UTO Panel Pushes Endowment Role
Episcopal News Service. December 10, 1987 [87244]
Barbara January, Diocese of Southern Ohio
New York (DPS, Dec. 10) -- Age has clouded the California woman's eyes, but she still sees her mother dropping pennies into a blue box that sat on the family dining table in Baltimore more than 80 years ago.
Allen J. Bachoroski, Bishop's Warden at Trinity Mission in Trinidad, remembers coming home from work at night and emptying his pockets onto the chest of drawers in the bedroom. His wallet, keys, loose change, and pens were placed in the same spot each night, beside a small blue box. One night after a particularly successful day at work, he noticed that on the side of the box were the words, "Thank Offering." He dropped three quarters in the box that night -- for three special blessings he had received that day. After that night, using the blue box as a way of giving thanks became as much a nightly ritual for him as it had long been for his wife.
For many lifelong Episcopalians, the Blue Box of the United Thank Offering is as familiar as the cookie jar in the kitchen or the family Bible in the parlor. For newer Episcopalians, it is an old tradition that often takes root in new Episcopal homes.
What is the Blue Box? When did the tradition start? Why did it start and where does the money go?
The Offering began in 1889 with a group of Episcopal Church women who wanted a way in which to express appreciation for the blessings they had received. The Offering grew to be the largest granting organization in the Episcopal Church and remained so until 1984, when it was surpassed by the Presiding Bishop's Fund.
The United Thank Offering goes for new mission work: for a school in Jamaica, West Indies; for a women's counseling facility in Atlanta, Georgia; for shelter for abused women and children in Texas; for a four-wheel truck for a priest in Sri Lanka; for construction of a building for a seminary library and Episcopal Church archives in Brazil.
Willeen Smith, UTO coordinator at the Episcopal Church Center, cites other recent projects: the construction of a potable water system for an ecumenical center in Nigeria, and the purchase of a truck in Tanzania. In 1987, the UTO funded 162 such projects worldwide, distributing a total of $2,525,877.64 in grants awards.
Now, in 1989, as the Offering approaches its 100th birthday, the creation of an endowment fund helps to ensure another 100 years of mission work while maintaining the integrity and intent of the Blue Box offering.
The UTO's Memorial and Gift Trust Fund's purpose is to generate enough annual interest income to cover overhead expenses. These expenses include printing and distribution of UIO materials (including grant forms, book marks, posters, brochures, etc.), as well as travel and meeting expenses of the volunteer committee. It is hoped that future earnings from the Trust will also supplement the grants for mission.
The Trust also provides the means for people to establish a permanent memorial to those they wish to remember, to honor, or to recognize, as well as an additional way to offer thanksgiving.
In a difficult and controversial decision, the UTO Committee decided early in 1986 to set aside $350,000 each year for the years 1986, 1987 and 1988 of the Blue Box offering, to create the Memorial and Gift Trust Fund account. Betty Clarke, chairman of the Memorial and Gift Trust Fund, reports that slowly but surely, the importance of the Trust is being recognized and support for it is growing.
Nick Nichols from Indiana wrote, "I am enclosing a check on Ann R. Nichols Estate in the sum of $5,000, her bequest to the UTO Memorial and Gift Trust Fund. The six years that Ann spent on the UTO Grants Committee were one of the hardest working and most satisfying periods in Ann's life."
An article from San Antonio, announcing a $1,000 gift to the Fund from the James D. and Katherine H. Folbre trust (part of the San Antonio Area Foundation), said, "The Folbre family is extremely interested in seeing that the Offering... go entirely for outreach granting."
Checks are often sent with explanations of how the individual or group view the Fund as vital to the UTO, even though they may disagree with the decision for a set-aside as a start-up for the Fund. The executive board of the ECW of the Diocese of Newark is a good example. Originally the group protested the use of Blue Box monies to enlarge the Trust principal, then decided to write to other dioceses to ask that they encourage local ECW members to follow Carol Toombs' lead. (Toombs, an Episcopalian from Rye, N.Y., although protesting the action of the set-aside but recognizing the need, contributed $25,000 to the Trust.) The Newark board asked that each parish ECW group pledge at least $100 for the Fund... "with monies other than those presented in Thanksgiving for blessings received."
In 1986, Lyn Johnson, chairman of the UTO at that time, said in a letter to all diocesan UTO chairmen, "As your elected custodians for the offering we are probably its most zealous guardians. But with the guidance of expert financial planners, had come to recognize that the set aside was the quickest and surest way to return wholly to the special tradition of the offering that..'every coin is, in turn, granted.' We are encouraging planned gifts of insurance, bequests, and stock, as well as cash gifts. This campaign must succeed in order that the UTO Committee continue as an independent grants making body."
Contributions to the Trust, may be sent to UTO Fund #852, 815 Second Avenue, New York, NY 10017. For further information, write to Betty Clarke, 2645 Bexley Park Road, Columbus, Ohio 43209 or phone (614) 236-1981.