Lilly Foundation Economic Challenges Initiative Gives Major Grant to the Southwestern Minnesota Synod and New Jersey Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)
For Immediate Release
Lilly Endowment Inc. has awarded grants of $250,000 to both the Southwestern Minnesota Synod and the New Jersey Synod of the ELCA to sustain the work they have been doing as part of Lilly Endowment Inc.’s National Initiative to Address Economic Challenges Facing Pastoral Leaders. The initiative supports a variety of religious organizations across the nation as they address the financial and economic struggles that can impair the ability of pastors to lead congregations effectively.
The two synods, with diverse rural and urban settings, had been selected three years ago to work on major challenges facing both congregations and pastors. These issues include large post-seminary educational loans facing new pastors, inadequate retirement resources facing older pastors, and crisis medical expenses.
The partnership has been fruitful. Now with these new grants, the two synods will continue to address their particular contexts with educational strategies to knock down the silence about money and increase pastors’ and lay leaders’ competency in addressing financial challenges and opportunities. Secondly, both will continue to give grants to address specific economic challenges facing pastors.
The Southwestern Minnesota Synod will use the Lilly grant to strengthen current programs they have found effective and explore new programs to enhance financial literacy among congregational lay leaders and pastors.
The second phase comes with a new title, God’s Gifts of Grace: Ministerial Excellence Fund. This work will continue to be a part of the larger synodical work to “Develop Servant Leaders” as emphasized in the synod’s funding initiative Embrace God’s Mission + Equip God’s People.
The grant calls for the people of the Synod to raise $250,000 in order to receive a matching
$250,000 for this Ministerial Excellence Fund (as part of the total $500,000 grant).
“We are profoundly grateful to receive this grant that will allow us to sustain our educational work and continue to give transformational gifts to address the financial challenges of our pastors. Thank you to our local donors, both individuals and congregations, who have helped us free our leaders from economic challenges to better lead. We also thank our director for this project, Pastor Andrew Hermodson-Olsen, and the team of lay and clergy leaders who have overseen this project in the past and those who will help in the future,” said Bishop Jon Anderson of the Southwestern Minnesota Synod.
Lilly Endowment has committed millions of dollars to this national initiative. The Endowment has awarded grants to a variety of Christian traditions, including Baptist, Catholic, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Church of God, Episcopal, Independent Christian
Churches/Churches of Christ, Lutheran, Mennonite, Methodist, Presbyterian, Reformed and Wesleyan churches, as well as non-denominational, and historic African-American Christian communities. Recipients also include denominational pension and benefits boards, local and regional denomination judicatories.
Each program is customized to the needs of pastoral leaders in each religious tradition, but the programs have much in common as they:
- provide incentives for clergy to take part in personal finance education
- offer low- or no-cost financial planning and counseling
- offer incentives for pastors to better fund their retirement savings programs
- help pastors create emergency funds
- develop strategies that help young pastors pay down or eliminate educational debt
- create new scholarships so that seminarians borrow less while in school
“Pastors, especially those just beginning in ministry, accept low salaries as part of their commitment to God and to church. Many enter ministry with significant debt from their undergraduate and seminary years and often have little financial resiliency when financial emergencies arise,” said Dr. Christopher L. Coble, vice president for religion at the Endowment. “These organizations understand the importance of the financial wellbeing of pastors and the implications for the congregations they serve.”
Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by three members of the Lilly family – J.K. Lilly, Sr., and sons J.K., Jr., and Eli – through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly & Company. The Endowment exists to support the causes of religion, education, and community development. Lilly Endowment’s religion grant-making is designed to deepen and enrich the religious lives of American Christians. It does this largely through initiatives to enhance and sustain the quality of ministry in American congregations and parishes.
