The FaithX Project

Strategic Missional Consulting

Response Strong to FaithX Small Congregation Vitality Program

Funded by a grant from Trinity Wall Street Philanthropies

By The Rev Ken Howard, Executive Director

Last week The FaithX Project proudly announced its Vitality Improvement Program for Small Congregations, made possible by a generous grant from Trinity Wall Street Philanthropies (a program of Trinity Wall Street Episcopal Church) to create a Vitality Improvement Program for Small Congregations (V.I.P.).

By the end of this posting, 22 Episcopal dioceses or their congregations had emailed us requesting application forms when we kick off the program in July.

Needless to say, we are gratified by the interest our announcement has generated.

Apparently, we hit some kind of nail on the proverbial head.

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Broadening Our Reach – Increasing our Offerings

It’s been 12 months since Ken Howard and Matt Felton, respective founders of FaithX and Datastory, appeared at the Austin Convention Center in Texas to launch Datastory’s new MapDash for Faith CommunitiesTM strategic missional planning platform, along with FaithX’s Strategic Missional Consulting initiative, which will help us continue broadening our reach.

Much has happened in the last year with both FaithX’s missional consulting services and Datastory’s platform. And we’d like to bring you up to date on all the progress we have made in such a relatively short time.

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A Great Big “Thank You!” to Our Beta Testers

The purpose of this blog post is to offer a Great Big “Thank You!” to the Dioceses, Diocesan Beta Coordinators, and Congregational Beta Users, whose assistance was invaluable in shaping MapDash for Faith Communities into the great missional tool it has become.

We gratefully acknowledge the five Episcopal Dioceses that agreed to be beta test sites for the Congregational Version of MapDash for Faith Communities, and the diocesan staffers who help coordinate the beta sites in their dioceses: Diocese of Maryland (Canon Scott Slater), Diocese of the Central Gulf Coast (Canon Kammy Young), Diocese of Georgia (“Loose” Canon Frank Logue), Diocese of Oklahoma (Susan Brown Snook), and Diocese of Pennsylvania (Canon Kirk Berlenbach and his team). Scroll down for a list of participating congregations by dioceses.

We offer special thanks to Diocese of Maryland, which with Bishop Eugene Sutton’s support took part not only in prototyping, alpha-testing, and beta-testing the Congregational Version, but also worked closely with us in developing the Executive (Diocesan Level) diagnostic map layers for Congregational Vitality, Congregational Sustainability, and Missional Opportunity. Canon Slater’s assistance in gaining us wide access to the congregations and leaders of Patapsco Valley Region was invaluable

Special thanks also go to Canon Young of Central Gulf Coast, who put many hours into reviewing and providing constructive feedback the Beta User Guide, worked with Bishop Russell Kendrick to bring me in to pilot test our training at their annual Discipleship Day, and worked with Canon Frank Logue of Georgia to develop a regional grant to train diocesan staff in Central Gulf Coast and Georgia to use MapDash for evangelism planning. And a special shout-out to Canon Kirk Berlenbach and his team for going the extra mile (literally) to help us identify and stamp out bugs.

Finally, our giving of thanks would not be complete without recognizing the role played by the Episcopal Church, specifically that of the Rev. Tom Brackett, member Presiding Bishop’s Staff and Manager for Church Planting and Mission Development, who support and encouragement helped us stay faithful, focused, and forward moving through the year and a half developmental journey. Tom, you are a saint!

 

Blessings and thanks to everyone!
Ken+
The Rev. Ken Howard
Executive director of FaithX
Co-creator of MapDash for Faith Communities

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