Newsletter February 6, 2019

Planning for the Future of Our Ministry

On the evening of January 24, several fellows and friends of the Episcopal Campus Ministry (ECM) attended a fundraising training workshop with Melissa Hickman at Canterbury House. Melissa, partner of Hickman Associates, is a very experienced and talented professional in the field of fundraising for religious organizations. She has been working with ECM over the last two years to help us develop and implement our own fundraising strategic plan with the aim of rediscovering our mission and vision as a community, finding new avenues for growth, and achieving sustainability for the future. We have identified new ways through which we remain faithful to our mission of being an embracing, diverse, and inclusive community, a nesting place for all who come to us, and a safe place to explore our spiritual journey and discuss the most pressing issues facing our society.

The time has come to match those dreams and plans with the resources needed to fund them. While most of us were totally unfamiliar with the world of fundraising, Melissa did a great job at helping us navigate through the basics of it. She helped us understand fundraising as a key part of ministry and community life. She reminded us that even though faith does not need money at all, faith-based organizations do need several resources to function and achieve their goals. Moreover, we now know that fundraising is not a one-shot, cold, transactional soliciting, but it is rather a continuous, organic and authentic relationship with people with whom we find shared interests and concerns, and who are willing to contribute their time, talent and money to the fulfillment of our mission. Now, we have the task to find these old and new friends that can support Episcopal Campus Ministry at Indiana University to live up to our mission for many years to come.(Written by Ricardo Bello-Gómez.)