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John Cleghorn
Join the church movement reshaping our neighborhoods—embracing love and creating community to house our neighbors and recognize our shared humanity.
Building Belonging is designed for congregational, communal, or small-group use. To assist these groups as they develop their own plans for creating community and housing neighbors, we’ve designed a free, downloadable congregational guide that provides a roadmap to enact the innovative strategies outlined in the book.
Accompanying Guide & Worksheet For Church Property Development
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Grace Duddy Pomroy
Many congregations across the country are coming to two seemingly unrelated realizations. First, the "Sunday morning offering" may not be enough to sustain their mission. Second, their ministry has been so internally focused that they are almost entirely disconnected from the community they are called to serve. Funding Forward provides a path to help a congregation discern God's mission, reconnect with the neighborhood, and find a new, more economically sustainable model for ministry. Drawing on years of teaching, research, and field work, Pomroy shows there are no one-size-fits-all solutions for church and nonprofit finances. There is no single model that will work for every ministry. Each economic model has a distinct shape because each ministry has a distinct mission and community. However, common tools span these ministry models: repurposing church property, social enterprise, impact investing, grants, multi-vocational ministry, and more.
While the tools and models can spark creativity, congregational leaders often wonder what process they might use to discern God's mission, which tools will work best in their context, and how they might get other congregational leaders on board. Discernment and execution are much more challenging than the ideation process. Funding Forward can help ministers and ministries move through the funding forward process from start to finish--paying special attention to the leadership challenges and pitfalls they might encounter along the way..
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Mark Elsdon, editor.
Consider using church buildings and land to further the gospel mission. Mark Elsdon, author of We Aren’t Broke: Uncovering Hidden Resources for Mission and Ministry, revisits questions of church resources with a team of pastors, scholars, developers, and urban planners. This collection of essays sheds light on how church communities can transform their properties to serve their neighborhoods.
Essays explore spiritual, sociological, and practical aspects of church property transition, including:
• assessing the impacts of churches on their neighborhoods—and the gaps they will leave behind
• developing church property into affordable housing
• transforming ministry in rural churches
• partnering with Indigenous peoples to return land
• fostering cooperation between congregations, developers, and city planners
• navigating zoning laws
• working with foundations and funders -
Enterprise Community Partners
The Faith-Based Development Guide is a free, online resource platform to provides houses of worship with information on the development process for affordable homes and community facilities.
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American Planning Association
While communities across the country are struggling to provide affordable housing options for their most vulnerable citizens, a new set of sometimes-overlooked development partners is rising to the challenge: religious institutions. Many of these institutions own vacant buildings and underutilized land in established neighborhoods.
Projects to repurpose unneeded land surrounding a religious worship structure often involves a still-active (though possibly struggling) congregation interested in both addressing the affordability challenge and preserving or improving the future of that worshiping community. Since the "excess" land that may be made available for housing is often currently used as a parking lot, they also frequently involve questions of zoning regulations requiring minimum amounts of parking.
This issue of Zoning Practice explores the growing trend of developing transitional and permanent affordable housing on underused faith-based land. It examines the relationship between land supply and the housing crisis, the reasons why religious institutions are increasingly interested in development partnerships, and the zoning standards that can limit development opportunities. And it highlights several successful efforts to bring new affordable housing to faith-based lands.
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Dominic Dutra
For decades, many different denominations have experienced devastating declines in attendance, finances, and influence. Thousands of church leaders have watched their congregations grow older, smaller, and, in many cases, whiter than their surrounding communities. Rising costs and decreased giving make it virtually impossible to sustain the staff and fabric of these organizations—let alone their spiritual mission. But all hope is not lost.
In a clarion call that demands death to bring new life, Dominic reiterates how the local church is tasked with evaluating and ultimately sacrificing all their resources—including underutilized real estate—to bring healing and hope to the poor, marginalized, and disenfranchised. By reimagining their church spaces, congregations can experience revitalization as they grow to better embody their missional purpose. -
Rev. Dr. Donna Schaper
"When I saw the title, I wanted to shout from the rooftop: It's time! Donna Schaper makes a compelling case for clearing space, both architecturally and in our ministry journeys. This little book is a gift to a tired and caged-in church!"--Paul Nixon, author of Multi and I Refuse to Lead a Dying Church
Pastor Donna Schaper takes the long view of religious institutions in an age of rapid change. The question of who the Church is today--and how it employs its buildings--is connected to the Church's past identities and future hopes. Remove the Pews offers concrete suggestions on how congregations can open their church spaces to revive their spirits.
From welcoming local dance troupes to serving undocumented persons, Schaper demonstrates how the imagination is the only limit to what church buildings mean and can do. Her meditations on community use of sacred spaces serve as a springboard for a broader examination of how the church might be renewed for the modern age. The pews are only the beginning!
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Partners for Sacred Places
Partners’ approach to supporting congregations and denominational bodies as they consider transition is informed by what we have observed over 30-plus years:
Older sacred places have a character and a soul that shape the life and values of congregations that occupy them, including their worship and music, their education and teaching, and their outreach to members and non-members alike.
Older and historic houses of worship embody the histories of communities, congregations, families, and individuals.
Most religious buildings represent decades (or even centuries) of investment, sacrifice, and service.
Through their abiding presence, older and historic houses of worship add cultural value and architectural character to their communities.
Religious buildings anchor communities, providing a sense of stability over time.
Congregations that steward historic properties provide a significant and measurable public value to their communities through the ministries, programs, and activities that utilize their buildings and grounds.
Older and historic properties are uniquely positioned to serve their communities by offering a diversity of space types and sizes that allow for activities from large, community-wide gatherings to smaller classes and workshops.
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David E. Kresta, Ph.D.
God loves just economies, but in our communities we see huge cracks chiseled by the invisible hand of the market. By taking on Jesus’ mantle when he announced freedom for the poor and oppressed, we have a role to play in helping establish just economies here and now! Jesus on Main Street provides church leaders and church planters with a broad overview of Community Economic Development (CED), with practical steps to lead your church in following Jesus into those cracks. You’ll be equipped with the CED “toolkit” including microbusinesses, makerspaces, business incubators, worker cooperatives, workforce development, commercial district revitalization, locality development, anchor institutions, and accountable development. A robust assessment and planning guide specifically for churches will help you create a collaborative CED strategy rooted in God’s love for people and justice.
For churches looking to bring healing to their local economies, CED builds capacity for long-term equitable economic growth, catalyzing a movement of business creation, employment, and job creation that does not leave anybody behind. This is the promise and challenge of CED as we follow Jesus down Main Street and explore what good news for local economies looks like!
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Mark Elsdom
What if everything you need is already there?
Many Christian churches and related institutions in the United States are struggling or, in some cases, facing imminent crisis, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Attendance is down. Funding is harder to come by. People are no longer drawn to traditional church services and programming in the ways that they once were. Often, we feel broke and powerless to do much about it. We settle for doing more with less: Less money. Fewer people. Fewer churches.
But if we reexamine our perceived limits and our assumptions about how resources are supposed to be used, then something remarkable and beautiful comes into view: we aren’t broke at all but have enormous resources at our disposal. Church and missional organizations nationwide own billions of dollars of prime property and investment assets, which, when combined with social enterprise and new expressions of mission, can be put to work for innovation and transformation. And these resources are often available to us right now.
This book is an invitation to envision a different way of putting God’s gifts to work in the world. It draws upon a remarkable story of rebirth at a Presbyterian affiliated campus ministry center at the University of Wisconsin, along with profiles of other creative social enterprises, to describe how church property and investment assets can be put to work for innovation, transformation, and financial sustainability. Theologically rooted but practically minded, it provides guidance and tools for church and nonprofit leaders, entrepreneurs, and investors of all kinds who are seeking new ways to fund and participate in God’s work in the world.
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Thomas E. Frank, Ph.D.
FROM THE INTRODUCTION: The more we can learn about the past, the more we will realize both the good and evil and the mass of gray in between that have brought us the built landscapes and the kinds of communities we have. And from that knowledge we can think more richly and constructively about how to sustain and direct these buildings now toward the aspirations and values, the culture and the sense of place, of today’s communities. To do so will require a fresh imagination, and to stir such imaginings is the purpose of this book.
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Mark DeYmaz and Harry Li
Our entire understanding of funding and sustainability must change.
Tithes and offerings alone are no longer enough to provide for the needs of the local church, enable pastors to pursue opportunities, or sustain long-term ministry impact. Growing financial burdens on the middle class, marginal increases in contributions to religious organizations, shifting generational attitudes toward giving, and changing demographics are having a negative impact on church budgets. Given that someday local churches may be required to pay taxes on the property they own and/or lose the benefit of soliciting tax-deductible gifts, the time to pivot is now. What's needed is disruptive innovation in church economics.
For churches to not only survive but thrive in the future, leaders must learn to leverage assets, bless the community, empower entrepreneurs, and create multiple streams of income to effectively fund mission. You'll learn why you should and how to do so in The Coming Revolution in Church Economics.
"Mark DeYmaz challenges local churches to think innovatively in order to fund and fulfill the Great Commission. I highly recommend a thoughtful reading of this engaging challenge."--Ron Blue, cofounder of the National Christian Foundation, founder of Kingdom Advisors, and author of Master Your Money
"Churches and ministries can do more to advance the kingdom if they have more resources by which to do so. You and your leadership team will find this guide a helpful resource for effective ministry in the third millennium."--Ed Stetzer, Billy Graham Distinguished Chair, Wheaton College -
Dr. Robert E. Simons
Rehabbing and reusing historic and public buildings
Each year in the United States, hundreds of religious buildings and schools become vacant or underutilized as congregations and populations merge, move, or diminish. These structures are often well located, attractive, eligible for tax credits, and available for redevelopment. In this practical and innovative handbook, authors Simons, DeWine, and Ledebur have compiled a step-by-step guide to finding sustainable new uses for vacant structures. The reuse of these important buildings offers those charged with revitalizing them an opportunity to capture their embodied energy, preserve local beloved landmarks, and boost sustainability. Rehabbing presents an opportunity for developers to recoup some value from these assets. Neighbors and other stakeholders also enjoy benefits as the historic structures are retained and the urban fabric of communities is preserved.
Retired, Rehabbed, Reborn features ten in-depth case studies of adaptive reuse outcomes for religious buildings and public schools that have achieved varying degrees of success. Several case vignettes appear within various chapters to illustrate specific points. The book is a useful tool for architects, planners, developers, and others interested in reusing these important structures. In addition to covering the demographics of demand and supply for historic buildings, the authors demonstrate how to identify a worthy project and how to determine a building’s highest and best use, its market potential, and its financial feasibility, including costs and public subsidies. Finally, they address the planning process and how to time the redevelopment and repurposing of these venerable buildings.
Simons, DeWine, and Ledebur explain that while each rehab deal is unique and tricky—especially for prominent community structures that hold significant nostalgic and historical value to community stakeholders—there are identifiable patterns of successful and unsuccessful approaches, patterns that are addressed in turn throughout the redevelopment process.
As the nation moves toward a mind-set and practice of recycling, reusing, and repurposing, this unique exploration of how that applies to buildings is an essential guide for anyone interested in being part of the process as communities develop and change.
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Donatella Fiorani, Loughlin Kealy, Stefano Francesco Musso
From the Introduction:
The theme of the 5th EAAE Workshop,Conservation/Adaptation, captures one of the most critical questions in addressing the legacy of inherited buildings and sites of cultural
importance. Over time, protection of the architectural heritage has become recognised as a cultural imperative, supported by international conventions and deepening scholarship.
The adaptation of such heritage for contemporary uses is one of the major issues in sustainable development of the built environment, and it has long been recognised that the continuing appropriate use of historic buildings is one of the best ways of ensuring their survival. In this context, the concept of ‘adaptive reuse’ has emerged.
Adaptive reuse can be described as ‘the process of wholeheartedly altering a building by which the function is the most obvious change, but other alterations may be made to the building itself, such as the circulation route, the orientation, the relationship between spaces; additions may be built and other areas may be demolished’1. In context, besides retaining the material values of buildings or sites, an important aspect of reuse is the preservation of immaterial significance. This is particularly important in the case of symbolic buildings or sites where the spirit of the place is important, such as those with social, political, commemorative or religious meaning, or those with a negative or ‘infected’ history.
The workshop addressed some difficult questions: how to combine the reanimation of such a building or site with the transmission of its material and immaterial values? What are the limits and opportunities in the adaptive reuse of this type of ‘sensitive’ heritage?
How is the genius loci – the spirit of place – to be preserved?
These issues in the adaptive reuse of historic buildings that embody special meanings were addressed under three headings:
Social meaning . . . Religious/sacred meaning . . . Commemorative/political meaning
