In Angola, ERD has partnered with the Anglican Diocese of Angola in the Uige and Cunene provinces. Since the program began in 2006, more than 16,000 insecticide-treated nets have been issued and more than 388 community malaria agents have been taught to educate communities about malaria.

Episcopal Relief and Development, in partnership with Roll Back Malaria, endorses the Global Health Council's Malaria Community Statement on Africa Malaria Day 2007. The statement is signed by ERD and other organizations fighting the spread of the disease and raising awareness about malaria prevention. Please click here to read the full statement.

Further information on NetsforLifeSM is available here.

To make a contribution to Episcopal Relief and Development's Malaria Fund, please visit http://www.er-d.org or call 1-800-334-7626, ext. 5129. Gifts can be mailed to: Episcopal Relief and Development, "Malaria Fund", PO Box 7058, Merrifield, VA 22116-7058.

Read it all at Episcopal Life Online.

The Episcopal Church, Archbishop of Canterbury and The Anglican Diocese of Ghana work together to build a hostel to accomodate pilgrims to the Retreat Center at Accra and serve as a counseling center.

Read more »

The challenge is how to make the issue of homeless seem like more than an abstraction to kids who go to school in a wealthy suburb. The answer is to involve them, through service learning in the lives of the homeless and the people who work with them. Samaritan Ministries of Greater Washington and St. Andrew's Episcopal School show the way. Read the interviews starting on pages 1 and six of this pdf of In Step magazine.

Nationwide, food banks -- clearinghouses that distribute food donations to local charitable pantries and emergency shelters -- report receiving fewer donations in the form of imperfectly packaged canned and boxed edibles.

It is the down side of a drive in recent years by manufacturers and retailers for greater supply-chain efficiency. Toward that end, many food manufacturers began producing food in quantities more closely tailored to individual retail customers' needs. That in turn has reduced the amount of food that gets sold to retailers and ultimately returned to the manufacturers.

At the same time, new technology has helped eliminate production errors such as processing canned food without labels or producing an entire order of cereal boxes using upside-down text.

In Phoenix, St. Mary's Food Bank is seeing about 15% fewer donations over the past year, says Executive Director Terry Shannon. St. Mary's, which bills itself as the world's first food bank, was established in 1967 by the late John van Hengel after talking with a poor woman who scavenged for dented canned food in grocery-store dumpsters. A creative character who dabbled in everything from advertising to driving beer trucks, he came up with the idea of having a central location for food-industry waste.

The concept is workable as long as the waste proliferates. But retailers are finding new avenues to sell damaged goods. Some grocery stores are putting dented cans in discount bins rather than sending them to the local food bank. Others are selling product into the so-called gray market where brokers sell unsalable groceries to discount stores, flea markets or "banana box" grocery stores, shops that sell salvage food packaged in old banana boxes.

While the the news is full of stories of our disagreements, Episcopalians are working to make a difference in our world. Anglican/Episcopal networks are active connecting people who want to use their gifts for creating a better world. Developing ways to provide food security for those who lack resources, providing treated mosquito nets to prevent malaria, lobbying governments to enact just laws, working to stop global warming, volunteering to teach children and adults, offering technical skills for clean water and sharing technology are some ways people are busy and involved. Some networks are all volunteer, others have paid staff to track efforts and offer specialized organizational talents.
Here are just a few that might be of interest:

Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation A Grass Roots Movement Supporting the Millennium Goals is not your typical development organization. In fact, its not a development organization at all. According to their web site: "We don’t build clinics and schools. We don’t collect money for projects. We don’t lobby politicians. EGR doesn’t do these things … we help everyone else dream them and do them with excellence. The organization fuels the movement. The movement transforms the Church and the world." The group offers connections, resources, ideas, worship and prayer to make the Millennium Development Goals a reality.

Beijing Circles is a resource for women of faith changing the world. This program forms circles - small groups of women - around the world working on issues that especially affect women's abilities to survive and thrive in the world of violence, poverty, and inequality for girls and women. The circles educate themselves on issues and connect with others around the world to make a difference in the lives of all people.

Episcopal Ecological Network (EpEN) helps the Episcopal Church in the USA to advocate and articulate protection of the environment and preserving the sanctity of creation. This network extends throughout the various congregations, Dioceses and Provinces of the Church and includes interaction with other Christian churches in the USA and around the world.

Episcopal Peace Fellowship is a national organization with local chapters across the United States. While we are affiliated with the Episcopal Church in America, we are an independent entity striving to work for peace in justice in our communities, our church, and the world.

Episcopal Public Policy Network connects more than 15,000 Episcopalians across the country, brings the positions of the Episcopal Church to our nation's lawmakers. It represent the social policies of the church established by the General Convention and Executive Council, including issues of international peace and justice, human rights, immigration, welfare, poverty, hunger, health care, violence, civil rights, the environment, racism and issues involving women and children. EPPN offers email action alerts for members to speak to the leaders of the US on issues of concern.

Prison Ministries offers support to volunteers and assigned chaplains working in jails and prisons. Visiting those in prison and bringing hope is one of the clear calls of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew chapter 25.

The Network for Science, Technology and Faith" offers connections between and among the communities science, medicine, technology and faith.

Episcopal Relief and Development responds to human suffering around the world. The organization provides emergency assistance after disasters, rebuilds communities, and help children and families climb out of poverty. ER-D is a channel for giving and working to change lives. Opportunities to participate in Nets for Life - preventing malaria, to provide food security around the world and rebuild after disaster are just some of the programs.

This is not an exhaustive list of networks of care that exist to connect those who want to "do something" and those who seek support. There are many more depending on where one wants to invest time, talent and treasure. Loving God and our neighbors as ourselves through action is at the heart of this work. Check with a local diocese in your state or The Episcopal Church web site to find those who are working on areas of interest and concern.

Christians and persons of other faiths gathered this week at the National Cathedral to urge governments to end hunger.

The Christian Post reports:

“I think all Christian people have experienced the goodness of God and it is that experience of God’s goodness and care that sustains us and makes us want to reach out and change the world and help hungry people in serious ways,” said the Rev. David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, on Sunday.
...
“The reality is that we don’t need more than an additional $75 billion to meet all the goals in all of the countries by 2015,” said Salil Shetty, director of the U.N. Millennium Campaign, at the event.

Shetty was referring to the estimated $75 billion in additional development assistance needed each year from all the rich nations to meet the Millennium Development Goals, which aim to cut global poverty in half by 2015. The U.S. would be responsible for about $25 billion.

“If the G-8 can’t find the money last week, then where did they find the $900 billion for arms sales,” he questioned to an applauding crowd. “If the G-8 could not find the money last week, then where did they find the $300 billion or more spent last year on Iraq alone.”

The U.N. Millennium Campaign director said grassroots Christian leaders are “so powerful” in the fight against hunger because politicians care about being re-elected and Christian citizens hold the power to vote them into office.
...
Temfwe told a story about a non-Christian community leader in Zambia who said to a fellow church leader while working together for the betterment of their communities:

“I didn’t know the church was interested in sanitation. I didn’t know that the church was interested in what kind of water we drink. I didn’t know the church was interested in what kind of roads are in our communities,” recalled the Jubilee Center in Zambia director. “Had you told me this, I would have become a Christian a long time ago.”

Thousands of believers from different faith groups united with the common goal of eliminating world hunger at the famed Washington National Cathedral on Monday.

The second annual Interfaith Convocation on Hunger brought together pastors, rabbis, imams, and people of faith to call on Congress and the president to renew their commitment to end hunger.

“You can’t connect with God if you walk away from hunger or if you don’t take it seriously,” declared the Rev. David Beckmann.

This Reuters report has more information on the legislative agenda of the group.

Economist Jeffrey Sachs is one of the few economists who believes world poverty can be stamped out. Here's a Vanity Fair story on him that's just appeared.

In a day heavy with news of schism you may welcome this story on the, um, lite side:

A study in which teetotal Spanish nuns drank a regular half-liter of beer showed that beer may help reduce cholesterol levels, a group financed by the Spanish Beer Makers' Association said on Thursday.
...
The experiment did not appear to have won many new beer fans among the teetotal Cistercian nuns who took part, chosen on the basis of their steady lifestyle and balanced diet.
...
"We did it for the good of humanity," Sister Almerinda Alvarez told the newspaper El Pais.

Episcopal Churches continue to live into their ministries - being the hands of Christ in the world in the midst of global and local crises.

The Immigration Bill is stalled and may die in Congress leaving many immigrants in a limbo world of jobs needing employees, willing workers and burdensome laws.

A group of church leaders have begun a New Sanctuary Movement to house illegal immigrants facing deportation in churches across the country. Law enforcement officers generally do not enter church grounds to make arrests unless lives are at stake.
St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Long Beach, CA joined the New Sanctuary Movement to protect illegal immigrants facing deportation in churches across the country. Law enforcement officers generally do not enter church grounds to make arrests unless lives are at stake.
Last Friday, Liliana, who refused to give her last name, took up residence at St. Luke’s.... She has three small children who were born in the United States and are citizens, but she has been told she is ineligible for legal status because she entered the country with a fraudulent birth certificate from her native Mexico several years ago.

“We are not criminals or bad people,” she said in a recent interview. “We just want a way to work here and provide for our children.”

In Cave Creek, AZ, Good Shepherd of the Hills Episcopal Church offers a safe place for day laborers to wait for possible jobs in the booming construction industry and other emploment. According to The Arizona Republic real-life consequences are playing out at this northeast Valley church where immigrants go to find work.

Cave Creek officials are steeling themselves for a heated hearing Monday, when residents will revisit the practices at Good Shepherd of the Hills Episcopal Church. The Rev. Scott Jones, a former Miami accountant and business owner, arrives at his new job at Good Shepherd just as the debate begins.

"Doing ministry to the poor and oppressed in the world is a big part of my attraction to them," said Jones, who will be ordained at the church in July. The enterprise at the church has been a generally peaceful practice for workers and employers, and has been seen by many as a useful alternative to workers hanging out on streets.

"Generally, unofficially, the town has been very supportive for the reasons we helped get it started," said Father Glenn B. Jenks of Good Shepherd. "I think they feel it helps alleviate some of the problems in the community. It hasn't eliminated them, but it's helped make them better."

Jenks said that the people who object to the program usually do so because of their attitudes toward migrant workers in general.

"They would like to believe that if they can make life miserable enough here, people will go home," Jenks said. "They're mistaken in that notion. What they have gone through to get here has been, in many instances, so horrific and so difficult there's nothing you can do here to make it worse than what they left."

A number of unique circumstances have combined over the past two years — circumstances involving two cousins who are both priests and who are both named Elizabeth — to inspire an upcoming trip that a group from St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Hanover will embark upon this month to the Gulf Coast.
On the exact day that Hurricane Katrina slammed the Gulf Coast at the end of August 2005, the Rev. Elizabeth Wheatley-Jones was hired as the new pastor of Christ Episcopal Church in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.
As the storm hit, some other candidates for the position decided to back out, but when she was offered the job, Rev. Wheatley-Jones, feeling she had been called to serve in that place, at that time and at that church, took the job and got to work.
And there would be a lot of work to do.
For starters, the church building itself was completely destroyed in the storm.
About one year later, in the fall of 2006, Rev. Wheatley-Jones came to the South Shore, and paid a visit to her cousin, the Rev. Elizabeth Wheatley-Dyson, who at the time, was serving as interim pastor at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Cohasset.
During that visit, the Rev. Wheatley-Jones gave a presentation about Katrina and the storm’s aftermath to her cousin and her (Rev. Wheatley Dyson’s) Cohasset congregation.
After hearing the presentation, Rev. Wheatley-Dyson was inspired to organize a group from the South Shore to travel to the Gulf Coast to help out in some way.

The Charlotte Observer reports on Family Promise - a network of churches that help folks in need of transitional housing, part of a national program. It uses community resources and church volunteers to help families on the brink of homelessness get back on their feet.

Ben Hill and his church, Christ Episcopal Church, brought the nationwide program to Charlotte after he saw it in action at his brother-in-law's church in Memphis, Tenn.

"I was lamenting the fact that the kind of things we were doing in Charlotte to help the homeless were probably doing us more good than the people we helped," said Hill, board president of Family Promise of Charlotte.

"My brother-in-law, Bob Lassiter, took me to his church to see the program. I got some of my friends from different churches together, we talked about it, and we were able to start a Family Promise Network here."

Read the rest here.

The Episcopal Church, and many of its dioceses and congregations, have made a very serious commitment to the Millennium Development Goals, which is a United Nations-backed effort to end extreme world poverty. In yesterday's New York Times, business columnist Joe Nocera's Saturday column (subscription required) is devoted to asking the tough question--can the MDG vision be achieved?

The column presents the competing views of Dr. Jeffrey Sachs (the leading economic power behind the MDGs) and his critics:

More than anything else — more even than the path-breaking work of the Gates Foundation — it has been Mr. Sachs’s ability to sell his vision that has caused wealthy philanthropists and large corporations to get behind the causes of eradicating malaria and ending poverty in Africa. He’s the reason George Soros gave $50 million to Millennium Promise, and why the organization has been able to raise over $100 million in its short life.

But that same vision, which is inexorably linked to malaria, but is much larger than that, has caused some mainstream economists to say that while Mr. Sachs means well, he is peddling a dream that will always be just that: a dream. “I think he is improving the lives of many people,” said Tyler Cowen, an economics professor at George Mason University (and a contributor to The New York Times). “But what he is doing is much oversold.” Mr. Cowen does not believe that Mr. Sachs’s work in Africa will endure.

The question that confronts us this morning is, Who is going to turn out to be right?

. . .

Although Mr. Sachs insists that he has always been consistent in his approach — “I try to design strategies appropriate to the circumstances,” he said — most other people think his Africa strategy is radically different from anything he’s done before. Mainly, he says he believes that the West needs to spend huge sums of money to control disease, improve farming, create better schools and build infrastructure in Africa. And if that can be done, he believes, economic growth, and all the good things that flow from it, will become Africa’s lot at last.

Though he is a prodigious fund-raiser, even Jeffrey Sachs can’t wave his magic wand and gather the hundreds of billions of dollars it would take to build all the roads and schools and farms and hospitals that Africa so desperately needs. So what he has done instead is to pick poor rural villages — he’s up to 79 by now — in countries with relatively stable governments, and find corporations, foundations and wealthy individuals who will adopt them to the tune of $300,000 a year for five years.

There is no question that the efforts of Millennium Promise are making a difference in those villages. The schools are drastically better, and thanks to a new lunch program, with the grain provided by the village’s own farmers, students are eating better. Each village is given bed nets coated with insecticide, which are the best way to prevent malaria, and a Novartis medicine, Coartem, which has to be taken within a day or so of malarial symptoms. Cases of malaria have dropped significantly. Mr. Sachs’s agronomists at the Earth Institute, which he runs at Columbia, create seed that can adapt to the village’s usually arid soil, and they give all the farmers fertilizer. Sure enough, the crop yield has increased, in many cases, by four to five times.

That is what Mr. Cowen means when he says that Mr. Sachs is improving people’s lives. Plainly, he is. But those efforts, laudable though they are, will not eradicate malaria or reduce African poverty in any serious way. The real question is how to turn Mr. Sachs’s efforts into more than just a pilot program that temporarily helps a bunch of villages. How will it transform all of Africa?

Ultimately, Millennium Promise is hoping that the governments of these countries will pick up where the Fortune 500 companies leave off. But given Africa’s history, that is one serious leap of faith. “He doesn’t have a coherent theory by which his model can scale up,” Mr. Cowen told me.

Read it all.

So who is correct, Sachs or Cowen? Can the Millennium Villages be "scaled up"? And even if Sachs is ultimately wrong, isn't the effort worthwhile? It certainly has been for the 79 Millennium Villages he has funded so far. And, the pessimists have proven wrong about development in other regions of the world. After all, who would have predicted in 1975 that Moaist China would be where it is today?

July 8th is the midway point in the United Nations' campaign to reduce extreme poverty in the world by 2015 through the Millennium Development Goals.

Materials to celebrate a special Millennium Development Goals Sunday in your parish include a complete worship service with sermon and prayers of the people, bulletin inserts and background information. Curriculum for children and youth are also included with PowerPoint presentations of MDGs and another with an MDG atlas from the World Bank. God's Mission in the World, a study guide provided by the Episcopal Church Office of Government Relations was used for adult curriculum.

These materials are available for your use on July 8 or at any other time. They were prepared by the Diocese of Texas and can be accessed from the diocesan Web site.

Background on the Millennium Development Goals:

Millennium Development Goals are a set of targets established by the United Nations to cut world poverty in half by 2015.

The goals were established in the early 1990s by development experts who looked at the various problems that make and keep people poor. They came up with 8 targets which would enable most people to not only meet basic needs, but to contribute to their society in more productive ways. These targets are known today as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

In 2000, most of the countries of the world re-affirmed their commitment to reaching these goals:

The 8 Millennium Development Goals
1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
2. Achieve universal primary education
3. Promote gender equality and empower women
4. Reduce child mortality
5. Improve maternal health
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases
7. Ensure environmental sustainability
8. Develop a global partnership for development

Learn More:
Episcopal Relief and Development

Millennium Campaign

United Nations
United Nations MDGs
United Nations Development Programme MDGs
MDG Progress Report 2006 (PDF)
MDG Development Indicators (Searchable Database)

World Bank
Youthink!: MDGs
Online atlas of MDGs

Street Pastors: local volunteers from churches are trained "to help those who have drunk too much or got into fights by getting them to taxis or the Nightbus, walking local people home, administering basic first aid or simply chatting."

According to eGovMonitor the Portmouth (UK) City Council has approved the Street Pastors. "They will work in teams of four, each wearing jackets and baseball caps emblazoned with the words 'Street Pastor' and will complement existing patrols of police officers and community wardens."

Twenty-nine people ranging in age from 18 to 70 have gone through the training course with topics ranging from personal safety, sex, relationships and child protection awareness to first aid and listening and mediation skills. Much of the training has been provided free of charge by many different agencies, demonstrating the widespread support for the scheme across the city.

"National statistics show that it makes streets safer and the scheme has enthusiastic support from the Safer Portsmouth Partnership."

Funding for the project has come from the Portsmouth Anglican Diocese, Safer Portsmouth Partnership, 'Seedbed' and the Police. Read it all here

The Episcopal Public Policy Network has the details.

Did you know that Sweden takes more Iraqi refugees than the United States?

Follow the EPPN link for suggestions on how to let your representatives in Washington know would you'd like done about it.

Prayers of gratitude multiply into blessings around the world.
United Thank Offering, gathers the prayers of women, men and children in contributions of money into Blue Boxes. Coins and bills are pushed through the slot of the little blue cardboard box each time a someone remembers to give thanks to God in his or her lives. These offerings result in the ability ot support mission at home and around the world. This year UTO approved approved 104 grants totaling $2,439,342.46

Many of the 2007 grants were given with the Episcopal Church's commitment to the Millennium Development Goals in mind. For instance, the hospital-completion grant in the Diocese of Sialkot in Pakistan focuses on the goals of reducing child mortality and improving maternal health, Chapman said. A $50,000 grant to the Diocese of Banks and Torres in Melanesia will help build the Mothers Union Training and Resource Centre in Vanuatu, thus addressing the MDG of empowering women. A nearly $62,000 grant to St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Jerusalem will support a health clinic and nursery hall in Ramallah to assist working mothers who need a secure place for their children to stay during the workday.

The MDG concern of reducing HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases was addressed by the $30,000 grant to the Cathedral Outreach Ministries in Bridgetown, Barbados in the Church in the Province of the West Indies. The money is meant to help renovate the old cathedral clerk's house to be used as a center for HIV/AIDS education and counseling.

The needs of immigrants and refugees were also a focus this year with grants going to efforts to care for and integrate migrants and refugees into the life of their communities. Such grants include $40,000 to Iglesia Espanola Reformada Episcopal to renovate its immigrant center in Oviedo, Spain; $8,400 to Exodus Refugee/Immigration, Inc. in Indianapolis, Indiana to provide professional English training, and $14,000 to the Episcopal Church of the Resurrection in Omaha, Nebraska in part to offer space to Sudanese refugees.

Read the story here.

For more on how you can participate and information on the United Thank Offering click here

Deacons are called to be the "nags of the church," Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori told the biennial Conference of the North American Association for the Diaconate (NAAD) on June 22 at their meeting in Seattle. According to reports by Kim Forman for Episcopal Life Online.

"As we look toward a third-millennium church and a renewed sense of mission," Jefferts Schori said, "I want to ask you deacons, and the rest of the church, about new ways in which deacons could be sent out."

Reminding them of their ordination vows, she said deacons are called to serve the poor, weak, sick, the lonely and those who have no other helpers and to interpret the needs and hopes of the world to the church.

The ministry of deacons, she explained, is one of urgency about the starving and homeless and also about "the full humanity and dignity of those in all sorts of prisons, whether legal ones, nursing homes or hospices, as well as the prisons we build through prejudice about race, gender, physical and mental ability, sexual orientation, national origin and so many others."

Jefferts Schori asked the deacons to think about service to people "captive to a consumerist society" or "caught up in the rat race of jobs or shopping or keeping up with the neighbors" and about "forming communities of faith and transformation among co-workers or fellow commuters or soccer parents."

"Where is the good news going unheard?" she asked. "Who are the hungry in spirit? Whose needs and concerns and hopes are not being addressed?"

Nigerian Priest, Venerable Geoffrey Chukwuneye, Vicar, All Saints Church, Surulere, Lagos is a rallying point for people of different age groups and gender desirous of finding true happiness and blessings of God.

According to a story in All Africa, by Bonny Amadi, writing in the Lagos Daily Champion,

Chukwunenye does not just wait for people to come to him to seek the face of God but also devotes greater part of his time in searching for lost souls who are confined inside the prison walls, those walking the street as the wretched of the earth as well as people with various diseases and illness who may have given up hope.

The prison evangelism department of his church, hospital outreach and his poverty alleviation programmes have since become a beehive of activities where various food items, clothes, money, property and other items are assembled regularly for the less privileged and needy thereby passing a message that he that oppresses the poor, oppresses his God.

"An apostle of democratic leadership that provides the needs of the common man, this clergy of repute has been an advocate of transparent leadership and on the vanguard to see that the youths who are leaders of tomorrow are taken out of the streets not as political tugs (sic) but as major contributors to the development of our nations economy.

To achieve this, he ensures that special empowerment and training programme are regularly organised for youths to equip them for the challenges of times."

Almost two years after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast of the United States, Episcopalians continue to arrive to help with recovery. Youth groups, seminarians, Episcopal churches and leaders spend time rebuilding homes and lives, physical and emotional. Although the media have moved on according to latest reports, churches and local groups have taken on the challenge to restore shattered towns and lives.

St. Mark's in Casper, Wyoming has partnered with St. Mark's in Gulfport, MS to offer material items as well as prayer support.

Bishop Marc Andrus' blog features Pilgrimage Journals from young Californians who have travelled to New Orleans to offer their skills and energy to the recovery efforts. Lily Moebes reports:

Coming here makes me hope that I hang onto the initial explosive emotions I felt while being there, and constructively turn them into productivity. I am really looking forward to coming home (yes, I know, even though the trip just began) as a San Franciscan 15 year old and finding ways of somehow incorporating all of these thing into daily life. Not bad for day one. I am really excited about the rest of the trip.

Tori Holt journals after a day of work and emotional experiences:

My qualms were soothed when I remembered the children. The school kids are simply inspiring. After struggling to comprehend really being here in New Orleans, I thought I would also have trouble connecting with them. I felt like I would have no way to relate… but this is no way to be. We’re here to help, and we are all fundamentally linked despite our vastly different lives. The kids and a few of our group’s volunteers ended up sitting around a table playing a question game. Each kid from NO was so eager to learn about our lives, and the volunteers were equally interested in the kids’ stories. We made a great connection, and it was electrifying. I left feeling reassured, loved, and embraced by another community.

Read her journal entry here

In September the House of Bishops will be meeting in New Orleans. Many church committees plan to meet in New Orleans or other Gulf locations this Triennium. They often plan to arrive before the meeting or stay following the meeting to work on recovery projects. Members of the committees, commissions, agencies and boards of The Episcopal Church stay at their own expense to do this work. According to Bishop Catherine Roskam of NY, " the Bishops' Choir and the Bishops and Spouses' Choir will cut their second CD in New Orleans. It will be called Wondrous Love and dedicated to the memory of Jim Kelsey. All proceeds will go to support the work in the Ninth Ward."

Giulianna M. Cappelletti, Postulant from the Episcopal Diocese of Louisiana, attending Virginia Theological Seminary, is interning in Bishop Jenkins' office. She writes at Bishop Jenkins' blog about her work this summer:

According to the most recent statistics from the Office of Disaster Response, nearly 240,000 of our brothers and sisters have been served to date through our various programs. This number in itself is impressive, but what has filled me with the most joy and hope has been the stories that I have heard from those to whom we are ministering.

Early last week, I spent time in the Treme neighborhood of New Orleans at the St. Luke's Homecoming Center. While this Homecoming Center still offers computer access, recovery and rebuilding information, and a community meeting space for residents, the bulk of the programming at St. Luke's is focused on the needs of the children in the neighborhood. The St. Luke's Homecoming Center has been transformed into a 'sacred space for children'.

For information on how you and your group can be involved go to:
Diocese of Mississippi
Diocese of Louisiana

youtube has several videos by those who have travelled to the Gulf Coast. Here is one from a partnering church about Bay St. Louis, MS.

Monks of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist (SSJE) are joining forces with a member of the Massachusetts National Guard to help men and women returning from Iraq and Afghanistan find a safe place to heal. Episcopal Life Online reports,

"There is a tremendous need to help these folks," according to Capt. Jeffery Cox of the Massachusetts National Guard.

Cox, a clinical social worker with the Guard, offered his expertise and advice to the brothers of the Society in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to create a time of healing at the monastery specifically for members of the armed services who have spent long stretches away from home in war zones.

Cox has been deployed twice since 2003 and served in a combat stress company in Iraq in 2005-2006. He is a postulant for Holy Orders in the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts and the Episcopal Church Province 1 Coordinator for Episcopal Relief and Development. He works full-time as a contractor for the U.S. Army Wounded Warrior Program, supporting seriously injured and wounded soldiers throughout New England.

The brothers reserved the first weekend in October at the monastery to offer a healing retreat for people returning from places of war.

Read it all here

More from Associated Press here

A group of soccer-playing girls recently returned to the US from a trip to South Africa. What did they most want to talk about upon their return?

What they wanted to talk about most was not the elephant herd that surrounded their bus or the lion cubs they held. It was handing out 1,000 hot dogs to squatters' families, joining dozens of little boys in a field to kick around a rubber ball the size of a walnut, and sharing secrets with African girls their age. They had caught glimpses of what was really important in life, and they knew it, even if they didn't know what to do with what they had learned.

Their favorite place was Richmond, a dusty speck of a town with high unemployment between coastal Port Elizabeth and huge Johannesburg. Under the umbrella of a program started two years ago by St. Peter's Episcopal Church in Poolesville, the girls stayed two days to deliver food and play with local kids. Joanna Meyer-Glitzenstein, 16, recalled riding into the town and thinking, "Oh, my God, there's nothing here. The streets are empty. Where are all the people?"

She didn't have to wait long to find out.

Read the entire Washington Post article here where you will also find links to blog entries written by the team members, and interviews with them.

The Corporation for National & Community Service has released a new study of volunteerism in the United States. It shows a large decline in volunteerism in the last year, and also shows a wide difference in levels of volunteerism among different communities.

The Christian Science Monitor reports the study's finding of a large decline in volunteerism, with changing demographics a leading cause of the decline

More than a quarter of Americans spent some of their time lending a helping hand last year.

That good news kept the rate of nationwide volunteering at historically high levels: Some 61.2 million people dedicated 8.1 billion hours of service to schools; hospitals; and religious, political, and youth groups in 2006, according to the Corporation for National & Community Service (CNCS).

The bad news is that the number of volunteers recently dipped significantly – by one third – from 2005.

A key reason: Nonprofits and other groups that rely on volunteers are having trouble retaining them.

"The demographics are such that we are poised to make this 30-year high get even better because the baby-boom generation is passing the traditional age of retirement," says David Eisner, CEO of CNCS. The group aims to raise the number of adult volunteers to 75 million by 2010.

"At the same time," he says, "our work is cut out for us because, nationally, the volunteer bucket is a bit leaky. We get a lot each year, but we lose a lot each year. We have to figure out how to plug those holes." Commuting time, education, and home ownership all play roles in determining how much time people are likely to spend helping organizations that need support, according to the CNCS's national study of America's top 50 cities based on census data between 2004 and 2006.

Other reasons for the decline include poor volunteer management, including the failure to make volunteers feel that their efforts are worthwhile:

"Our surveys show that the biggest hurdle to getting a volunteer to stay involved is that they felt ineffective in their use of time," says Rob Wallace, a spokesman for Keep America Beautiful, a national nonprofit public education organization that seeks to improve community environments. "Everyone is extremely busy today, so if they begin to feel their volunteer time is sucking the life out of them without giving them satisfaction, they get jaded and want to quit."

Often this happens because volunteer programs are not being run effectively, experts say.

"Most nonprofits … if they got a million dollar grant, they would put their CEO in charge of it," says Sandy Scott, spokesman for CNCS. "But at the same time they might have $5 million worth of volunteers at work but they are being run by an intern or busy receptionist. We are trying to change that."

More groups are now teaching nonprofit organizations how to help guarantee volunteer satisfaction in part by working with their busy schedules.

"We help them plan flexible projects for times that volunteers have free, or in geographical areas where they are already commuting to or that deal with such facts [such as] they don't have much money to get around," says Ariel Zwang, executive director of New York Cares, which helps 850 nonprofit agencies, public schools, and others create projects for volunteers.

And "compassion fatique" can also be a factor:

Compassion fatigue is one reason Dr. Erickson believes volunteerism has dropped.

"Our nightly news is riddled with very few good news stories. Wars, corporate and political scandals and ethical breaches have made us not only weary but also wary of others. So a "bunker mentality" has developed, where people keep to themselves and don't worry about anything but insulating themselves from the world and the latest bad news. We simply have to turn that around," she says.

People must constantly remind others that one person can make a big difference, says Cathy Lanyard, executive director of American Friends of Alyn Hospital in New York.

the study also found a large difference in volunteerism in different communities. Experts think that the differences can be explained by economics, community stability, local leadership and an intangible sense of community:

For example, in Minneapolis, where home ownership is high and neighbors stay connected, volunteerism is nearly 41 percent.

But in Los Angeles, where people spend more time alone in their cars than talking over the back fence, volunteerism is about 22 percent.

In Portland, Ore., where almost 90 percent of residents over age 25 have completed high school, the volunteer rate is nearly 36 percent.

In Riverside, Calif., where only 75 percent of people over age 25 have a high school degree, the number of folks willing to help for free is about 21 percent.

. . .

The levels of local, state, and federal financial commitment are key to making a city work well for volunteers, experts say.

"Volunteering doesn't happen in a vacuum," says Shawn Lecker-Pomaville, executive director of the Nevada Commission for National and Community Service, which administers AmeriCorps programs. "It takes resources and oversight and management and public policies to support it. This state could do a lot more."

In the CNCS study, Las Vegas was ranked the lowest among the top 50 cities, having a volunteering rate of 14 percent.

It's crucial to develop a culture of connectedness, too. "Here in the Midwest, helping each other is just something we do," says Beth Erickson, a business consultant in suburban Minneapolis who volunteers at least twice a week at her church in St. Paul. "I have long surmised that we volunteer up here on the frozen tundra because our lives quite literally can depend on it," she says.

Read the entire Christian Science Monitor reort here.

Have you noticed a drop in volunteerism in your church and community? Any ideas for how we can turn this trend around?

On the lighter side of the news that's breaking today, an article about a novel way of fund-raising to support mission work in the developing world was published in Christianity Today:

"From carrot cake to Lincolnshire plum bread with marmite, bishops throughout the UK and the Anglican Communion have named their favourite cakes to help launch the ‘More Cake, Vicar?’ campaign – which is being run by the USPG: Anglicans in World Mission.

...Churches are being invited to bake and sell cakes to raise funds to help USPG support the vital work of Anglican churches in over 50 countries, from hospitals in Tanzania to house building in Chile.

...Archbishop [Rowan Williams] also said: ‘USPG continues to enrich the life of the Anglican Communion through its rootedness in the life of the Provinces. Its commitment to partnership and cooperation yields great dividends as together we share in God’s mission worldwide.’"

Read the rest here: ‘More Cake, Vicar?’ Campaign to Support Anglican Mission Abroad

Kirk and Leslie Steffensen just returned to the US after a two year mission in Tanzania. Kirk reflects on their return and the gifts to their family from being a missionary. From their homepage

While we were working in the Diocese of Central Tanganyika (DCT), we were lucky to work for the one Bishop in Tanzania that was willing to stand up against signing the Anglican Church of Tanzania (ACT) letter cutting off ties with the Episcopal Church USA. Bishop Mhogolo gathered all of the DCT missionaries together to explain his position and told us that with all of the help that Africa needs, it is foolish to single out one organization for one sin. He said that no one in Africa asks the Red Cross, UNESCO, or the many governments that donate money if they have any homosexuals working on their staff. He also said that singling out homosexuality over adultery, greed ( i.e., corruption), and dependence on alcohol (all issues in Tanzania) was missing the point that we are all sinners and we are all forgiven.

Bishop Mhogolo emphasized that the important thing is developing partnerships. Our family helped DCT in many ways, through both of us teaching many students and my setting up two computer networks for two schools. But our family received many blessings in return. Our children learned life lessons that we could not have paid for at home. They are much more aware of the world around them, how lucky they were to be born into the situation they’re in, and how much other cultures have to offer to their understanding of life. (The kids couldn’t articulate that if you asked them, but you can see it in the ways that they’ve changed over the past year.)

Kirk concludes this entry:

And now that we’re back in the States, we will always have a piece of Africa and Tanzania in our hearts. We’re still unpacking our possessions, but after we finish with them, we’ll need to unpack our experiences and share them with our parish, our Diocese, and the other people that helped enable our mission journey. This lifelong partnership is one of the key points that Bishop Mhogolo makes when he talks about the ways missionaries help DCT. He says that we help in the ways that we can while we’re there, but that we help even more when we come home by spreading the message of partnership with Africa and by helping to recruit more missionaries and assistance, whether it is through active recruitment or by passive recruitment through witness of life in Africa.

Read all their family reflections here

The violent death of Episcopal seminarian Jonathan Daniels' was remembered Saturday by 200 people who braved in 103-degree heat to honor the white seminary student who gave up his life to save a black teenage girl 42 years ago, according to a report in the Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser. A student of the Episcopal Divinity School, Daniels answered the call of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and other civil rights leaders for the church to become more involved in the struggle for civil rights. Daniels was killed on August 20, 1965 by a shotgun blast fired by an Lowndes County special sheriffs deputy at a small convenience store where Daniels and several other civil rights activists had gone following their release from the Lowndes County Jail, where they spent a week behind bars on charges related to a protest in Fort Deposit.

Episcopalians were joined Saturday by adherents of other faiths from throughout Alabama, Georgia, Florida and Mississippi, who paid their respect to Daniels and the civil rights cause under a blistering sun.

Jerry McGee of Destin, Fla., recited a Biblical passage about "giving your life for another," something Daniels did without question when he stepped in front of 16-year-old Ruby Sales to protect her and take the fatal shotgun blast.

"That's why I wanted to come here and honor him," said McGee. "He gave the greatest gift he could possible give -- his life."

The Rev. Polk Van Zandt of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Selma said Daniels has been given a "Black Letter Day," which sets aside a day each year to honor his memory.

Van Zandt said others given "Black Letter Days" include nursing pioneer Florence Nightingale and author C.S. Lewis, but added that Saturday's commemoration was "more than just about him."

"This is also about all the martyrs of Alabama," said Van Zandt, who alluded to honors bestowed Saturday on several others who were killed during the civil rights era.

Also included in the commemoration were four girls killed in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham and Viola Liuzzo, who was shot to death by Ku Klux Klansmen in Lowndes County a few months before Daniels was killed

Daniels was a native of Keene, New Hampshire, and a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute. The VMI archives writes about Daniels in this way:

In August 1965 Daniels and 22 others were arrested for participating in a voter rights demonstration in Fort Deposit, Alabama, and transferred to the county jail in nearby Hayneville. Shortly after being released on August 20, Richard Morrisroe, a Catholic priest, and Daniels accompanied two black teenagers, Joyce Bailey and Ruby Sales, to a Hayneville store to buy a soda. They were met on the steps by Tom Coleman, a construction worker and part-time deputy sheriff, who was carrying a shotgun. Coleman aimed his gun at sixteen year old Ruby Sales; Daniels pushed her to the ground in order to protect her, saving her life. The shotgun blast killed Daniels instantly; Morrisroe was seriously wounded. When he heard of the tragedy, Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "One of the most heroic Christian deeds of which I have heard in my entire ministry was performed by Jonathan Daniels."

In the years since his death, Daniels' selfless act has been recognized in many ways. Two books have been written about his life, and a documentary was produced in 1999. The Episcopal Church added the date of his death to its Calendar of Lesser Feasts and Fasts, and in England's Canterbury Cathedral, Daniels name is among the fifteen honored in the Chapel of Martyrs.

At VMI, the Board of Visitors voted in 1997 to establish the Jonathan M. Daniels '61 Humanitarian Award. The award emphasizes the virtue of humanitarian public service and recognizes individuals who have made significant personal sacrifices to protect or improve the lives of others. The inaugural presentation was made to President James Earl Carter in 2001; the second award was presented to Ambassador Andrew Young in 2006.

In addition, one of only four named archways in the VMI Barracks is dedicated to Daniels, as is a memorial courtyard.

The feast commemorating Jonathan Daniels is August 14

Here are two other remembrances: here and here.

Social networking tools on the internet are providing new ways of giving and getting involved.

From the Wall Street Journal's "Young Money" series:

Some of the newer Web-based nonprofits, such as DonorsChoose and Kiva, are attractive because contributors say they allow them to connect directly with their recipients. Donors or lenders can hand over money directly to, respectively, teachers and students in urban public schools or individual entrepreneurs in developing countries, rather than sending a check that ends up with an abstract recipient.

"You can donate money to a charity, but it seems like it just goes into a pile and you never know what really goes on there," says Mr. Alamo, the Kiva lender. "With Kiva, you just pick someone out and lend to them directly and watch what they do and how they succeed. That was the main appeal."

Kiva, which started in the fall of 2005, has already drawn more than 89,600 lenders who have lent $10 million. Mr. Alamo's Kivafriends.org Web site has attracted about 600 members since it was launched in March.

Some older charities are grappling with how to best take advantage of social-networking sites. The Salvation Army, for instance, has had a MySpace profile for "Red Kettle," its online persona, since last year. But the site has only roughly 80 online "friends," or people who have linked to it. (By contrast, Kiva has some 7,000 online friends on MySpace.)

Other networks mentioned in the article:
- change.org
- dosomething.org
- sixdegrees.org
- red kettle

Episcopal Relief and Development has had an important role in the distribution of hundreds of thousands of nets used to protect sleeping children and their mothers from contracting malaria. Episcopal Life Online has the full story.

Episcopal Relief and Development's (ERD) NetsforLifeSM malaria partnership is providing life-saving protection to children and families in 16 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The program is protecting close to 700,000 people, including mothers and vulnerable children who are most susceptible to contracting the disease.

The NetsforLifeSM partnership encompasses ERD and a number of private individuals and corporations including ExxonMobil Foundation, Standard Chartered Bank and the Coca-Cola Africa Foundation. Christian Aid is playing a key role as well. The Episcopal Church's Millennium Development Goal Inspiration Fund supports NetsforLifeSM.

In its second year, NetsforLifeSM has distributed 328,708 long-lasting insecticide-treated nets in eight countries including Angola, Kenya and Zambia since June 2007. The program has trained more than 3,400 malaria agents, or community volunteers, who have reached more than 500,000 people directly with malaria prevention messages.

Read the full report here.

Don't let the quietness of the day with regard to the HoB fool you: the bishops have been very busy today. Episcopal Life Online covered bishops working at nine different recovery projects in New Orleans and several additional projects in other areas affected by Hurricane Katrina two years ago.

As fate would have it, there was some concern about a tropical system in the Caribbean However, the storm weakened and hit land well away from the Gulf areas in which the bishops were working.

From the story:

While the work done on September 22 contributed to the efforts of New Orleanians and Mississippians to rebuild their lives and their communities after the devastation of hurricanes Katrina and Rita in August and September 2005, the day had other purposes as well.

Diocese of Newark Bishop Mark Beckwith, pausing from his work with Schori and others, said the past two days of meetings had brought the bishops "a lot of information to digest" and the work day was giving them "some breathing space to sort that through."

At a news conference the day before, Mississippi Bishop Duncan Gray said he hoped that the Day of Service would be helpful in "interpreting the discussions within the context of mission." Louisiana Bishop Charles Jenkins said he hope the work day would show that "people of good will and faith stand for the dignity of humanity … [and] even in the midst of our disagreements we stand strongly for all of God's people."

After helping to measure and cut a piece of sheetrock at a home in the Gentilly neighborhood, Diocese of Olympia Bishop Suffragan Bavi Edna "Nedi" Rivera looked up at the people working together in the gutted house and said "there's nothing that's going to build community more than this."

The story touches on several different projects and includes comments from many of the participants. Read it all here. There is also a gallery of images from the day here.

Churches in the Fort Walton Beach, FL area offer shelter for the homeless when temperatures drop. The NorthWest Florida Daily News writes that this time around, they’re hoping more congregations will lend a hand.

"We definitely need more," said Lenore Wilson, a local homeless advocate who participates in the program. "What we really need is 14 churches!"

The current group of shelter providers are: First Presbyterian of Fort Walton Beach, St. Simon’s on the Sound Episcopal Church, Seventh Day Adventist Church of Fort Walton Beach, Gregg Chapel, Mary Esther United Methodist Church, First Baptist Church of Fort Walton Beach and Hollywood Boulevard Baptist Church.

"The churches are all we have," says Wilson. The area has no permanent homeless shelter.

That became clear to Shaun Ellis, youth minister at First Baptist, when the congregation offered its building as a shelter.

"It’s been a blessing to us," Ellis said. "The meal’s easy to do, and we have people donate blankets."

Ellis said the shelter program has softened his view of the homeless.

"A good number of these people are just looking for some help because they’re in a bad situation," he said, adding that serving the homeless is the duty of churches. "In my understanding of Scripture, that’s a mandate we’ve been given. If churches are not involved in that we’re missing the call."

Read it all here.

With books like The Cross and the Switchbade, the story of young pastors ministering to gang members became a cliche many years ago. As the Christian Century reports in its cover story this month, however, there is some very good and important ministry occurring that is focused on gang members--and not just in urban areas:

At a recent gathering of ministers, I asked a colleague what was new at her parish. "I've been doing a lot with gang ministry," said Maria Edmonds, a pastor in a small town in the mountains of North Carolina. "I'm trying to get gang members into the church. They're not accepted anywhere else. So I figure Jesus would have me spend time with them."

There are few images in our culture more frightening than that of the gang member: tattooed, armed, as likely to shoot you as look at you—as part of the member's demand for "respect." Millions of dollars are spent each year at the federal level and in cities like New York, Los Angeles and Chicago to combat gang activity and reduce gang-related violence. And as the North Carolina pastor found out, gangs are also a feature of life in many small towns.

How does the church minister to youths in street gangs and to neighborhoods marked by their presence? An even more daring question: Is there something the church can learn from the gangs? (There was a time when the church was reviled as dangerously antisocial because it provided an alternative identity a