FROM THE PRESIDENT
TABLE OF CONTENTS
3 Update on Partners; New Dollars/New
Partners Success Story; Arts in
Several years ago, I was talking with Melanie Stewart, a
respected leader in the dance community, who mentioned
that many small dance groups are in a constant struggle to
find affordable space for rehearsals and other functions. I
noted, in turn, that churches and synagogues, ironically, have
a great deal of unused or underused space. There was a shared
“Aha!” moment. Why couldn’t Partners serve as a “matching”
and support agency, bringing sacred places together with
performing arts groups?
Sacred Places Success Story
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20
22
FEATURE STORY:
A Visionary Model: First Christian
Church and the Community Eye
Clinic of Fort Worth
Professional Alliance Spotlight:
Levine and Company
Professional Alliance Directory
ABOUT PARTNERS
Partners for Sacred Places is the only
national, nonsectarian, nonprofit organization
dedicated to the sound stewardship and active
community use of America’s older religious
properties.
Partners’ Programs and
Services Include:
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Training. New Dollars/New Partners for Your
Sacred Place is an intensive program that
gives congregations with older buildings the
skills and resources to broaden their base of
support.
Regional Offices. Partners offers training,
workshops, and technical assistance through
its Pennsylvania, Texas, and Chicago Offices.
Workshops and Conferences. Partners’ staff
speaks at national and regional conferences
on a variety of topics. Additionally, Partners
offers consulting services on fundraising and
adaptive re-use options for congregations and
community organizations.
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Information Clearinghouse. This web-based
resource provides information related to the
care and use of older sacred places.
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Advocacy Initiatives. Partners works with
civic leaders, funders, and policymakers,
urging them to adopt policies and practices
that provide new resources to older religious
properties.
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The Economic Halo Effect. Partners
documents and articulates how congregations
positively contribute to the economic health
and vitality of their communities.
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Making Homes for the Arts in Sacred Places.
Partners pairs historic sacred places and arts
organizations in ways that benefit both groups.
COVER PHOTO: First Christian Church in
Fort Worth, TX, houses the newly opened
Community Eye Clinic of Fort Worth. Photo
courtesy of Renelibrary from Wikipedia.com.
THUMBNAIL PHOTO: A volunteer helps
clear the site of Ward AME’s new community
garden in Philadelphia, PA. Photo courtesy of
Urban Tree Connection.
That conversation was the seed for our Making Homes for the Arts in Sacred Places
(AiSP) program, which has already met with great success. As we started to
communicate AiSP to civic leaders and funders, we were asked if we could also match
sacred places with social service, health, and education groups. Another “Aha!”
moment!
The cover story of this issue – on our work to bring together First Christian Church
in Fort Worth with a new, cutting-edge Community Eye Clinic – illustrates how
Partners can serve a wide range of community needs. And as clinic director Dr.
Jennifer Deakins notes, the church is providing not just space but much more.
Volunteers from First Christian and the community will be serving as patient
advocates, connecting them to important resources that can provide food, shelter,
job training, and other types of health care. In sum, a sacred place can provide a
bundle of services and support, all revolving around its physical place.
As our cities identify acute challenges, especially in certain neighborhoods where
people are underserved, Partners is seeing that sacred places are perfectly suited to
function as centers for performing arts, nutrition education, health programs, and
other community outreach. Why is this so?
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Sacred places are universal. They are present almost everywhere – evenly
distributed in neighborhoods that may lack nutritional food, or a safe place
for kids after school, or the performing arts. And they often have highly visible
locations that are easy to reach via public transportation.
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Sacred places offer one-stop space shopping. Older churches often have a
wide range of available space, including auditoriums, classrooms, institutional
kitchens, and a range of meeting spaces. There is likely to be a space to meet
almost any need.
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Sacred places are flexible. Church spaces have been used for multiple purposes
over decades or longer. The congregation’s parish hall, for example, may have
housed a theatre in the 1920s, civil rights meetings in the 1960s, and afterschool programs in the 1990s. Today, that same space might be appropriate for
nutrition education or rehearsals.
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Sacred places have owners with shared values. Congregations are, very often,
eager to share their space and serve the community in new ways. They ͕