Lessons Learned at March Ministry Fair

By MILEVA SAULO, Bishop's Warden

he Bishop’s Committee, along with about 800 other Episcopalians, gathered on March 13 for the fourth annual Diocese of Los Angeles Ministry Fair. It was a joyous and rich day, full of culturally diverse, creative liturgy and meaningful workshops on stewardship, planned giving, congregational administration, development, formation and education, worship, children and youth ministries, congregational leadership, spirituality, and making the church a safe place. This article will highlight what we learned at the ministry fair and its application to our church community.

• Discovering Your Spiritual Passion. Jim Dale of St. James, Newport Beach, led this session by asking us to review three versions of Ephesians 4:11–12. In this Scripture, Paul talks about gifts…" It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up. Jim suggested that each of us was capable of discerning our gifts the use of tools such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, or Firo B,C,I and True Colors.

• For me the most intriguing part of the program was a challenge to each of us to identify our values and to write our own mission and vision statements. It makes sense doesn’t it? If I don’t know where I’m going, how will I know when I have arrived? Vision statements put forward the preferred future while mission statements describe or define your "business." What would be the power of our ministry at Saint Andrew’s, if each of us wrote our own personal mission and vision statements and then made a commitment to use that foundation to live out that ministry in this church community?

• Wardens’ Workshop: This session for wardens was led by the Rev. Canon Thaddeus Bennett, Canon to the Ordinary [the bishop] and Diocesan Officer for Clergy Development and Deployment. He reported on a study conducted by the Episcopal Foundation and the Cornerstone Foundation which studied the role of the rector and vestry (a parish’s equivalent to our vicar and Bishop’s Committee) and markers of a healthy rector/vestry/ relationship and resources to strengthen the rector/vestry relationship. Of note were the references made to changes going on in churches all over the country where rector/vestry systems are changing from an "authoritarian "Father knows best" model to a more collaborative, consensus-based relationship. It is important in this new relationship for roles to be clear and to understand that collaborative systems depend on "trust, open process, personal maturity on all sides, patience, and a willingness to see the whole, rather than represent a certain constituency or point of voice" (Ehrich, 1995, p. 3.). At Saint Andrew’s, the Bishop’s Committee and the Vicar are committed to this kind of ministry: One that is mutual in which we hold each other accountable for goals set, promises made. We have also promised to love each other when we fall short of our goal and have agreed to problem-solve and move forward.