Serving the homeless & housing insecure

No doubt you’ve seen the statistics. The U.S. Census Bureau reported in December 2020 that an estimated 14 million adults living in rental housing were behind on their rent. An additional 11.8 million adults lived in households that could not keep up…

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How do we care for congregational leaders?

In recent years, a particular focus of Alban has been the health and wellbeing of congregational leaders. In this edition of the Weekly, Jessica Young Brown offers us suggestions for how to care for pastors who are experiencing secondary trauma because of…

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Creative community-based ministries

Happy Tuesday – and welcome to a new design for the Alban Weekly! In this week’s edition, we’ll find inspiration in the stories of three congregations that have developed enterprising ministries to meet the evolving needs of their communities. We’ll…

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Becoming an Affectively Competent Congregation

I am an educated white clergyman of European descent (half Hungarian with some Transylvanian and Irish thrown in). When I grew up, we didn’t talk at all about feelings in our family, and the patterns of emotional expression were pretty…

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Transforming the Spirit of Communities

One fall CiRCLe M (Centre for Rural Community Leadership and Ministry), a nonprofit I direct, organized a conference on the church and community development. In workshops, worship, and conversation, one church leader after another shared stories of how their congregations…

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Paging God: Working with Chaplains in Healthcare

by Wendy Cadge Meg, an interfaith chaplain, agreed to let me shadow her to learn about her work in a large academic medical center. By 9:00 a.m. on a Friday morning, we were sitting in a conference room filled with dirty…

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