. So in the short term, we’re not seeing a drastic difference. The question’s going to be what happens in a couple of decades, as particularly the younger generations -- millennials and to an extent Xers -- are disaffiliating in higher percentages.
I think that could have a drastic effect on giving.
Q: Talk a little bit about your findings regarding generational giving patterns.
So we know that a greater percentage of the “greatest” and “silent” generations continue to give to religion than other generations.
Boomers, however, give the largest annual amounts to charity and to religious giving, because they’re in that period of life where they are oftentimes either working or newly retired and have the most resources to give.
Through other studies, what we are finding particularly about those younger generations, the X and millennial generations, is that on average, they don’t give as much across the board, and they don’t give as much to religious giving in particular.
While there may be fewer of them giving and therefore fewer donors, those who do give, even among those millennials, are giving at significant levels.
Q: Are there other influences on the generations?
I think not only socioeconomic but cultural factors are having a major impact on how this new generation might give, and how they are conditioned and cultivated to be givers.
Part of it is the formal way that we define giving. I would suggest that religious leaders or religious institutions need to expand their imaginations and how we talk about giving.
For many millennials, it means informal giving -- helping a friend with a Kickstarter campaign, loaning them some funds, letting someone sleep on their couch -- as much as it is making a tax-deductible donation to a religious institution or charity.
Q: So what are the lessons for Christian leaders? How does the information in this report translate into action for folks who are in positions of leadership?
One of the most dramatic takeaways is that religious affiliation matters. So whether it’s Protestant, Catholic or Jew, those with a religious affiliation give more than twice as much as an individual without any religious affiliation.
Despite the trends and the headlines of decline and change, it’s really important for religious leaders, Christian leaders, to recognize how important faith is as a motivator for people’s giving.
Think of that as a strength and an asset -- to really engage those individuals entrusted to your care in conversations about giving.
We also know that religious intensity is the second-best measure for how people might give. We oftentimes look at attendance. We know attendance patterns are continuing to change.
What are the other ways we can imagine engaging with individuals around their faith lives -- inside or outside our religious institutions -- as touch points for how they can engage in community?
Don’t shy away from teaching and talking about these questions. Faith is an important factor in people’s giving. Questions of vocation, work, justice, the economy -- all these questions are ripe for exploration. Those entrusted to our care as religious leaders are hungry for conversations about these topics.
While they may not want to hear another stewardship sermon, they do want to engage with you on what it means to live a just life and what the meaning of their life and work might be.
Take those assets and start conversations around them.
Q: So not just asking people to donate to the church but engaging them in a broader conversation?
Exactly. We are operating on a fairly narrow definition of religious giving -- basically, to congregations, denominations, missionary societies and religious media.
But there is a dramatic number of faith-based nonprofits or even secular nonprofits that people give to because of their faith that are outside the realm of this narrow definition of religious giving. And in fact, that continues to grow.
When we ask individuals to think about how their faith motivates their giving, a majority of Americans will say that their religious commitments are one of the key motivators for their giving.
Individuals may not be giving in the same ways to their religious congregations, but that doesn’t mean they’re not engaged out of their faith to give and volunteer more widely.
And we think conversations about these topics will be conversations that actually cultivate generosity and giving for individuals broadly. And for the most part, that’s going to be a rising tide.
The other thing I would say is that people are more strategic with their giving. They want to see impact and change. Congregations in particular have trailed far behind other nonprofits in demonstrating why they’re the best recipient of a gift.
They lack transparency, accountability and demonstrated success, impact and outcomes. Congregations in particular, but religious institutions in general, can learn a lot from other nonprofits in how to tell their story.
We talk a lot at Lake Institute when we work with religious leaders about this sense of general trust the congregations have operated out of. It’s assumed that they’re at the center of civic life in the community and that they’re a trusted resource not only for the care of the resources they’ve been given but also in the use of those resources in the community and more broadly.
Now we see most individuals operating much more out of a sense that that strategic trust has to be earned and demonstrated. Congregations are beginning to clearly see that they have to make that case.
It doesn’t mean you have to shift your mission. It’s clarifying what makes your organization unique and what kind of impact and outcome you’re having. It really centers on being clear about your values and how you tell your story.
So often, we don’t tell those stories that are right in front of us, because we assume that everybody knows them.
Q: We’ve talked about this report, which looks at individuals and giving. But you are launching a study to look at the other side -- what do the religious institutions do with the resources they receive? Explain a little bit about the new study.
It’s hard to get good information on giving from congregations, in particular because, unlike other nonprofits, most congregations are not filing 990 forms with the IRS.
So we’re working with the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB) to collect the data from within denominations for that purpose.
What we’re really interested in in this study is actually getting for the first time in a number of years a really important, reliable foundation of what’s happening with congregational finances.
And beyond simply how much congregations receive, which is really important data for us in thinking about how individuals give (the bulk of it is congregational), but also how congregations manage and then spend those resources.
Q: So that ties back to what you were saying about making the argument and telling the story for impact.
Yes. We don’t know much about how congregations create their budgets and what part of the leadership is involved in those conversations.
One thing that we find a lot is the religious leaders have taboos around money and their own understanding -- how they preach and teach about it.
They also don’t know much about the inner workings of the finances of their institutions. This is in contrast to what an executive director of any nonprofit would know. They would know their donors; they would know if their budget was in the red or the black. Oftentimes, we outsource that information within a congregation to a small finance committee.
We have questions about what is happening within congregations -- not simply how they manage their finances, that transparency and accountability, but also how they talk about it.
What type of teaching and training are congregations doing with their members? If a congregation offers financial literacy courses and talks about how much is enough -- addresses questions of consumerism with youth and children and adults and Christian education classes -- does that make a difference in their giving and how they manage their resources?
And then also, where do those resources go? How much do they then give to the denominations? We know that story’s changing. How much of that goes to global missions and service around the world?
From a number of studies, like the National Congregations Study (NCS) and others, we know about how congregations are important players within the local economy or local community.
So for us, it’s not simply how much money comes in to congregations but how they receive, manage and then spend or send those resources around the world.
Q: When are the findings expected to be available for this study that you’re starting?
This national survey will begin in early 2018, so we would hope to have initial findings by the fall of ’18.
We’ll follow up with a number of the congregations with further interviews and even observations, spending time in those congregations, interviewing laypeople and clergy, observing services.
Because an important point for us is not simply getting at the number of how much money comes in and goes out of congregations, but it’s those deep, theological, cultural, contextual conversations.
And that’s really something that Lake feels strongly about -- that there are theologies of money and how we preach, teach and talk about it that are essential to how we receive, manage and spend those resources.
So what are those theological or cultural orientations around money that are oftentimes shaped within our congregations?
We’d really like to raise awareness of how these economic issues are an important aspect of considering the future of American religious life, and particularly American religious institutions, as far as what those institutions will look like -- past, present, future -- and even how that actually impacts the practice of religious leaders and those that are entrusted to their care.
Read more from David King »
Crowdfunding offers new opportunities to expand congregational giving MONEY, STEWARDSHIP & FUNDRAISING
Adam J. Copeland: Crowdfunding offers new opportunities to expand congregational giving
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Crowdfunding offers congregations a way to broaden their concept of stewardship, with opportunities to expand the focus, audience and reach of fundraising efforts, says an expert on stewardship and congregational giving.Crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter and GoFundMe offer congregations a chance to reach beyond their usual network of church donors, expanding the congregation’s focus and impact, says Adam J. Copeland.
Initially popularized in the arts community as a way to raise money for specific projects, crowdfunding, or “crowdsource funding,” is part of the rapidly changing landscape of charitable giving, with important implications for the church, Copeland said.
“Usually, congregations are supported only by members of the congregation -- typically, only a subset of the congregation,” said Copeland, who teaches practical theology at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota. “But many folks support intellectually the mission of our congregations,” he said. “Crowdfunding offers the opportunity to expand giving beyond those who attend worship.”
As the director of Luther Seminary’s Center for Stewardship Leaders, Copeland studies trends in religious giving and financial stewardship. Earlier this year, he wrote a free, downloadable booklet, “Crowdfunding for Congregations and Faith-Related Nonprofits,” available at his website.
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He spoke recently with Faith & Leadership about crowdfunding for congregations and the changing nature of church stewardship. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: First, give us some background about crowdfunding in general.
Crowdfunding, in its mainstream, online form, developed in 2008-09 out of the arts community, with artists asking for support for particular artistic ventures. They had an idea and they wanted to see it come into being, but they didn’t have the funds, so they asked their fans and others to help make the project happen.
Since then, it’s expanded to many different areas beyond the arts community.
I define crowdfunding generally as goal-based fundraising ventures conducted by groups or individuals using the internet to seek small contributions from a large number of people.
There are many different types of crowdfunding campaigns, and different types of goals and approaches.
Nonprofits have long used what we call peer-to-peer fundraising, basically inviting their supporters to raise funds on their behalf -- historically, through in-person contact. The CROP Hunger Walk, for example, historically was a peer-to-peer fundraiser that emphasized cash and checks.
But now, through the power of the internet, folks are fundraising on behalf of nonprofits or other organizations by setting up a website and inviting friends through different areas of social media.
Q: What does the development of crowdfunding mean for the church?
Crowdfunding offers several opportunities for the church to learn and to engage.
First, the church can learn by looking at successful campaigns and appreciating what gets folks engaged and excited to give. Crowdfunding campaigns have an incredible relational quality to them. Folks share their ideas and open their hearts and invite others to give to projects that they’re passionate about.
Stewardship in the church can become overly intellectual, divorced from actual relationships and mission. Crowdfunding campaigns, when done well, have a delightful relational, personal quality.
Second, the church can learn from crowdfunding by exploring it and giving it a shot. Crowdfunding won’t support a church’s general budget, but it may help with a project or an idea that the congregation has always wondered about.
They can use crowdfunding as a sort of discernment tool by saying, in effect, “We think this is a great idea. We would like to see this exist in the world. But to do that, we need the support of the whole community.”
Then, by launching a crowdfunding campaign, the church discerns what the Spirit is doing in that community and whether there’s support for that particular project.
Q: You’ve said that the church budget is a “macro” goal and that crowdfunding works best for “micro” goals -- some specific project or vision.
Yes. Crowdfunding works best when it’s focused on a particular goal that has a clear outcome and a potential that can be imagined and realized.
When churches do budgeting overall, we think in broad, macro terms.
In describing our mission, we might try to focus in on particular instances of how God is working in our communities.
But crowdfunding takes that to the extreme by narrowing in on a particular goal. It uses the principles that are in the acronym SMART -- ideas that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound.
That specificity and particularity can be inspiring. Crowdfunding campaigns tend to have a tangible, focused outcome with a very clear calendar in mind, so you’re not giving to support a cause forever and ever. You’re giving to bring a particular idea into the world.
Q: You suggest in the booklet that crowdfunding can be about more than raising money -- that it offers opportunities for a church to expand its focus, audience and reach -- part of a shift in how we even think about stewardship. Tell us about that.
Often, when congregations talk about financial stewardship, we start with the notion that all of creation belongs to God. Then we talk about giving to the church, but we disregard the fact that our people are making giving decisions not only about our congregation but also about nonprofits.
Certainly, God is working in the church -- and God is working beyond the church. So I encourage the church to help members think about how to give beyond the congregation in ways that are important because of our faith.
When applied to crowdfunding, that approach can help us think of new possibilities for expanding the audience for congregational giving. Usually, congregations are supported only by members of the congregation -- typically, only a subset of the congregation.
But many folks support intellectually the mission of our congregations. Crowdfunding offers the opportunity to expand giving beyond those who attend worship. We can do this by focusing on shared values and offering a compelling vision for a particular mission that appeals to people in the congregation, their friends and acquaintances, and others outside the congregation who share those same values and ideas and mission.
We’re also in a time of many shifts in how folks think about religious giving and giving in general.
In the old paradigm, religious givers gave out of moral obligation or a sense of duty. They gave to the church because it was expected; it was what people have always done. Also, there weren’t that many other ways to give.
But now, we’re moving to a paradigm that emphasizes donor cultivation. It invites people to be partners in giving and help establish giving priorities for the congregation. It embraces giving to a particular mission.
Giving is understood as creating change. It’s about furthering a particular idea or project rather than simply giving to the church budget because there is a trust in the institutional church and that its budget priorities are the right ones.
Crowdfunding reflects this newer paradigm of giving to particular projects, of giving as a sort of experimental act that invites folks to help create the change they want to see in the world.
At the same time, the number of places where folks can give has grown. The enormous rise of nonprofits, the growth of charitable giving to colleges and universities and other non-profits, has significantly expanded the possibilities for people to make charitable donations.
The church, for better or for worse, is in a place where the conversation about charitable giving is much broader than just congregational giving. And crowdfunding helps frame these new realities through a multiplicity of giving options.
Q: You’ve written that “crowdfunding supporters don’t give away money; they midwife dreams.” What do you mean?
Crowdfunding supporters catch onto a dream.
The founders of Kickstarter, one of the leading crowdfunding platforms, talked about crowdfunding campaigns as folks who tell the world, “I’ve got this idea; I think it’s pretty cool; I want it to exist in the world.”
Then they ask the world if it agrees and will help the idea come to fruition.
This develops a sort of partnership. You’re not giving to an anonymous institution; you’re giving to help create this particular dream.
It uses very inspirational language. It’s about creating new life. It’s about helping. It’s about supporting folks who have an entrepreneurial spirit and an exciting vision for supporting community, coming alongside them and saying, “I want to see the fruits of your ideas in the world, so here’s my support.”
And by doing that, the people who support crowdfunding campaigns aren’t outside observers. Instead, they become part of the action. They get updates through the platforms. They often receive rewards or perks that connect back to the campaign. They become collaborators and partners in the venture rather than just making a one-time gift.
Q: How does this process work for a congregation? What would they do?
Many congregations and nonprofits have launched successful crowdfunding campaigns.
Often, what happens is an entrepreneurial individual or a forward-thinking committee has an idea that isn’t supported by the church budget. Maybe it’s something they always wanted to do but couldn’t because of other giving and budget priorities.
So crowdfunding can become a type of experiment or discernment process to see if the congregation and those beyond it support this new project.
Successful campaigns tend to have a small group of committed individuals in a congregation working together. Campaigns that are launched by only one individual tend to be less successful.
Fortunately, congregations are already set up for group decision making and shared work. Our existing committees or stewardship teams or generosity initiatives can incorporate crowdfunding.
Q: What else makes for a successful campaign?
Crowdfunding is still relatively new, so the marks of successful campaigns are still developing. Even so, we can see some similarities.
Good campaigns have a video on their crowdfunding page. The video can be short with basic production values. It communicates a sense of the passion of the folks who are asking for the gifts. It helps color in the vision and put a person behind the idea.
Successful campaigns also have very specific goals that are measurable and that folks can appreciate as attainable.
And then, they have this tricky intangible that appeals to folks both in the congregation and beyond. Crowdfunding campaigns get their momentum from people already connected to the people who are launching the campaign. For congregations, that’s members and their friends and family. Once momentum picks up, then the audience expands.
Q: So you’re pitching the potential audience a dream. You’re pitching them your vision, your idea for doing whatever it might be.
Absolutely.
And one of the challenges and opportunities for congregations in thinking about their audience is the question of what language to use that both reflects our values and faith and also invites those with slightly different values, and maybe different faith claims, but who support what we’re doing and want to help us reach our goal.
The challenge for congregations is to think about who beyond their walls might be excited and join the passion of the campaign.
Q: What campaigns and congregations have done well? What models do you point to?
The most creative I’ve seen -- and it’s mentioned in the downloadable PDF -- is Radical Hospitality and the Rooster Soup Company in Philadelphia.
This was one of the most expansive and creative crowdfunding campaigns out there. A congregation, Broad Street Ministry, has a related nonprofit, the Hospitality Collaborative, that serves people in Philadelphia who are homeless. They partnered with local restaurateurs who were interested in starting a new restaurant, the Rooster Soup Company, which would generate proceeds that would go to support the ministry.
They had a goal of $150,000 but raised nearly $180,000 from 1,587 backers. The funds helped cover the startup costs.
It’s a great example of expanding an audience beyond the congregation. The campaign supporters were fans and customers of the restaurateurs.
Q: How does crowdfunding affect other forms of congregational giving? Does it negatively affect the stewardship campaign?
For congregation members who are already regular givers, crowdfunding offers an opportunity to give beyond their usual support. Congregations shouldn’t worry that regular givers will stop so that they can support a campaign.
In fact, it may even strengthen their relationship with the congregation and increase their generosity.
That said, many congregations are surprised when they realize how many of their people don’t regularly give. So this could be an invitation to a first gift or an opportunity to give in a way that particularly connects to their passions or claims new possibilities for how they see the church at work.
A crowdfunding campaign might be a first step in a long journey of financial stewardship to the congregation.
Q: How does a church know whether crowdfunding is right for them? What do they need to think about?
They need first to have an idea that can generate excitement around it. That’s the starting point.
Crowdfunding campaigns are less likely to succeed if the goal is something that the congregation has put off doing because there’s no will to do it. Replacing the heater is not going to be an exciting campaign.
But ideas with clear passion, exciting vision, and innovative or entrepreneurial spirit are the ones that can catch fire.
Once folks have developed that idea, then they can begin to figure out a plan to implement the campaign. A common mistake is thinking that your work is done once the campaign is launched.
That’s an important step, but so is supporting the campaign while it’s live. It’s social media shares, putting out a press release, putting it in the church newsletter and sending it to any folks who have a connection with the project. Building momentum is an important part of the campaign.
Finally, that discernment piece is often a win-win for congregations. Even if the campaign is not successful, they’ll learn something about how to ask for gifts, how the congregation supports innovative ministry, and even about what God is doing or calling them to do.
When it comes to crowdfunding, perfection is the enemy of the good. I would invite folks to take a leap of faith and go for it, and see what they might learn about the Spirit’s work.
Read more from Adam Copeland »
Building an institution to carry on a legacy of giving
MONEY, PHILANTHROPY
Christy Morse: Building an institution to carry on a legacy of giving
Update: Christy Morse retired as CEO in 2017 and continues to serve as board chair of Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies.
Christy Morse and Margaret A. Cargill were unlikely friends.
Cargill was the granddaughter of William Cargill, co-founder of Cargill Inc., the Minneapolis-based grain-trading conglomerate. Despite her immense wealth -- her worth was estimated at $1.8 billion by Forbes magazine in 2005 -- Cargill had no interest in business and preferred to live a low-profile life. She grew up in the Midwest but spent much of her adult life in Southern California, pursuing arts and crafts and enjoying nature.
Morse grew up in a small Minnesota town and earned an accounting degree at Gustavus Adolphus College. She eventually went to work for Waycrosse Inc., a financial advisory firm for family owners of Cargill Inc. She now has 30 years of management and financial experience.
The two women met after Morse initiated a correspondence, and they quickly became friends. That friendship lasted until Cargill’s death in 2006.
“She was a very creative person, and I’m not so creative,” Morse said. “But I am financially capable, and organized, and the combination of those two really made life fun.”
Christy Morse: Building an institution to carry on a legacy of giving
Photos courtesy of Christy Morse
In her lifetime, Margaret A. Cargill gave away money anonymously and spontaneously. In this interview, Christy Morse, CEO of the Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies, talks about carrying on her legacy.Update: Christy Morse retired as CEO in 2017 and continues to serve as board chair of Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies.
Christy Morse and Margaret A. Cargill were unlikely friends.
Cargill was the granddaughter of William Cargill, co-founder of Cargill Inc., the Minneapolis-based grain-trading conglomerate. Despite her immense wealth -- her worth was estimated at $1.8 billion by Forbes magazine in 2005 -- Cargill had no interest in business and preferred to live a low-profile life. She grew up in the Midwest but spent much of her adult life in Southern California, pursuing arts and crafts and enjoying nature.
Morse grew up in a small Minnesota town and earned an accounting degree at Gustavus Adolphus College. She eventually went to work for Waycrosse Inc., a financial advisory firm for family owners of Cargill Inc. She now has 30 years of management and financial experience.
The two women met after Morse initiated a correspondence, and they quickly became friends. That friendship lasted until Cargill’s death in 2006.
“She was a very creative person, and I’m not so creative,” Morse said. “But I am financially capable, and organized, and the combination of those two really made life fun.”
Today, Morse is the CEO of the Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies, which includes three grant-making organizations: the Margaret A. Cargill Foundation, the Anne Ray Charitable Trust and the Akaloa Resource Foundation.
During her lifetime, Margaret Cargill gave away an estimated $200 million, nearly always anonymously. She gave to a variety of causes, including the Red Cross, the Nature Conservancy and the American Swedish Institute.
“She used to say to me, ‘Well, honey, I just have the money; I don't do the good work,’” Morse said.
The organization was founded after Cargill’s death -- she had no children -- and it is Morse’s mission to develop the philanthropies according to Cargill’s wishes.
Morse visited Duke as part of the Foundation Impact Research Group seminar series. She spoke to Faith & Leadership about how she is carrying out Cargill’s wishes and building an institution that will endure. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: Margaret Cargill seems to have been a remarkable person. Talk a little bit about her attitude toward philanthropy when she was alive.
She was an Episcopalian and went to an Episcopal high school in Kenosha, and was very influenced by the sisters there. She became in her later life a supporter of St. Paul’s Cathedral in San Diego. I would say she was a very spiritual woman.
The two of us got to know each other as friends, but we both believed -- and we talked about this -- that we were brought together for a reason and there was a purpose to our deep friendship, our deep relationship.
She was a very creative person, and I’m not so creative -- but I am financially capable, and organized, and the combination of those two really made life fun.
Q: Does your faith influence the work that you do?
I think the spiritual basis that we had -- it was one of the things that brought us together, our faith.
Q: Are you also Episcopalian?
No, I’m a Lutheran. Minnesota Lutheran. I used to bring her the lutefisk dinner placemats and things like that. She wanted the prayer in Swedish and the placemat from our lutefisk dinner, and yeah, it was great. It was great.
Q: From what I’ve read, she seems to have been a free spirit. She loved arts and Native American culture and camping, that sort of thing.
Oh yes, absolutely! She loved to be out. That stemmed from her growing up in Minnesota, when she would go to camp in the summertime, and it was just a wonderful experience.
Q: I read some stories -- I don’t know if they’re all true -- that she would just pop in and hand someone an envelope full of money and then leave. And also that you served as a go-between, because she didn’t even want the recipient institution to know who was giving.
Absolutely, those are true.
Q: What was the reason for that?
She didn’t want the attention. She wanted to live a low-key, middle-class life, and she did. She could have been any elderly lady walking down the street in La Jolla or San Diego, which is the way she wanted it.
Q: But she was in fact a billionaire, right?
Yes.
There is one story that the bishop tells: She came to [St. Paul’s Episcopal] Cathedral after one of her dear friends, who is very active in the cathedral, told her that they were short of money.
And so she went down there, and the bishop didn’t know who she was. She walked in and asked if she could see him. She just handed him an envelope. She said she wanted to help. When he asked her name, she said, “Oh, just say an angel stopped by.” And then she got up and walked out.
He then put the check in his drawer and went to several meetings and didn’t open it until he came back. He figured that it had 20 bucks in it, right?
And when he opened it, it had $50,000 in it, which was the amount of their shortfall.
So yes, she liked to do that. I would arrange donations for her so that they wouldn’t have her name on it. She was very intent on making sure that the attention was on the grantee and not on her.
She used to say to me, "Well, honey, I just have the money; I don't do the good work.”
And that is something that we continue to emphasize in the organization.
Q: I’m sure it gave her great pleasure to show up with a check out of the blue. But you were charged with creating an institution after her death. How did you go about doing that?
We [had] formed the Akaloa Resource Foundation and the Anne Ray Charitable Trust in ’95 and ’96. At that time, there were literally three of us: there was Margaret, myself and Cathy Hopper, who was one of her very good friends, and became my very close friend.
She left instructions that said Cathy and I were to run this going forward. Well, a year after Margaret died, Cathy passed away.
It was then that I realized I had to start bringing in not only people with specific expertise to help me form a lasting institution but also to take advantage of those people who knew her during her lifetime.
One of the things that Cathy and I did during her lifetime was invite in two people who were at the time strangers to her but whom I had been working with on the financial side.
And that was Paul Busch, who is now the philanthropy’s president, and Naomi Horsager, who is now our chief financial officer. And so those two sat with her alone without anyone else in the room and talked with her about what she wanted these organizations to work on when she was gone.
And [Cathy] and I did that very intentionally. We felt we knew, but we wanted to establish the fact that these were her wishes, not mine and not [Cathy]’s, and we wanted it documented.
And so Paul and Naomi came back several times over six to nine months. In that process, in addition to documenting what she wanted, they laid out for us how you go about building this from a legal perspective, from an accounting-finance perspective, that kind of thing. So we had those guidelines.
Q: Is it a challenge or is it exciting to build something from scratch?
I think it’s both. It’s a blessing to be able to bring to life what she wanted done.
But it is definitely a challenge. We’ve gone from the three of us doing absolutely everything to a lot of people, a lot of lives, a lot of people who need to understand why they’re there, and what is expected of them.
Building our culture is one of the most important things I can do before I’m gone. So it’s really important to be sure that our employees understand who Margaret was, and why we’re doing what we’re doing.
Q: How do you do that?
I did a video for my employees where I talked about her history, and the history that I had with her, and the history of her giving, and how she approached giving, to give them a feeling. That video is shown to all of our employees when they come on board.
We have a set of values written down, and that is given to the employees when they come on board.
We talk about excellence and integrity; doing the right thing when nobody’s watching is really important. We talk about respecting both internally and externally our fellow employees, as well as the people we deal with, our vendors and grantees; how you treat them is crucial. We talk about being a learning organization through evaluation.
And we talk about the humility, because it’s really making sure they understand that it’s not about them. It’s about the grantees and what the grantees do.
So we try to make this obvious and apparent, and we talk about it, and bring it into our meetings and our discussions.
Q: Given that Margaret Cargill was so unstructured in her giving, do you ever worry about making things too systematized?
I think that her interest areas help us not to do that.
We have an animal welfare program because she loved animals. She had puppies; she cared about the habitat corridors and helped fund some of the corridors in California so the wild cats could move from one area to another.
We have “relief and resilience” disaster response, domestically and worldwide.
Q: Disaster relief seems to be a theme through her lifetime and in the giving you do now. Did she have a personal experience that made her interested in that area?
I don’t think she did. It touched her.
That goes to another one of our philosophies of grant making. One of her philosophies was to fund issues that are underserved. And so our disaster relief and our relief and resilience program domestically, for instance, covers the middle of the country.
When we did our gap analysis and our due diligence on that sector of philanthropy, the media was creating a lot of input of funding to the coast. But there are always disasters that are happening to people in the center of the country that get very little media attention and very little funding for assistance.
And so she felt strongly that we should pay attention to those people that others are not paying attention to.
Q: Is that a theme that goes throughout the philanthropy?
Absolutely. There is not a lot of funding going into Native American arts and culture in this country, or indigenous art and culture around the world. She was very interested in our Native Americans. She was very interested in the indigenous people in Canada, First Nations people. She was very interested in the Mexican culture just south of where she lived.
She was very interested in Scandinavia, because she was raised in a household where they had immigrants from Sweden and Norway.
Another area that was near and dear to her was teacher education. And so she really wanted to be sure that teachers had the support to want to stay teaching, and she thought a really important area for children to learn about was art and culture.
Q: Did she give to religious organizations?
She was involved in the [Episcopal] cathedral in San Diego. But that was really the only religious institution she was involved with during her lifetime, other than when Bishop [John] Chane was elected [interim dean] to the Washington National Cathedral. Then she was interested in what he was doing there, because he was a friend.
We give grants to a number of faith-based organizations; we do that not because the philanthropies are associated with any particular religion but because they use the grants in ways that are in concert with our values.
Q: So it sounds very gratifying as well for you, not only to carry out the wishes of a friend, not only to do good, but also to build this enduring institution.
Yes, it is. I’m blessed. I just feel so lucky to be able to do it.
Read more from Christy Morse »
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES ABOUT GIVING
The Center for Stewardship Leaders at Luther Seminary
The Center for Stewardship Leaders at Luther Seminary (St. Paul, MN) seeks to shape a faithful, multidimensional culture of stewardship in congregations, households, and society. The Center strives to consider the full spectrum of stewardship practice and theology, including financial stewardship, holistic stewardship, and leadership. The Center publishes a weekly newsletter, hosts stewardship conferences, and conducts research for the church and academy.
Learn more about The Center »
Lake Institute on Faith & Giving
Lake Institute on Faith & Giving fosters a deeper understanding of the dynamic relationship between faith and giving, through research, education, and public conversation. By pairing the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy's groundbreaking research with Lake Institute's on-the-ground knowledge of religious traditions, the Institute translates an understanding of statistics and trends into practical tools and strategies.
Learn more about Lake Institute »
FROM THE ALBAN LIBRARY
More than Money: Portraits of Transformative Stewardship by Patrick H. McNamara
More than Money is a wondrous journey to 11 congregations across the United States that have been transformed by living out stewardship that is more than fundraising.
Important factors emerge from the lively descriptions and records of dialogue between McNamara and the pastors and lay leaders he visited. The pastor's leadership is a linchpin of stewardship endeavor; they are willing to talk directly with their members about money. The churches take seriously a biblical and theological vision of their mission and are willing to be counter cultural in reaching toward that vision. In these churches, membership is viewed as carrying a high level of meaning and responsibility.
In reading the stories of other congregations where transformative stewardship is happening, you can find ways of supporting and nurturing such stewardship in your own setting.
Learn more and order the book »
During her lifetime, Margaret Cargill gave away an estimated $200 million, nearly always anonymously. She gave to a variety of causes, including the Red Cross, the Nature Conservancy and the American Swedish Institute.
“She used to say to me, ‘Well, honey, I just have the money; I don't do the good work,’” Morse said.
The organization was founded after Cargill’s death -- she had no children -- and it is Morse’s mission to develop the philanthropies according to Cargill’s wishes.
Morse visited Duke as part of the Foundation Impact Research Group seminar series. She spoke to Faith & Leadership about how she is carrying out Cargill’s wishes and building an institution that will endure. The following is an edited transcript.
Q: Margaret Cargill seems to have been a remarkable person. Talk a little bit about her attitude toward philanthropy when she was alive.
She was an Episcopalian and went to an Episcopal high school in Kenosha, and was very influenced by the sisters there. She became in her later life a supporter of St. Paul’s Cathedral in San Diego. I would say she was a very spiritual woman.
The two of us got to know each other as friends, but we both believed -- and we talked about this -- that we were brought together for a reason and there was a purpose to our deep friendship, our deep relationship.
She was a very creative person, and I’m not so creative -- but I am financially capable, and organized, and the combination of those two really made life fun.
Q: Does your faith influence the work that you do?
I think the spiritual basis that we had -- it was one of the things that brought us together, our faith.
Q: Are you also Episcopalian?
No, I’m a Lutheran. Minnesota Lutheran. I used to bring her the lutefisk dinner placemats and things like that. She wanted the prayer in Swedish and the placemat from our lutefisk dinner, and yeah, it was great. It was great.
Q: From what I’ve read, she seems to have been a free spirit. She loved arts and Native American culture and camping, that sort of thing.
Oh yes, absolutely! She loved to be out. That stemmed from her growing up in Minnesota, when she would go to camp in the summertime, and it was just a wonderful experience.
Q: I read some stories -- I don’t know if they’re all true -- that she would just pop in and hand someone an envelope full of money and then leave. And also that you served as a go-between, because she didn’t even want the recipient institution to know who was giving.
Absolutely, those are true.
Q: What was the reason for that?
She didn’t want the attention. She wanted to live a low-key, middle-class life, and she did. She could have been any elderly lady walking down the street in La Jolla or San Diego, which is the way she wanted it.
Q: But she was in fact a billionaire, right?
Yes.
There is one story that the bishop tells: She came to [St. Paul’s Episcopal] Cathedral after one of her dear friends, who is very active in the cathedral, told her that they were short of money.
And so she went down there, and the bishop didn’t know who she was. She walked in and asked if she could see him. She just handed him an envelope. She said she wanted to help. When he asked her name, she said, “Oh, just say an angel stopped by.” And then she got up and walked out.
He then put the check in his drawer and went to several meetings and didn’t open it until he came back. He figured that it had 20 bucks in it, right?
And when he opened it, it had $50,000 in it, which was the amount of their shortfall.
So yes, she liked to do that. I would arrange donations for her so that they wouldn’t have her name on it. She was very intent on making sure that the attention was on the grantee and not on her.
She used to say to me, "Well, honey, I just have the money; I don't do the good work.”
And that is something that we continue to emphasize in the organization.
Q: I’m sure it gave her great pleasure to show up with a check out of the blue. But you were charged with creating an institution after her death. How did you go about doing that?
We [had] formed the Akaloa Resource Foundation and the Anne Ray Charitable Trust in ’95 and ’96. At that time, there were literally three of us: there was Margaret, myself and Cathy Hopper, who was one of her very good friends, and became my very close friend.
She left instructions that said Cathy and I were to run this going forward. Well, a year after Margaret died, Cathy passed away.
It was then that I realized I had to start bringing in not only people with specific expertise to help me form a lasting institution but also to take advantage of those people who knew her during her lifetime.
One of the things that Cathy and I did during her lifetime was invite in two people who were at the time strangers to her but whom I had been working with on the financial side.
And that was Paul Busch, who is now the philanthropy’s president, and Naomi Horsager, who is now our chief financial officer. And so those two sat with her alone without anyone else in the room and talked with her about what she wanted these organizations to work on when she was gone.
And [Cathy] and I did that very intentionally. We felt we knew, but we wanted to establish the fact that these were her wishes, not mine and not [Cathy]’s, and we wanted it documented.
And so Paul and Naomi came back several times over six to nine months. In that process, in addition to documenting what she wanted, they laid out for us how you go about building this from a legal perspective, from an accounting-finance perspective, that kind of thing. So we had those guidelines.
Q: Is it a challenge or is it exciting to build something from scratch?
I think it’s both. It’s a blessing to be able to bring to life what she wanted done.
But it is definitely a challenge. We’ve gone from the three of us doing absolutely everything to a lot of people, a lot of lives, a lot of people who need to understand why they’re there, and what is expected of them.
Building our culture is one of the most important things I can do before I’m gone. So it’s really important to be sure that our employees understand who Margaret was, and why we’re doing what we’re doing.
Q: How do you do that?
I did a video for my employees where I talked about her history, and the history that I had with her, and the history of her giving, and how she approached giving, to give them a feeling. That video is shown to all of our employees when they come on board.
We have a set of values written down, and that is given to the employees when they come on board.
We talk about excellence and integrity; doing the right thing when nobody’s watching is really important. We talk about respecting both internally and externally our fellow employees, as well as the people we deal with, our vendors and grantees; how you treat them is crucial. We talk about being a learning organization through evaluation.
And we talk about the humility, because it’s really making sure they understand that it’s not about them. It’s about the grantees and what the grantees do.
So we try to make this obvious and apparent, and we talk about it, and bring it into our meetings and our discussions.
Q: Given that Margaret Cargill was so unstructured in her giving, do you ever worry about making things too systematized?
I think that her interest areas help us not to do that.
We have an animal welfare program because she loved animals. She had puppies; she cared about the habitat corridors and helped fund some of the corridors in California so the wild cats could move from one area to another.
We have “relief and resilience” disaster response, domestically and worldwide.
Q: Disaster relief seems to be a theme through her lifetime and in the giving you do now. Did she have a personal experience that made her interested in that area?
I don’t think she did. It touched her.
That goes to another one of our philosophies of grant making. One of her philosophies was to fund issues that are underserved. And so our disaster relief and our relief and resilience program domestically, for instance, covers the middle of the country.
When we did our gap analysis and our due diligence on that sector of philanthropy, the media was creating a lot of input of funding to the coast. But there are always disasters that are happening to people in the center of the country that get very little media attention and very little funding for assistance.
And so she felt strongly that we should pay attention to those people that others are not paying attention to.
Q: Is that a theme that goes throughout the philanthropy?
Absolutely. There is not a lot of funding going into Native American arts and culture in this country, or indigenous art and culture around the world. She was very interested in our Native Americans. She was very interested in the indigenous people in Canada, First Nations people. She was very interested in the Mexican culture just south of where she lived.
She was very interested in Scandinavia, because she was raised in a household where they had immigrants from Sweden and Norway.
Another area that was near and dear to her was teacher education. And so she really wanted to be sure that teachers had the support to want to stay teaching, and she thought a really important area for children to learn about was art and culture.
Q: Did she give to religious organizations?
She was involved in the [Episcopal] cathedral in San Diego. But that was really the only religious institution she was involved with during her lifetime, other than when Bishop [John] Chane was elected [interim dean] to the Washington National Cathedral. Then she was interested in what he was doing there, because he was a friend.
We give grants to a number of faith-based organizations; we do that not because the philanthropies are associated with any particular religion but because they use the grants in ways that are in concert with our values.
Q: So it sounds very gratifying as well for you, not only to carry out the wishes of a friend, not only to do good, but also to build this enduring institution.
Yes, it is. I’m blessed. I just feel so lucky to be able to do it.
Read more from Christy Morse »
The Center for Stewardship Leaders at Luther Seminary
The Center for Stewardship Leaders at Luther Seminary (St. Paul, MN) seeks to shape a faithful, multidimensional culture of stewardship in congregations, households, and society. The Center strives to consider the full spectrum of stewardship practice and theology, including financial stewardship, holistic stewardship, and leadership. The Center publishes a weekly newsletter, hosts stewardship conferences, and conducts research for the church and academy.
Learn more about The Center »
Lake Institute on Faith & Giving fosters a deeper understanding of the dynamic relationship between faith and giving, through research, education, and public conversation. By pairing the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy's groundbreaking research with Lake Institute's on-the-ground knowledge of religious traditions, the Institute translates an understanding of statistics and trends into practical tools and strategies.
Learn more about Lake Institute »
More than Money is a wondrous journey to 11 congregations across the United States that have been transformed by living out stewardship that is more than fundraising.
Important factors emerge from the lively descriptions and records of dialogue between McNamara and the pastors and lay leaders he visited. The pastor's leadership is a linchpin of stewardship endeavor; they are willing to talk directly with their members about money. The churches take seriously a biblical and theological vision of their mission and are willing to be counter cultural in reaching toward that vision. In these churches, membership is viewed as carrying a high level of meaning and responsibility.
In reading the stories of other congregations where transformative stewardship is happening, you can find ways of supporting and nurturing such stewardship in your own setting.
Learn more and order the book »
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Alban at Duke Divinity School
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