Dale Poel

Lost a letter in my name, this is Dale Poel, All Nations Halifax:

I am interested in a different version of "reserve fund."  After being introduced to the legally required Reserve Fund for my condominium, it FINALLY dawned on me that our church has never had or even thought of that kind of reserve fund.  The result is that we have always been caught off guard when our bulding needed some major attention. The comments above are talking about a month or two of "reserve" available to handle monthly cash flow, if necessary.

I am thinking of a Reserve Fund that is found as a line item in the annual budget and is a reserve against identifiable, future building/infrastructure expenditures.  We bought a 100 year old inner city church from the UCC in 1995 and, with the sale of existing property and a small loan from church help fund did a reasonable amount of renovations (new electrical, kitchen, bathrooms, roofing).  Then, we stopped thinking about the building (sort of), but the building didn't stop normal wear and tear.  In a condominium context, your Reserve Fund study anicipates the life span of key features of your building and establishes a recommended yearly set aside to anticipate these future needs.

Without that knowledge from a reserve fund study, a congregation will always be SURPRISED when they are confronted with the need for a new furnace, shngles on the roof, exterior painting or repointing of 100 year old masonry.  We are currently SURPRISED to need a $250,000 to $300,000 renovation/restoration to our foundation and brick work, plus some work on the stain glass windows.  Our Council has had a heart attack and, in the best of traditions, has deferred the work while we wonder whether or not we can raise that amount of money from within or without of the congregation.

Some of this surprise may come from the mistaken separation of building from mission.  In our case, the bulding -- its capacity, multi-function community and program use), its prime location within the city -- is intimately related to our church's mission.  We are in the process of developing a Mortar to Mission statement that clarifies that relationship and justifies the expenditures necessary to keep the building/mission in place. 

This issue may be exacerbated by the age of our building, but even a new church has to anticipate replacing an asphalt shingled roof within a 20 to 30 year period.  Twenty years from now when we may have to do that, it will be a $100,000 project.  If you have strong themes in your church culture against borrowing and paying interest, you have to anticipate these expenditures on in the annual budget and have that reserve set aside on an annual budget in some (conservative) investment fund.  eh?

Hello again,

I am familiar enough with both types of reserve funds and am interested in other church's experience with the second.  Your church's experience with approximately 2% of monthly collections in our context would not begin to meet our long term renovation/restoration needs.  In fact, 2% is just about what our annual budget includes for general maintenace (which we also find a challenge)  -- keep the building functioning, but not in a state of maintenance that in an ideal world would be desirable. We would probably need a minimum of 6-10% of general fund offerings (annual total between $160,000 to $180,00)  to anticipate the larger, capital projects without borrowing funds with interest payments.

Smaller worshipping community + large, older but very useful buidling + aversion to borrowing = temporary "immobiisme"

Cheers,  Dale

Our Halifax/Dalhousie University context is different and maybe unique.  Since it's beginning our CRC chaplain has been an official  "Dalhousie chaplain" sharing space in the University building --- university provided office space, some admin assistance, phone, copier, internet, etc.  It has changed from the University's Chaplaincy Office to a Multi-faith centre.  So, it does give us a presence on campus. Brad participates in semester-beginning student service events.  There are still challenges of being recognized in more informal and important ways and boundaries to our engagement of the campus (e.g., a brochure in the Multifaith Centre alerts students to "aggressive" religious groups). 

The annual fall lecture series has been important in connecting with various departments, depending on the substantive area of the lecture series.  And, the ties to All Nations Church for fellowship has been important to both the church and the campus ministry.  We look forward to sharing with you the dynamics of this campus ministry model at the annual cma conference in Halifax this Spring.

"Every dollar that goes to debt is a dollar that does not go to ministry." Experts suggest that you need a compelling vision, congregational trust, and unity among the leadership to lead a congregation in a campaign to lower debt. 

Well, that depends doesn't it. Unless a congregation has the unusual capacity to fund large capital projects (new building, restoration of an older bulding), it will find it necessary to borrow -- and that borrowing needs to be done to clearly link the mortar/bricks etc of a congregation to its mission.  To say that debt acquired in support of a physical facility needs does not go to mission sounds profound, but it isn't.  We need to link mortar and mission and have the capacity to articulate that relatinship.

"The church has a responsibility to contribute to the conversations that make for the best public policy for the common good."

We can chew on the technical details of pipelines, but the starting point is found in the UCC quote found earlier.

All Nations has an "interim" term between 2 "semesters" of Sunday School in which the high school and adult SS classes join in one class.  So, we have a 5 week period and are using the Belhar materials (DVD and study guide) for this combined class.  Attendance in the class has been about 20 +/-, but the time limit of a Sunday morning class slot (about 45-50 minutes) has been limiting.  The material has more good questions to chew on than we have time.  So far, we are saving the "yes/no" discussion until the final class.  I'm also trying to avoid the 50 minute monologue of a retired prof.  :-)

I've stayed out of this exchange for awhile, in part because I found the initial comments in this thread moderately depressing and requiring a response beyond my time limits to create.  Thanks to Dan for coming in and offering a response that fits my perspective.  The Belhar Confession offers us an opportunity to formally incorporate broad themes of unity, justice and reconciliation that will challenge us in our denominational, congregational and personal expressions of our faith in Christ.

The discussion thread also highlghted for me the broad continuum of individual church experience.  The contextual issues mentioned earlier in this thread (other division/fractures) are not adequate reasons for setting aside the Belhar Confession.  If these contextual issues remain salient for those attending a future Synod, it will be a painful discussion.

All Nations (Halifax) is a "scent free" worshipping community, but occasional reminders are necessary. In the beginning, men had to be told that their after shave was a "frag."  And, our older (100+) building has its own problems in this regard.  Nova Scotia has the only provincially funded NS Environmental Health Clinic which is a pilot project focusing on the treatment of MCS.  We're blessed to be located here.  NS is especially "sensitive" because the province built a new hospital that had a design flaw that turned it into a "sick building" and they had to face the consequences.

With all the attention to Classis renewal over the past years, Classis Eastern Canada is not the first to conduct a review of its programs, budgets, vision, direction, etc., but it is doing that now.  And, although techically a Classis only exists when it is sitting, the assumptions of this "operational review" and the committee's mandate certainly implies something that is ongoing.

1.1.Mandate from Classis

This operational review seeks God’s wisdom and direction in carrying out and completing an in-depth and objective review of all the ministries of Classis Eastern Canada (CEC) by

 a) Documenting ministry successes so that CEC can give thanks to God and celebrate them 

b) Providing an accurate review of our current ministries along with recommendations regarding their viability and effectiveness

c) Considering and proposing the need for any new ministries; and,

d) Advising whether the financial and personnel resources allocated to accomplish each ministry are within the means of Classis.

The on-going ministries supported by CEC might be nervous if the formal understanding of Classis (each Classis sitting de nova)  governed the actual life of Classis. We have an interesting assignment and are presenting an interim report next month.

Cheers,

    Dale