Give and pledge

2024 PLEDGE CAMPAIGN 

Dear Friends in Christ,

As 2023 ends, it’s time again for us to renew our support for our parish and its missions and ministries. We have continued our outreach to the community, and new parishioners and visitors continue to find us and enrich our parish life. At the same time, St. James faces significant financial challenges. Our parish daily and weekly activities are the cornerstone and foundation of our larger missions, and these are funded by the contributions that you pledge every year. Staff salaries, maintenance of our campus, and production of service bulletins are all the daily expenses that provide the base for our worship together and our outreach to our online community. Inflation will continue in 2024, and we expect our operating expenses to rise accordingly.

 We will finish 2023 with a significant deficit in our operating account of over $20,000. We ask that each St. James’ family and individual prayerfully consider their ability to contribute time and treasure to the continuation of the parish. Our pledges do not just support “the budget,” they support our expressed parish mission – spread the Gospel, study Scripture, worship God, share our blessings, and help those in need. Our giving is an act of sacrificial worship, where we donate some of what God has given us to promote His mission through our parish.

 For those of you who have not pledged before, please consider doing so! Pledging allows the rector and vestry to determine our resources and needs to support our parish mission and goals. For those of you who have stayed the same in their giving over several years, please consider increasing your gift. If all 49 people and families who pledged last year increase their pledge by $10 per week, that would give the parish $25,480 to maintain the base for our mission and ministries. Consider the blessings God has given you and with faith and trust, ask if God might be calling you to increase your giving in gratitude.

A pledge card for 2024 is included with this mailing. Please join others in our congregation in planting seeds for today and tomorrow by making a financial pledge by November 9,2023. The Stewardship Committee would also like you to consider pledging and giving electronically, through the St. James’ website. This is a very secure and convenient means of carrying out our pledges, and greatly helps our staff ensure your gift goes where you want it to. It also helps for you to write “2024 Pledge” (or other instruction) in the memo field of your check if you give that way.

We want our pledge campaign to be more than dollars and cents: it’s a way to plan our spiritual life, and to consider the role for St. James in that life and in our community. Please consider prayerfully how you might contribute.

Yours in Christ,

The Stewardship Committee

Sig Johansen and Phala White