Words: Charles Wesley, 1747 Music: William Penfro Rowlands Blaenwern
Choir of Wells Cathedral Malcolm Archer, director
God bless Mark, Dinah, Robert, Brian… and all who have written testimonies.
Phase 1 of Our Capital Campaign Passes 70%
Beloved,
For seven-plus years, we've never asked you for money, except for a new Bible and some worship materials. Now we've begun our long-anticipated capital campaign to raise $50,000 to make our Daily Office websites, after 1.7 million visitors, a permanent fixture on the Web.
The money breaks down like this:
Phase 1: Site Rebuild: $5000 Ending Date: Easter Sunday, April 8, 2012
Our new site (with this same address, dailyoffice.org) will contain two entry portals: the Chapel where we say our prayers, and the Parish Hall, where we gather for community, social networking and mission. Bring your own coffee, tea, wine and snacks, and visit awhile! Most of all make friends in Christ.
We've got a wonderful congregation here. With current technology, I want you to get to know each other. We come from all over the world but are united in Christ. It's time we met each other more fully.
We're not adopting social networking to be trendy, or because everyone else is doing it, but in order to develop relationships and to work together in Christ's name. If your parish or diocese is organizing a mission trip, tell us about it and invite us to go with you. Is there a peace demonstration coming up? A funeral procession for a valiant fallen soldier? We want to know. Got an organ recital, an art exhibit, a summer camp, a weekend retreat? Invite us to participate. Post your videos and photos, your podcasts, your blogs. The Parish Hall is where we link up, socialize, learn, plan and organize to feed the world.
With all the good work that can be done with a Christian network, we would be foolish not to take advantage of the opportunities. We'd be bad stewards; as in the Parable of the Talents, we'd be the wicked servant who buried his treasure in the dirt, only to dig it up again when Christ came to call. No; let's turn our three talents into six, thanks to our new and prayerful network.
Phase 2: General Convention Booth: $5000 Ending Date: Day of Pentecost, Sunday, May 27, 2012
The General Convention of the Episcopal Church meets this year in Indianapolis, 107 miles from the Vicar's house in Northwest Indiana. We should introduce the whole Church to our new, revamped website. A booth will cost about $1500 to rent, $1000 to decorate and provide with publicity materials, and pay travel and per diem expenses up to $2500 (over 12 days) for our volunteer staff. (If this last number is high, the remainder will be applied to legal services and accounting software.) The purpose of the booth is so we can meet you and make new friends among the convention's deputies, bishops and visitors; it's a key part of our growth strategy.
In future years we hope to network with other churches, denominations and organizations. Dailyoffice.org has always been ecumenical and we want to strengthen those ties.
Phase 3: Hiring a Staff: $40,000 Ending Date: First Sunday of Advent, December 2, 2012, our Official 8th Anniversary
Your Vicar is 60 years old. He started a prayer site that's turned into an important institution-without-walls, attracting more annual visitors than the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. This institution should be made permanent; that is, it must be staffed and financially supported, but without draining funds from other institutions. Most of all we need a succession plan for ongoing leadership, so that our site and our community continue after the Vicar retires or, God forbid, gets carried away by a Hoosier tornado. (You could tell people I was assumed into heaven!)
We believe we have a business plan to make this site self-supporting, by selling non-intrusive, strictly Church-related advertising in the Parish Hall/social network. Authors, artists and craftspeople need to reach a Christian audience; so do seminaries, mission organizations, monasteries and others. But no Christian dating sites!
We want our sites to be the "anti-Facebook" of social networking. We won't install cookies to track your movements around the Web, nor will we allow our advertisers to do so. We won't sell your name, address, demographic information or anything else to anyone, ever.
Just as "the worker deserves her wages," the staff must be paid to ensure this continuity. Today our work amounts at most to one full-time job among the volunteer Vicar and three volunteer Subdeacons. But running a business, which the network would become, selling advertising and troubleshooting the technology, will take more time. That means hiring a staff to support you in your community-building and mission work.
The volunteer Subdeacons and I will be active this year in seeking foundation grants for the building of this electronic parish. We welcome your prayers, advice, testimonials and referrals. If you have found our services valuable, please write us an e-mail and say so; we will compile these endorsements and make them part of an exhibit with our grant applications. You need only write a few lines telling how you have used our sites and what they've meant to you. If we have your support, we know we can trust the Holy Spirit to provide the resources we need.
Write to me, josh at dailyoffice.org, with your questions, concerns and your endorsements. Put a notice and a link about us in your parish and diocesan publications, websites and blogs. Send us more traffic; encourage donations. Spread the Good News.
Now may the blessing of God Almighty, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, be amongst you and remain with you always. Amen.
Josh Thomas Founder and Vicar January 16, 2012
UPDATE: We "broke ground" last weekend!
Gifts are coming in from laypeople, deacons, priests, bishops - from Jamaica, the Netherlands, Georgia, Missouri, Washington State, New York, Maryland, Kentucky, Texas, Indiana, Tennessee, California, Vermont, Illinois, New Jersey, Wyoming, Michigan - some large, some small, all important, all of them blessings. We are now able to begin work on our new expanded website.
Special thanks to those of you who drop us a line and tell us what our sites mean to you. What I clumsily called our "endorsements" above in fact are Our Faith Stories, and they're worth their weight in gold. Read a few of them here.
Lesson to me: Don't ever be afraid, after prayer and careful preparation, to take a risk for Christ. I've dragged my feet on this project for years, afraid of public failure, not knowing the technology, finding myself out on a limb when the devil's got a big old chainsaw. Oh, What a Friend We Have in Jesus!
Or as Anglicans prefer to put it:
O God, our help in ages pahst, our hope for years to come…
Welcome! Let us pray together. A worldwide community surrounds you.
Please click on today's date from the buttons on the left for Morning and Evening Prayer. (The date disappears from view, and subsidiary buttons pop up, but click where the date was anyway.) Evening Prayer is printed right below Morning Prayer on the same page.
For Noonday and Latenight (compline), hover over the main buttons at left. Every day also has prayers for special intentions; just hover your mouse to see them. Please bookmark our site from this page.
