Executive Council backs plan for initial Haiti rebuilding appeal
Episcopal News Service. October 25, 2010 [102510-02]
Mary Frances Schjonberg
The Episcopal Church's Executive Council has reaffirmed its February challenge to the church to raise $10 million to help begin to rebuild the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti.
Council said, via Resolution FFM032 passed on Oct. 25 on the final day of its three-day meeting here, that its reaffirmation comes "in solidarity with and in support of our bothers and sisters in Christ."
Council members, who will pledge their financial support to the appeal during the council's closing worship, called for "the grassroots participation of all Episcopal communities of faith at every level of the church, including provinces, dioceses, congregations and other institutions and organizations." They also said that they would support the appeal through prayer and the identification and recruitment of volunteers and donors.
At the request of Bishop Jean Zaché Duracin and the diocesan leadership, the money will be targeted to the diocese's Holy Trinity Cathedral complex in Port-au-Prince. The complex once contained two schools and a convent, as well as the cathedral church with its world-renowned murals depicting biblical stories in Haitian motifs which were crafted by some of the best-known Haitian painters of the 20th century.
Member of the council's Finances for Mission and World Mission committees heard during a joint meeting on Oct. 23 that members of the Haitian diocese see restoration of the cathedral as a source of diocesan and national pride, and symbolic of the efforts to resurrect the country following the Jan. 12 magnitude-7 earthquake.
The effort will be administered by the Episcopal Church Foundation, whose president, Donald Romanik, told council members Oct. 23 that they had done "a very courageous thing" in February.
Romanik was clear to say that the initial work of Episcopal Relief & Development, to which many Episcopalians have contributed, went a long way to meet the emergency needs of Episcopalians in the first months after the quake. He noted that that agency has long been committed to a policy that precludes spending money on church buildings.
Brian Sellers-Petersen, Episcopal Relief & Development director of church engagement, told ENS that the agency is partnering with the Diocese of Haiti and its relief and development arm Centre Diocesain de Développement et de Secours (CEDDISEC) in what he called "ongoing community-focused recovery work." Those efforts, he said, currently provide Haitians with short-term employment through cash-for-work programs, semi-permanent housing, community and household sanitation systems and other recovery activities.
The agency also is funding a chief of operations to help strengthen diocesan administrative functions, Sellers-Petersen said.
He said that the agency is "grateful to the Executive Council for their leadership in working with the Diocese of Haiti and the Episcopal Church Foundation in rebuilding the cathedral complex in Port-au-Prince," adding that "we all have to work together and we all have our different roles."
Rob Radtke, president of Episcopal Relief & Development, told ENS via e-mail that "since our recovery programs focus on relief and development needs after the quake, we applaud the Episcopal Church's efforts to support the church in Haiti through the rebuilding of the cathedral and other church properties."
"We look forward to continued cooperation with the Episcopal Church to support the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti in different but complementary and mutually supportive ways," Radtke added.
Romanik told the council that "our commitment to Haiti has to be long-term." He called the $10 million effort "the initial phase of a long-term campaign" to aid the diocese.
"This is one step in a multi-stage process of supporting our brothers and sisters in Haiti," he said, noting that "a lot of people don't realize that Haiti is part of us and we are part of Haiti and that we are all part of the body of Christ that is the Episcopal Church."
While "the details have to work themselves out" for what Romanik called a "complicated process," he told that council that a fundraising effort is planned that would involve provincial and diocesan coordinators, and congregational spokespersons and other volunteers.
The appeal would officially be launched on Jan. 12, 2011 and last for 12 weeks with an announcement of results in the Easter-Ascension Day timeframe. If dioceses or congregation cannot participate in the early 2011 effort for any reason, Romanik said, they would be able to use a "packaged approach" of resources and training that the foundation will offer during any 12-week period sometime in 2011.
ECF has estimated that the appeal will cost as much as $100,000 for overall management and coordination, development of a website and electronic and print resources, and travel.
Romanik predicted that the appeal could yield results beyond raising money to assist the Haitian diocese in rebuilding, calling it a chance for the church to rally around a single mission opportunity in a way that has not happened for years.
The appeal also could be a chance "to create a culture of philanthropy" among Episcopal Church congregations and institutions, he said, while not taking away from other missional relationships that congregations and dioceses might have.
Finances for Mission Committee chair Del Glover, who has been deeply involved in working out the details of the appeal thus far, told his committee on Oct. 23 that such a churchwide effort would mean that "we would be singing the same hymn, the same verse, the same tune."
Both Romanik and Glover urged all council members to commit themselves to the appeal as a symbol to the rest of the church.
"It's an opportunity for the folks in the pews to realize that our complex polity structure actually engages in the mission of the church," Romanik said.
The Executive Council carries out the programs and policies adopted by the General Convention, according to Canon I.4 (1)(a). The council is composed of 38 members, 20 of whom (four bishops, four priests or deacons and 12 lay people) are elected by General Convention and 18 (one clergy and one lay) by provincial synods for six-year terms, plus the presiding bishop and the president of the House of Deputies.