World missions face huge cuts in competition for PCUSA funds
By John H. Adams, The Layman Online, March 19, 2002
The budget crunch in the Presbyterian Church (USA) threatens to force the recall of Presbyterian missionaries, Marian McClure, director of the Worldwide Ministries Division, says in some internal letters and other documents obtained by The Layman.
In a letter to mission partners, she said current projections indicate a shortfall of $11.3 million for the 2003-2005 budget years.
“This shortfall will decrease the church’s ability to send mission workers, and to support important ministries in evangelism, education, health, development, and others with partners around the world,” she added. “There will be some staff cuts within Worldwide Ministries. It will also be more difficult to consider new mission personnel positions and even replacement personnel.”
Fundraising campaign proposed
The denomination’s precarious financial status was made known to the General Assembly Council when it met in February. John Detterick, the council’s executive director, proposed “The Mission Initiative” campaign to try to raise $40 million for world missions and national evangelism/new church development, with emphasis on new racial/ethnic congregations.
Those two areas were targeted for an infusion of funds because historically Presbyterians have generously supported them. The Catch-22 for some Presbyterians is that fundraising for missions and evangelism would ease the pressure to cut budgets of less popular and often controversial programs.
Neither Detterick nor others have proposed transferring money to missions and new church development from programs such as the World Council of Churches, the National Council of Churches, the Washington Office, peacemaking and the National Presbyterian College Women’s Network.
It is those programs that have often generated a backlash by Presbyterians and declining support for the denomination’s ministries, just as the 1993 ReImagining Conference cost the PCUSA millions of dollars.
Reasons for budget shortfall
In her letter to mission partners, McClure cited three reasons funding has decreased dramatically: 1) endowment funds, plagued by investment declines, are generating 30 to 40 percent less income; 2) a requirement that the division spend out funds that were not specifically classified as endowments; and 3) there has been no extraordinary funding campaign in the PCUSA for more than 10 years.
“The good news is that this situation is not caused by any withholding of funds from congregations or presbyteries,” she added. “On the contrary, current giving is solid.”
However, in an internal memo for the staff of her division, McClure listed other factors, including the denomination’s decline in membership and an increase in designated giving.
She also noted that the Worldwide Ministries Division no longer gets support from the PCUSA’s “Bicentennial Fund,” a $150-million campaign that closed out in 1997 after less than half that goal was raised. The cost to raise the money was more than 30 percent – more than double the General Assembly’s mandated cap. The consulting company that helped on the Bicentennial Fund is the same company that now proposes “The Mission Initiative.”
Decline in membership
Detterick and Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick told the council in February that they expected membership to decline by 45,000 in 2002, which would be the highest numerical loss since 1981 and the highest percentage loss since 1975. Furthermore, they projected a $400,000 shortfall in per-capita support for the administrative work of the denomination.
The budgets for the General Assembly and General Assembly council are roughly $14 million a year, funded almost fully by per-capita apportionments voluntarily fulfilled by local church sessions. The mission budget is about $144 million annually, funded by endowments, bequests, special offerings and other gifts.
McClure’s letter to mission partners and internal memo were intended to generate support for “The Mission Initiative,” which the General Assembly Council has tentatively approved. The council attached a number of conditions to Detterick’s proposal, including spelling out how the money would be spent and securing financial commitments from 90 percent of the council members.
The proposal will be reviewed again by the General Assembly Council in June, the week before the full General Assembly meets June 15-22 in Columbus, Ohio. The General Assembly must give final approval.
Uncertain long-range future
But even if the fundraising campaign is approved – and successful – the long-range future of world missions is uncertain.
“Detailed planning from National Ministries and Worldwide Ministries have identified a need for approximately $200 million over a ten-year period of time in order to adequately strengthen their ministries,” McClure said in her internal memo. “Phase One [‘The Mission Initiative’] would be a first step toward meeting these needs.”
Marts & Lundy, a fundraising consultant, made a report on the prospects for raising the money that included an assessment of the denomination’s problems.
The consultants recommended that the denomination proceed with the fundraising effort even though there is “an underlying concern about ‘where the denomination was headed’ and whether the central governing body could inspire any focused motivation for such an undertaking, given the very real possibility of schism.”
Based on a number of interviews, the Marts & Lundy report also concluded that the “larger church has been assailed by issues of human sexuality, Christology, abortion, decentralization of governance, local congregations perceiving their destinies in their own hands alone, a sensitivity to ‘colonialism’ within overseas missions, a reimagining of God, a lack of clarity about ‘what the central church is for,’ and the absence of a unifying rallying point. In the midst of these challenges, the central church has suffered a loss of morale along with what might be called a serious ‘lack of faith’ in the denomination.”