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Ministry Futures Institute this Summer at Loyola of Chicago
This summer, Loyola University Chicago will host a special first-time event tackling some of today’s most pressing issues—from health care to interfaith dialogue—with a focus on the unique role of ministers. Deemed The Ministry Futures Institute, this one-of- a-kind conference is designed especially for deacons and lay people and will run in two one-week sessions from June 14–25.
“The time is now to renew our creativity, imagination, and commitment to mission,” says Robert Ludwig, director of Loyola’s Institute of Pastoral Studies, which is planning the event. “We hope to create mission-oriented ministries that will implement the Gospel values through creative faith-based initiatives.”
The conference gives participants the vision and tools to become “ministry entrepreneurs,” Ludwig says, blending imagination, talent, and experience with faith in God and service to others.
Specifically, they will develop skills to propel them into positions of leadership at non-profits. They will learn how to recruit volunteers, write grants, and cultivate donors while hearing from founders of schools for the poor, hospice ministries, urban gardens, worker-rights organizations, and centers for spiritual care.
Guest lecturers during the first half of the conference, June 14–18, will include Phyllis Tickle, author of The Great Emergence, and Fr. Richard Rohr, who will take an in-depth look at social justice, community development, and environmental ministry.
The following week, June 21–25, will center around health care, pastoral care and counseling, education, and spiritual direction ministries. Speakers during this time will include John Allen, author of The Future Church: How Ten Trends Are Revolutionizing the Catholic Church; Sr. Patricia Talone from the Catholic Health Association; educator Marva Collins from Marva Collins Way; and Liz Budd Ellmann from Spiritual Directors International. “We are re-envisioning vocation for the 21st century in a very new and exciting way,” Ludwig says.
More information at ministryfuturesinstitute.org.
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