Your June Mission & Service Stories JUNE 4
Your Generosity Inspires Healing through Storytelling [Image credit: copyright (c) The Raven Collective]
The theatre performance, Bunk #7, shares the true story of six boys rioting against the abuse they received at a residential school. Your gifts to Mission & Service open opportunities for this kind of powerful storytelling. JUNE 11
Preserving Language through the Mohawk Language Bible
[Image credit: Page from Bible copyright © Canadian Bible Society; landscape: Lindsay Vautour] The much anticipated Mohawk Language Bible will be available in fall 2023. Your gifts to Mission & Service allow projects to preserve language and culture to flourish. JUNE 18
The Path toward Healing: Murray Pruden’s Work  [Video still credit: The United Church of Canada/Murray Pruden]The Rev. Murray Pruden is Nehiyaw, Cree First Nations, from the Goodfish Lake and Saddle Lake First Nations. He is the current Executive Minister for Indigenous Ministries and Justice for The United Church of Canada. Supported by Mission & Service, Pruden has made significant gains in building relationships of trust and healing between the church and Indigenous communities.
JUNE 25
Your Gifts Help to Restore Lost Languages
[Image credit: Pitquhirnikkut Ilihautiniq/Kitikmeot Heritage Society] Today, fewer than 600 people can still speak Inuinnaqtun fluently. Many lost the language when they were removed from their communities and sent to residential schools. In partnership with Mission & Service, Inuinnaqtun language mentors get resources to allow them to spend 300 hours a year working with their apprentices to begin to restore their language. |
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Congregational Stewardship/Generosity
This is your resource to help you grow generous disciples and gather the resources you need to respond to God’s calling. Please modify and use these ideas in your context.
Ideas You Can Try!
Say “Thank You!” to Your Consistent Donors
Send a special note of thanks to everyone who gives monthly (or more regularly) to your community of faith. That includes everyone on PAR, everyone who gives monthly through CanadaHelps, and all who are consistent in their envelope or e-transfer giving. This is NOT a request to increase donations, just thank them for their regular, generous, giving.
Invite People to Consistent GivingContact the participants in your community of faith who are not yet giving consistently and thank them for their gifts, then invite them to start giving consistently. Monthly – consistent – giving is a sure way for people to grow in generosity; and growing in generosity is a big step in growing closer to God. Be sure to show them how to sign up for PAR or any other monthly giving programs you offer. Make giving easy!
Pentecost Sunday (May 28) / Church Union Sunday (June 4)What is your passion and hope for the United Church? These are great Sundays to give people time to creatively share their passion for their church; to tell why they are part of your community of faith; to share their hope for the future. What a great way to get people excited about The United Church of Canada, Mission & Service, and your local community of faith. Hold a special thank-offering to support BOTH your local ministry plus Mission & Service, to celebrate! |
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Called to Be the Church: The Journey
Called to Be the Church: The Journey modules really make a difference. “The course leaders brought ‘lots of enthusiasm and commitment to making the course enjoyable and fun.’” In each cohort, community of faith leaders rediscover how inspiring their church really is and get excited about telling their stories as they invite people to share their resources to grow in faith and make a difference in people’s lives. Come and join the movement! Plan now to participate in the fall! Getting Started in Stewardship: Next offered the week of September 11.Join United Church people across the country for this 90-minute on-line course to learn some stewardship first principles. Follow-up projects get you ready to go deeper.
Stewardship Best Practices: Next offered in fall 2023.Newly updated! Four two-hour sessions interspersed with practical exercises and discussions to examine Stewardship Best Practices in order for you to set achievable goals, create an annual stewardship plan, and get energized! Ongoing coaching helps keep you on track.
Bequests & Estate Giving for Your Community of Faith: next offered October 2023
Explore how to set up and maintain a Planned Giving Program at your church, with two one-hour online sessions.
Setting Up Your Congregational Giving Program: Next offered in January 2024.
Learn how best to utilize the Called to Be the Church Giving Program materials and develop a plan that will work for your church with two 2-hour online sessions and coaching. For those planning a giving program in the first half of 2024.
For more information on these and other stewardship supports, contact called@united-church.ca. |
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Stewardship Seconds (revised for 2023) Short, pithy sayings that pack a punch, to help infiltrate stewardship thinking into your community of faith. Add them to newsletters, worship, announcements, webpages, wherever people gather! Find them at the Stewardship in Worship webpage. |
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Offering Introductions and Dedication Prayers (revised for 2023) The offering time in worship is NOT about collecting money! It is about growing generous disciples and stewards. These Offering Introductions and Dedication Prayers, for each Sunday of the year, will help. Find them at the Stewardship in Worship webpage. |
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Our Call and VisionThe General Council Office has adopted a Call and Vision statement that speaks to how we boldly embody the Christian story in this time, filled with the certainty of resurrection and hope for new life, and which informs the 2022‒2025 Strategic Plan of the General Council Office. Living purposefully into this call and vision anticipates becoming what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and others called the Beloved Community—the ever inbreaking, ever transforming, ever reconciling realm of God, realized in our time. In the next few issues of God’s Mission, Our Gifts, we are sharing stories, prayers, and worship resources that your community of faith can use to engage with the Call and Vision: to live into deep spirituality, bold discipleship, and daring justice.
This month, try examining deep spirituality through the words of theologian Rob Fennell, who believes that deep spirituality is for regular people like us – in the everyday actions and thoughts that make up our day-to-day lives. As he says, “We don’t need to figure everything out to be people with deep spirituality. And we don’t have to do things the way others do them.” It’s not hard, but it takes practice. But the good news is that you can start right now. |
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GOD’S MISSION, OUR GIFTS is your newsletter. We want to provide news and information that you can use in your community of faith, whether you’re a minister, a board member, an administrator, a treasurer, or anyone else who wants to make a difference.
What else would you like to see? What can we do to help your community of faith get where it needs to go? Send us your thoughts!
Fill out your Mission & Service goal-setting form online! |
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Your generosity enables the United Church to love, serve, and minister in the world. Make an online donation or learn more about your options to support the work of the church. |
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