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Selecting An Endowment Committee
The Session may choose to delegate to its original committee, another committee, or one or two volunteers, the on-going responsibility of interpreting and promoting endowment gifts.
Once an Endowment Committee is appointed or volunteers are chosen, they have at their disposal an increasing supply of information and materials available from the Board to assist in the promotion of an endowment program. In addition, Board staff are available to lend personal assistance and support as well as provide leadership, encouragement and information. You are encouraged to call upon your Board staff for any technical advice you may need.
When selecting the committee members or individual volunteers, keep in mind the need to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest. For example, bankers, attorneys, and insurance agents serving on the committee or as volunteers may be perceived by church members as having vested interests in promoting their own products or services. The expertise of such persons is a rich resource, but can be best used in other ways.
The ideal committee member or volunteer will be a person who is devoted to the Church, gentle in approach to persons, flexible and non-judgmental toward others, possessed of clear convictions, approachable, and a good listener. Preferably, the committee member or volunteer will have made the commitment of a planned gift for the benefit of the church. Thus, she or he can share his or her own sense of excitement and joy in making such gifts.
Crucial to the success of your program are the long-term relationships which your committee members and/or volunteers will form with others in the congregation.
Understanding The Purpose of Endowments
It is important that the Endowment Committee or volunteers always present the endowment program as a supplemental opportunity for stewardship. It needs to be stressed that the program will not replace or interfere with the on-going budget commitments supported by annual pledges normally fulfilled by current income. An endowment program should develop special gifts, bequests and life income gifts, which are normally made from accumulated resources.
Implementing Your Endowment Program
Your program will bring opportunities to members for gifts of accumulated resources that will continually benefit the ministry and mission of your church "for the centuries."
Suggested below are steps for getting that message to your congregation:
1. Organize a supper or meeting to educate the congregation about the importance of wills, and how to remember the church as well as loved ones in a will. This meeting might also provide information from the Board concerning life income plans and memorial gifts (Causes Frequently Remembered and Creative Uses of Endowment Income).
2. Gather and review other complimentary materials from the Board (Communication Resources).
3. Consider an "Every Member Endowment" which involves each member making a contribution--as little as $1--to the endowment program. Support materials are available from the Board at no charge.
4. Plan a year-round program to educate and inspire the congregation. Here are some suggested activities for your year-round program:
a. Mail a letter introducing your endowment program and other materials to update all members of the congregation.
b. Use bulletin inserts (such as for a Wills Emphasis Sunday).
c. Use bulletin covers available from the Board.
d. Display posters for a Family Week Wills Emphasis in May.
e. Include endowment reminders and related items of interest in your church newsletter and Sunday bulletin. (In fact, consider including each week in your Sunday bulletin a reminder such as: "Remember Union Valley Cumberland Presbyterian Church in your will." Let it become "part of the furniture" of that bulletin. On the Sunday when the making and/or revising of a will is on the mind of a particular member, those words will suddenly become very relevant.)
f. Promote endowments in your "Minutes for Mission" during the worship service.
g. Occasionally distribute emphasis materials to members.
h. Place appropriate endowment program material in your congregation's literature rack.
i. Invite the congregation to view videos on the importance of wills and estate planning.
j. Assign speakers to visit your church's organized groups, i.e. church school classes, women's and men's organizations, family night events, senior groups and others.
5. Use a bulletin board to keep the congregation up-to-date with your program's progress.
6. Highlight news stories and reports on bequests and trusts benefitting your church or other churches.
7. Distribute your own inspirational brochures about the program.
8. Use every opportunity to bring missionaries and representatives of missions and service causes of the Church to your congregation.
9. Display an attractive "Book of Remembrance" which contains the names of donors and/or the persons memorialized through endowments in your library or vestibule.
10. Communicate the ways to give:
a. Cash, securities, real estate, art, or collectibles.
b. Bequests by wills.
c. Life Income Gifts--Charitable Gift Annuity, Deferred Charitable Gift Annuity, and Revocable Trusts.
11. Sponsor financial/estate planning seminars for members. Use local attorneys, bank trust officers, certified life underwriters, certified public accountants and professional estate planners. In your area, many of these persons will be committed to such programs and will make themselves available to help in the development.
For more information, contact Richard Magrill
Page updated on May 2, 2007 Pages maintained by Elinor Swindle Brown