LOUISVILLE (Outlook) The Presbyterian Mission Agency board heard first reports Sept. 15 from leaders of the eight ministerial teams that it’s created – groups that will meet for short periods of time (six to 18 months) and each of which are focused on a specific question.
In those presentations, the teams’ chairs tried to give a sense of those initial conversations – and some idea of what to expect next.
Highlights from the ministerial team reports:
Next steps for 1001 New Worshiping Communities program. Team chair Jeffrey Joe said the team heard reports from Chip Hardwick, director of the Presbyterian Mission Agency’s Theology, Formation, and Evangelism ministry area and from Vera White, national coordinator for 1001 New Worshiping Communities, on the progress and challenges of the 1001 program.
The team will need some time to study available research involving the program – including a survey of its leaders released in 2015, Joe said.
He also said the team wants to learn more about legal efforts which could potentially provide additional funding for the 1001 program. He referred to cy pres actions – in which lawyers ask a court to make a determination regarding the use of endowment funds whose donors had imposed restrictions. The question being raised is whether the use currently being considered by the Presbyterian Mission Agency – such as for the 1001 program – comes close enough to that original intent to meet the Presbyterian Church (U.SA.)’s current needs, but to still conform with the desires of the donor.
In an interview, Hardwick said the funds involve a “really significant amount of money” – enough that, if the money is freed up, “we’ll be able to double the budget for 1001 from the proceeds.”
The funds generally were given for construction of new church buildings, and “we don’t build as many buildings as we used to,” Hardwick said. Instead, evangelism now is more often being done through the creation of new worshipping communities.
Tony De La Rosa, who is interim executive director of the Presbyterian Mission Agency and also a lawyer, and April Davenport, an attorney for the Presbyterian Mission Agency, explained in an interview how cy pres actions work.
“When someone gives a restricted gift, we are morally and legally bound by those restrictions,” De La Rosa said. “Over time, those restrictions may prove unwieldy and cannot be properly effectuated.” An example might be: scholarships given for students at a school that no longer exists.
The funds in question here are endowment funds – some of which date back to the late 1800s and are held by the Presbyterian Foundation, which has its offices in Jeffersonville, Indiana, just across the Ohio River from Louisville.
A cy pres action would be filed in probate court, De La Rosa said – in this case, in Clark County, Indiana, although a case involving these funds has not yet been filed. When a case is filed, lawyers for the PC(USA) and for the Foundation would present both the original restrictions from the donors, the reasons why those restrictions have proven unwieldy and proposed amendments to the restrictions so the court can determine “if it falls within the general parameters of the original intent of the donor.”
The requirement is that “you have to be as near as possible to the original donor restriction, yet changing it to something that can be accomplished in this world,” Davenport said.
The money in these endowment funds was provided for church growth – which at one point in church life essentially meant that “if you build it, they will come,” Davenport said.
Now, the PC(USA)’s church growth strategy centers around the 1001 program – and many of those new worshiping communities don’t own or want to own buildings, De La Rosa said.
About 10 endowed funds are at stake here, involving roughly $90 million. Some are from particular donors; others are endowments from fundraising efforts for church growth by predecessor boards of the church, Davenport said.
Income from permanent funds held by the Foundation is paid to the Presbyterian Mission Agency according to a spending formula designed to maintain the fund in perpetuity. The spending formula is currently 4.25 percent per year, and is reviewed every year.
“We don’t take this lightly,” De La Rosa said, regarding the potential cy pres action. If the restrictions of donors can be met, “we will adhere to those restrictions” – having both a legal and a moral responsibility to do so. In this case, if the cy pres isn’t granted, “the money will be sitting there and inaccessible because we cannot comply with the restrictions.”
How long will it take for the cy pres action to be filed and be considered? That’s not clear, Davenport said.
“You can quote me,” De La Rosa said. “Not fast enough.”
Implementing the Belhar Confession. Patsy Smith, the team chair, said her team took a “deep dive” into the history of the Belhar Confession, which South African Christians wrote in the 1980s during the struggle over apartheid, and which the 2016 General Assembly voted in June to add to the PC(USA) Book of Confessions.
The team will work to provide resources for Presbyterians to use to implement the vision of Belhar – a vision “for a fully inclusive church that is informed by Belhar,” Smith said.
Among the work ahead for the team, she named: identifying what resources are already available; finding ways to distribute those to the church; and creating a bibliography of resources.
Power and privilege. Team member James Parks said the group tried to understand what power and privilege means – both individually and collectively – and what the denomination can do to address that.
The PC(USA) “has addressed power and privilege numerous times,” he said. “There are many reports, many actions, of General Assembly, many referrals.” The problem is that “the hard work of all those clouds of witnesses … [has] not been honored. We have to admit that within our church there is structural and personal racism that has resulted in many of these reports sitting on the shelves, going into wastebaskets and just being ignored.”
A lesson from that is “the way we have been addressing power and privilege isn’t working,” Parks said. “We have to put these reports into action. … This is a kairos moment, and we have to act.”
Increased coordination between the Presbyterian Mission Agency and the Office of the General Assembly. Team chair Conrad Rocha said the board heard presentations about the cooperation and collaboration which already exists – and will be working to document that and looking for ways to do more.
The team also is trying to be really clear that “we weren’t in any way a surrogate for the Way Forward Commission” that the 2016 General Assembly created. “We’re not trying to do their work or in any way supplant it,” but to cooperate with the Office of the General Assembly to further the work of the church.
Allocating and communicating overhead costs. The discussion about how the Presbyterian Mission Agency allocates overhead costs involves complex and sensitive matters of trust and power dynamics, said team chair Wendy Tajima. “It’s a critical issue for the larger church in how they perceive the Presbyterian Mission Agency.”
The team plans to look at a lot of information, she said – including inconsistencies in the way the fees are implemented or communicated. It also can be difficult to determine what are administrative or overhead costs, or what is ministry. Many who work in support functions “still see them as ministry,” Tajima said, because such things as “having lights, having support staff … all contribute to our ability to do mission.”
There also can be a sense of perceived scarcity, she said. “The Presbyterian Church has a history of being pretty comfortable,” Tajima said. Although Presbyterians still are affluent, “we have constraints on resources we probably didn’t experience in the past. We believe some of the pressure on donor education and overhead allocations are a response to some perceived scarcity.”
Developing World Mission competencies in domestic mission. The team is looking at ways that the PC(USA)’s domestic mission work can learn from World Mission, said team chair Nancy Ramsay. The team will consider how what’s been learned from international work can inform the Young Adult Volunteer program, the 1001 program and work with congregations, she said.
The implications of what’s been learned internationally could be particularly important, Ramsay said, in work with new immigrant communities and with congregations with a greater concentration of people of color than the typical Presbyterian church.
Role of print. Team member James Ephraim said the group is considering the role of print in Presbyterian Mission Agency publications – focusing at this first meeting on questions more than answers. For example: What’s the role of print in the society and the church?
And “is it profitable?” is a key question for print publications, Ephraim said. Does the board expect the Presbyterian Mission Agency to be profitable? And “can print serve as a form of evangelism?”
Future of the Young Adult Volunteer program. The program, more than 20 years old, provides leadership development through faith and action, said team chair Marci Glass.
This year, the program sent 79 young adult volunteers to serve, “and we had capacity for a lot more,” she said.
So the team will talk about recruitment – including how to work with mid councils and seminaries – and the question of how much money it’s reasonable to expect the young adult volunteers to raise on their own to offset their costs.
Transparency
The board also spent part of its Sept. 15 plenary discussing the question of “what is the purpose of transparency?” Among the matters they discussed, mostly in small groups:
- How can transparency be used to build trust among board members and with the Presbyterian Mission Agency staff?
- What are the board’s obligations to keep some matters confidential?
- How can practices of accountability promote confidence and trust?
- How can board members learn to anticipate and respond to conflicts of interest?
- What are best practices in practicing transparency?
Ramsay, a board member who led the discussion, acknowledged the tensions inherent in some of the questions – for example, board members want good relationships with the agency’s staff, but also are responsible for voting on mission budgets for the PC(USA), which sometimes involve staffing cuts.
Jan Edmiston, co-moderator of the 2016 General Assembly, said that her discussion group considered “the difference between transparency and secret-keeping.”
Part of that is recognizing that “all of us make mistakes,” Edmiston said. “But keeping the mistakes to ourselves, hiding the mistakes, is the problem.”
