Stewardship, accountability at heart of Faith In Our Future Trust
Four Catholic professionals part of board that oversees funds

By Brian T. Olszewski
Special to your Catholic Herald

ARCHDIOCESE OF MILWAUKEE -- While they come from various professional backgrounds, all are Catholic and all share a passion for Catholic education and faith formation. With the archbishop and the two auxiliary bishops, they comprise the board of trustees for the Faith In Our Future Trust.

“Archbishop (Timothy M.) Dolan recruited Catholics who have specific expertise, that bring great value to this process – investment expertise, legal expertise, prior experience in grant making and fund-raising,” said Debra Lethlean, interim grants manager for the Faith In Our Future Trust.

Trustees Bruce Arnold, Joseph Kearney, Kristine O’Meara, and Mary Ellen Stanek take their responsibilities seriously – from their joint endorsement of the security of the trust that receives and disburses the $105 million Catholics will contribute, to their individual accountability as trustees.

Mary Ellen Stanek, a member of Christ King Parish, Wauwatosa, has been involved in the Faith In Our Future Campaign since its beginning in 2007. Managing director at Robert W. Baird and Company and president of Baird Funds, Stanek said she got involved because “the campaign’s support of Catholic education and faith formation is critically important to the future of the church in southeastern Wisconsin.” As she became more involved, she realized something else. “We had to give our donors comfort that the dollars they contributed would be spent as intended. This led to creation of the trust,” she said.

Stanek said she was not alone in her concern. “One of the things that became important to several of us was: How can we assure our donors that these funds are going to be isolated for the purpose under which we are raising these funds – to strengthen Catholic education and faith formation – and only and exclusively for that purpose? We talked a lot about that,” she said.

Lethlean concurred, noting that ensuring donor intent was one of the reasons the Faith In Our Future Trust was established.

“Because all gifts to the Faith In Our Future Campaign are restricted gifts, they can only be used for specific components outlined in parish cases and for the six specific initiatives of the archbishop,” said Lethlean, a member of St. Alphonsus Parish, Greendale. “It’s the role of the trust to ensure that donor intent is honored and carried out and to do the work of distributing that money back to the parishes for their specific initiatives and to the archbishop’s six initiatives.”

Exercising stewardship and accountability

Kristine O’Meara, a principal at Irgens Development Partners, LLC, became involved in the campaign because of the value she places on Catholic education. “One of a number of things the Catholic Church does really well is education. My husband, Mark, and I have four children who are products of Catholic education, something for which we are very grateful. We are enthusiastic supporters of the Faith In Our Future Campaign because it will help extend opportunities for a Catholic education to those who need the support,” she said.

A member of St. Frances Cabrini Parish, West Bend, O’Meara said, “An important aspect of the campaign is its missionary spirit as it promotes Catholic education for people who cannot necessarily afford it.”

While praising the work that the campaign will fund, O’Meara said it is imperative that stewardship is pervasive in the handling of campaign resources.

“If we are going to ask people to donate as generously as they have been donating, then we have to be able to promise them we are going to be good stewards of their donations,” she said.

O’Meara said the role of the trustees is to guarantee contributors that there is a good process for disbursing those funds.

“We have to make sure that, if gifts are designated for specific projects, we disburse the money according to donors’ wishes – and in an efficient and careful manner,” she said. P>Lethlean noted that stewardship – how one lives and shares blessings – is one of the pastoral priorities established by Archbishop Dolan.

“In this campaign, there is accountability for how those sacrificial gifts from Catholics are used. This means that the community will be informed about what grants are made from the archbishop’s six initiatives. And, grant recipients, through a grant reporting process, will be asked to detail the impact and outcomes of the projects funded,” she said.

The earliest the grant and scholarship application process will begin is fall of 2010. Lethlean noted that the trustees will be assisted by a board of advisors who will review applications and make recommendations regarding grants and scholarships.

“Accountability and sound stewardship of resources are the foundation of the application and granting criteria now in place and used to evaluate the many requests that will come in from Catholic parishes, schools and agencies,” Lethlean said.

Lethlean commented that the campaign’s emphasis on careful stewardship and the involvement of lay trustees and advisors are key to accountability.

“Times are different,” Lethlean said. “Past generations simply assumed contributions to the church would be managed appropriately. Today, donors want to know details about the goals of fund-raising campaigns before they invest. They expect transparency in fund management and they like hearing about outcomes and impact upon ministry areas. This is a good thing,” she said. As a result, she noted, Catholics won’t be saying, “I don’t know where all that money went. I don’t know how that money was used.”

Separate from the archdiocese

Arnold, a member of Lumen Christi Parish, Mequon, said, “Early in the development of the campaign, Archbishop Dolan put a very high measure on making sure that the faithful knew the monies raised through this campaign were completely separate from the Archdiocese of Milwaukee.”

A managing director at Whyte Hirschboeck Dudek, S.C., Arnold said Archbishop Dolan, whom he termed “passionate about transparency,” asked the question. “’What kind of vehicle would make this entire campaign separate from the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and any issues that may come up either now or in the future?’”

The result of that question, according to Arnold, was the establishment of a trust, which the archbishop did on Oct. 25, 2007.

Kearney, an attorney and dean of the Marquette University Law School, remarked of the trust that it is “important … that there should be a separate legal entity to support, via fundraising, the undertakings of the Catholic Church in this area and that this entity should not entirely consist of the hierarchy of the local Catholic Church but rather should be guided by a broader and more diverse group of individuals than might be the case if the campaign were an arm of the archdiocese.”

Now and for generations to come

While the Faith In Our Future Trust will help schools, parishes and individuals address immediate needs related to Catholic education and faith formation, trustees welcome the added long-term benefit the trust will provide.

“This is an opportunity for Catholics today to make their own very significant contribution to the mission of the archdiocesan Church,” said Kearney, a member of St. Monica Parish, Whitefish Bay. Ninety-five parishes in the archdiocese are preparing now to participate in the Faith In Our Future Campaign this spring.

“There’s still a lot of fundraising work to do in order to grow the resources that will put the trust in a position to make grants,” Lethlean said. “Each of the funds has an identified corpus (or level of funding) that must be reached before grants can begin, and most contributions are in the form of three-year pledges. Grants from the endowment funds will be made from earnings and appreciation. It takes time for all of this to be in place, but the trust will communicate broadly in extending invitations to apply at the appropriate time,” Lethlean said.

Catholics can learn more about the application process, and review the application forms, grant guidelines and stewardship criteria by visiting . Arnold said that one of the “hallmarks” of the trust is that the work being done in Catholic education and faith formation today would continue long into the future.

“The beauty of creating a trust is that it gives us vibrancy to promote and forward underlying trust objectives for this generation and the generations to come,” he said. “I hope it far outlives me and my fellow trustees.”

Editor’s note: This article has been read and approved for publication by members of the Faith in Our Future board of trustees.