Big push planned to fund pastoral education

Key points:

• United Methodist bishops are planning a one-time special offering next year for theological education in Africa, Europe and the Philippines.
• The board of the denomination’s finance agency gave its approval to the appeal Sept. 12, clearing the way for the offering on a Sunday during the Easter season.
• The money will go to an endowment fund that supports education rooted in the Wesleyan tradition in regions where church growth far outstrips the number of seminary-trained clergy.

The job of clergy, John Wesley said, calls for the readiness of thought to “answer a fool according to his folly.”

“How frequent is this need!” Methodism’s founder quipped in his 1756 “Address to Clergy.” 

United Methodists the world over will soon have a chance to help clergy cultivate their minds to answer foolishness whenever needed.

At an online meeting Sept. 12, the board of the General Council on Finance and Administration gave the green light for a one-time worldwide offering for the Endowment Fund for Theological Education in the Central Conferences. The endowment supports clergy education in the denomination’s eight regions in Africa, Europe and the Philippines.

With the board’s approval, the funding appeal has cleared the final hurdle to take place next year. The Book of Discipline, the denomination’s policy book, requires that such churchwide appeals receive the support of the finance agency’s board, the Connectional Table and the Council of Bishops. The appeal previously received the support of the other two bodies in May.

Retired Bishop Patrick Streiff, the endowment fund’s board chair, told the GCFA board that the bishops expect to schedule the churchwide offering on a Sunday during next year’s Easter season sometime between April 5 and May 24. That way, the bishops can avoid conflicting with any of the Special Sunday offerings designated by the denomination’s General Conference.

The churchwide appeal serves a critical need, Streiff told United Methodist News after the board’s vote.

“We need really well-educated clergy so that we can have an impact long term in the society,” he said. “And you need, among these educated clergy, those who have a good understanding of our Wesleyan way of being church.”

Since its earliest days, education has been a core value of Methodism. The Oxford University-trained Wesley worked to make learning accessible to everyone, regardless of gender or class. In 1748, he established Kingswood School to teach the children of coal miners and others.

“It cannot be that the people should grow in grace unless they give themselves to reading,” Wesley famously wrote in a 1790 letter. “A reading people will always be a knowing people.”

Following Wesley’s example, the late historian Russell Richey said, the Methodist movement in the U.S. had established or formed an affiliation with some 200 educational institutions by the time of the Civil War.

But developing universities and theological schools in the central conferences outside the U.S. has been slow going. The United Methodist Church now has 13 U.S. seminaries, with combined endowments of $1.2 billion, and more than 20 seminaries and theological programs in the central conferences that each have little to no endowment.

In 2014, the Council of Bishops established the endowment fund to generate sustainable, long-term support for central conference theological education — similar to what the Central Conference Pension Initiative has done for clergy retirement benefits. An 18-member board named by the Council of Bishops governs the endowment fund.

The endowment augments the Central Conference Theological Education Fund, first approved in 2012 by General Conference, the denomination’s top lawmaking assembly.

The education fund mainly relies on money from apportionments — shares of church giving. However, those apportionment payments vary depending on the denominational budget that General Conference approves.

For example, the current 2025-2028 denominational budget cuts the theological fund by half — from $10 million approved by the 2016 General Conference to the $5 million approved at last year’s legislative assembly.

“We want continuity, so it doesn’t go up and down with apportionment giving,” Neil Alexander, the endowment fund’s vice chair, told United Methodist News.

With that in mind, the disbursements from the endowment fund also go to the Central Conference Theological Education Fund. In May this year, the commission that distributes the theological education fund awarded 83 grants, totaling $1.26 million, at its first meeting under the new budget.

“We don’t want to create a parallel structure,” Streiff said.

Both Streiff and Alexander have long experience serving the church on a global scale. Streiff previously led the Central and Southern Europe Episcopal Area, which encompasses churches in both western and eastern Europe as well as North Africa. Alexander is president/publisher emeritus of the United Methodist Publishing House, the denomination’s oldest general agency.

Both acknowledge building a sustainable source of revenue is just at its beginning. Until now, the endowment has relied mainly on the generosity of big-dollar donors. At present, the endowment has $2 million invested through Wespath and another $1 million pledged. Of that amount, the endowment fund board plans to disburse 4% to the Central Conference Theological Education Fund.

The fund’s grants support scholarships and resource material, online theological education and professors in Methodism.

United Methodist leaders agree that the need is urgent in the central conferences, where in many cases, church growth has long outstripped the availability of seminary-educated clergy. According to materials the endowment fund board shared with GCFA, 71% of United Methodist clergy in the U.S. have a master’s degree or higher in theology while less than 5% of clergy in the central conferences can say the same.

Endowment fund leaders are hoping the coming appeal will help close the gap, so that at least 50% of central conference clergy have the equivalent of master’s degrees or higher.

When endowment fund leaders first approached the finance agency’s board in May with a request for a churchwide appeal, the financial leaders agreed that the need was urgent. However, they asked the endowment fund to work more closely with the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry, which administers the theological education fund and is subject to annual audits.

With the endowment fund now entering into a cooperative agreement with the higher education agency, the GCFA board at its Sept. 12 meeting quickly approved the request for the special appeal with no debate.

Endowment fund leaders stress that they hope all feel welcome to contribute no matter the amount they can give.

“What we really want to tell people is that we want to have as full a participation as possible over all the church,” Streiff said.

Hahn is assistant news editor for UM News. Contact her at (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org. To read more United Methodist news, subscribe to the free UM News Digest.