wfn.org | Budget `stops bleeding, focuses on

[ENS.parti@ecunet.org]

August 6, 1997
Episcopal News Service
Jim Solheim, Director
212-922-5385
ens@ecunet.org

97-1908
Budget `stops bleeding, focuses on mission'

     (ENS) The Episcopal Church is on sound financial footing and has
a new, unified funding formula offering some relief to smaller dioceses.
     The $114 million, three-year budget approved by the 72nd
General Convention in Philadelphia focuses on mission and "stops the
bleeding,"said Episcopal Church treasurer Stephen Duggan.
     Rocked by an embezzlement scandal two years ago, the church
has struggled to regain financial credibility and overcome an $8 million
shortfall in income against budgeted expenditures resulting in budget
cuts.
     Duggan said the balanced budget was essentially "flat," based on
current actual income, with only a very slight increase for inflation. 
     The budget sets a new assessment rate of 21 percent of diocesan
income to support national church ministries and programs. The new
unified budget includes operations for the national church program and
for General Convention~in the past assessed at different rates.
     The new higher rate is offset by a $100,000 standard deduction
called an "episcopal exclusion," initiated because the committee
recognized "one thing every diocese needs is a bishop."
     During the past three years, support from dioceses has ranged
from payments below 16 percent to above 20 percent of diocesan income,
Duggan said. 
     The new formula means 30 dioceses~generally smaller, rural
ones~will be asked to pay less during the next three years. Forty
dioceses will be asked to increase their giving by less than $10,000 per
year. 
     Larger dioceses will be asked for greater support, due to a
clarification of rules regarding diocesan endowment income, Duggan
said. 
     Diocesan support for the budget is projected to be $78.7 million,
     Vincent Currie of the Diocese of Central Gulf Coast said that
while there is not much new money in the budget, everything was looked
at from the point of view of enabling the mission of the church. Currie
serves as chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Program, Budget and
Finance (PB&F) which developed the budget.

A time for leadership
     Calling for renewed efforts in stewardship, the bishops said this is
a time for leadership.
     "The budget will not mean a thing unless we are behind it and
make the funding happen," Bishop Edward Jones of the Diocese of
Indianapolis said. "It is up to us. It is time to exercise leadership."
     "The world needs the ministry our church can give," Bishop
David Joslin of the Diocese of Central New York said.
     The Rev. John Hiers of the Diocese of Southwest Florida warned
giving that will not increase if the program and ministry of the national
church is not known in the parishes. "If my people are going to give,
communications have to improve," he said.
     The result was a resolution calling for creating in each province a
committee for national mission to communicate and promote financial
support for the church's mission. 
     The core of these committees will be the provincial members of
the committee on Program, Budget and Finance, and the provincial
members of the Executive Council.

Other actions
     In addition to numerous line-item appropriations, the convention
determined the following policies:
     ~ requiring resolutions with funding implications to be referred to
the Joint Standing Commission on Program, Budget and Finance or to
the Executive Council, and electing Duggan as treasurer of General
Convention;
     ~ clarifying that the treasurer elected at every meeting of the
General Convention may also be treasurer of the Domestic & Foreign
Missionary Society and of the Executive Council;
     ~ authorizing the church's treasurer to borrow funds to defray the
cost of General Convention; and 
     ~ establishing audit and reporting standards for the Domestic and
Foreign Missionary Society.

     Convention also approved stewardship legislation:
     ~ affirming "the tithe as the minimum standard of individual
giving for Episcopalians;"
     ~ calling for an education program on Planned Giving;
     ~ advocating consistent congregational giving for the care of
people in the congregations;
     ~ integrating Episcopal and Lutheran stewardship education;
     ~ adopting the theme "Stewardship, Our Covenant with
God/Mayordomia, Nuestro Pacto con Dios"  as the theme for the Office
of Stewardship Resources;
     ~ supporting  stewardship education for Latino members, with a
video, training manuals and regional training events.
     ~ authorizing a study to determine if membership and giving
increase when a congregation incorporates ecological concerns into its
program; and
     ~ directing the Planned Giving Ministries of the Episcopal
Church and the Episcopal Church Foundation to include The Book of
Common Prayer rubric on the importance of wills in their materials.

~Based on reports by Carol E. Barnwell, communications officer of the
Diocese of Texas, and the Rev. Walt Gordon, a writer, editor and
consultant from Minneapolis.