2024 Roanridge Grants
Resolution text
Resolved, That the Executive Council, meeting April 18-20, 2024, in Raleigh, North Carolina approve and authorize the following, as recommended by the Roanridge Grant Review Committee, and reviewed and recommended by the Joint Standing Committee on Mission Within The Episcopal Church.
The eleven grants listed below total $248,500.
The distribution of the grants is subject to the full payment of the 2023 diocesan assessment or granted diocesan waiver.
Leadership Retreat and Exchange - from one Wilderness to Another
(funds a leadership training / exchange retreat from St. John the Baptist in Waianae, Oahu to St. James in Waimea, Hawai'i, to observe the community meal and thrift shop.)
Diocese of Hawaii $15,000
Vocational Discernment for Rural Youth
(funds an opportunity for Native youth from four small towns to visit college campuses and cultural sites in Minneapolis, while exploring questions of vocation in community. It provides coaching to rural faith leaders before, during and after the trip on how best to support youth and build the trip up as a sustainable ministry that will ensure trips continue with future cohorts of youth beyond the granting period.
Diocese of Minnesota $25,000
Requiem or Renaissance, Phase 2
(funds an 18-month discernment and skills-building program for small congregations in need of revitalization, the vast majority of whom are rural. In this program, congregations enter a discernment process that helps them determine God's call to them: to a Requiem, a holy ending of this congregation's ministry in this location at this time, or a Renaissance, a church re-plant with a new vision.)
Diocese of Missouri $27,000
Theological Education for Rural Churches to Build Spanish-speaking Leaders and Congregations in Nevada
(Funds bringing a bilingual consultant and Spanish language resources to rural Nevada and work with ordained and lay leaders in rural churches now serving growing populations of native Spanish speakers, helping shepherd them with the already outstanding resources offered by The Episcopal Church.)
Diocese of Nevada $15,000
A New Day Draws Near: Conference on Collaborative Leadership & Shared Ministry
(funds a conference that will focus on reimagining sustainable congregations who form ministry collaboratives with their members, both lay and ordained, as well as the wider local community.)
Diocese of Northern Michigan $18,500
Developing New Models of Sustainable Rural Ministry
(funds cohort-based coaching that helps clergy lead change and activate lay leadership, and a new preaching formation program for lay leaders, new clergy, aspirants, and postulants in three key rural regions: the Oil Region of western Pennsylvania, the Genesee Region of western New York, and the towns of DuBois and Brookville, also in western Pennsylvania.)
Dioceses of Northwestern Pennsylvania & Western New York $41,000
Youth Choir School on San Juan Island, Washington
(funds a Youth Choir School that will serve as a key means of spiritual formation for elementary through secondary school aged children at Saint David's and will be a unique offering in the ecumenical community, since no other church offers a program like this, and public schools on the island no longer offer education and training in choral music.)
Diocese of Olympia $10,000
Network of Rural Episcopal Leaders
(funds Gathering of Leaders to recruit and fund full or partial scholarships for rural leaders to attend in-person Gatherings and allow GOL to reimburse these rural participants for their travel expenses; as well as reinstate virtual Gatherings to better serve the needs of Bi-vocational and Lay Leaders in their unique ministry settings.)
Para-Church $37,000
Connecting Rural Communities in Province VI to our Global Human Family
(fund brining the Art Theology Method to the entirety of Province VI and train the trainers in the method of Art Theology, introducing ministry leaders and educators in churches across the country to the method of art theology; and allowing participants are able to use the making of art to reflect on God's love in their daily lives, uncover their unique gifts and how God is inviting them to share those gifts with our one human family, and experience a profound sense of community, connected to their rural faith community as well as the indigenous communities in their areas.)
Province VI $25,000
Youth and Young Adult Leadership and Empowerment
(fund twelve Leadership and Empowerment workshops recruiting Native leaders and high school youth leaders in a program called Art Empowers, based on verbal and artistic self-expression, mentoring and healthy living practices.)
Diocese of Utah $15,000
The Diocese of West Virginia College for Clergy
(fund The College for Clergy (CfC) that provides both peer-learning cohorts and individual, on-going leadership coaching to clergy throughout the diocese as structures to provide a foundation for congregational development, spiritual formation, and continuing education, focusing primarily on skills for both full-time and bi-vocational rural contexts, taking on the groundwork to ensure healthy clergy and congregations.)
Diocese of West Virginia $20,000