missio:engage
Purpose statement: The goal of missio:engage is to assist communities of faith in the process of re-rooting their ministries in the communities they are called to serve, with enough critical mass “back home” that this initiative is sustainable and avoids “burnout.” This is part of a multi-cultural Community of Practice that is committed to learning publicly in the service of the Episcopal Church at large.
Measurable outcomes:
Transformed and outwardly-turned faith community.
Multiple streams of newcomers and visitors from the surrounding communities.
A developed and refined process of incorporation leading to a Strengths-based approach to ministry formation for all.
Core leadership development on multiple levels.
The critical mass necessary to engage in sustainable missional ministries.
A real-time, on the ground reconnection (or “re-rooting”) in the ministry context.
Assumptions:
This is a covenanted two year ministry adventure. It is specifically focused on the systematic
redevelopment of parish ministries that have struggled with decline.
Each site has a Team of five led by lay leader. This team does not include the Rector.
Each team member can expect to spend about four hours per week on this ministry.
Each site will enter into a covenant with each other, with their Vestry/Bishop’s Committee, with their Rector/PiC as well as with Reverend Tom Brackett to learn together and practice what has been proven to work in this venture.
Each site will also share their learnings and discoveries with the church at large via a dedicated website.
Process:
Over a period of sixty days, Canon Anthony Guillen and Reverend Tom Brackett will work with a team of coaches to train a core group of leaders in each participant parish. Each member of the team will be dedicated to this ministry, alone. Over the following two years, that core group will learn how to offer radical welcome to newcomers in their community, move visitors from being newcomers to fully-formed leaders, reconnect with the realities emerging in the communities they are called to serve and offer relevant outreach that offers God’s grace in ways meaningful to their communities. By the end of the two year period, each of the members of the group will have identified, trained and nurtured their replacement.
