Hospitality for the unhoused

The gospel provides a clear mandate to offer concrete acts of compassion to people on the economic and social margins of society. Today, unhoused people comprise a sizeable number of this struggling demographic. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban…

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Is your congregation burned out?

We all know pastors who are burned out from the stresses of 2020 and 2021. Maybe we are willing to say, “I am burned out” — but I wonder if it would help us to think about a congregation being burned out. A Harvard…

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Churches and mental health

As we cross the threshold into another year of a global pandemic, the stress is palpable. We all want to be resilient, but resilience is becoming more difficult. For church leaders, the call to action is clear: Congregations must not underestimate…

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Are you just tired – or burning out?

A group of ministers told me about a senior pastor they knew who resigned because the demands of ministry had become too much. This was not the first person they knew personally who resigned this year. Such sudden exits make…

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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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