"Fuel prices have fallen back. Will we fall back, too?" -- by the Rev. Lauren R. Stanle. W

In the midst of this humongous economic mess, when all of us are fretting constantly about our futures, there’s a glimmer of hope in our lives: The price of gas has fallen to incredible lows, which means that at least one thing we have to buy won’t cost us an arm and a leg.

Just the other day, I managed to buy gas for $1.44 a gallon. If I had purchased fuel a few days earlier, I could have gotten it for $1.39 per gallon.

Every time I tank up – and I have to do that a lot, because I travel long distances, usually by car – I marvel at how cheap it is. I can fill the tank for less than $20!

And to think, just last summer, it cost me nearly $40 for the same amount of fuel.

Am I glad about this? Absolutely.

But I’m also somewhat confused and very worried.

First, the confusion:

Why, pray tell, did the price of gas, and of oil overall, skyrocket so much last summer? There were all kinds of explanations, but few wanted to admit that for the most part, speculation and greed were to blame.

Now, can anyone explain exactly why the prices are so low? Oil closed recently around $39 per barrel. OPEC, under the leadership of the King of Saudi Arabia, thinks that $75 per barrel would be the best price. They made that announcement and prices fell yet again.

So what’s going on?

Second, the worry, which is far more important:

What are we going to do about it?

I’m not talking about getting into oil futures. I’m talking about what each of us is going to do, now that gas is practically dirt cheap again. Are we going to go back to driving our cars far too much, without a care about the environment anymore? Are people who drive gas-guzzlers of all kinds, the ones that couldn’t be sold just six months ago, going to resume driving them, using way too much gas?

Or are we going to continue our gas-saving ways, walking more, using public transportation, thinking hard about where we need to go and where we want to go and how to bundle trips so that we aren’t wasting gas frivolously?

Good times are here again, at least when it comes to fuel prices, but that doesn’t give us the right to take it and run without thinking. When it cost us an arm and a leg to fill our tanks, we immediately went into environmental consciousness mode. We were energy conscious. We used less gas. We were, in a word, good to God’s very good creation.

But now, with ridiculously low prices at the fuel pump, we’re at the very least tempted to forget all we learned during economic hardship and go back to our wasteful ways.

We’ve had our warning. We’ve received our blessing.

Now the question is, what are we going to do with them?

X X X

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an Appointed Missionary of the Episcopal Church serving in the Diocese of Renk, Sudan. She is a lecturer at the Renk Theological College, teaching Theology, Liturgy, Biblical Greek and English, and serves as chaplain for the students.

"Trickle-down Hell" -- by the Rev. Lauren Stanley

By the Rev. Lauren R. Stanley

“The Dow Jones fell 5 percent today …”
“Markets in Asia plummeted on news of …”
“Foreclosures hit a new high in …”

The credit crisis dominates our lives right now. Every day, there is more bad economic news, so much of which can be traced straight back to pure greed.

The subprime mortgage crisis set off much of the trouble here in the United States, both the selling of these mortgages to people who were not qualified financially, and the subsequent bundling and selling of these risky loans as investments.

One thing led to another, and voila! We have a recession that is spreading around the world in record time, threatening another Great Depression.

The crime in all this is the greed behind all of it. Not the greed of those who wanted to own their own homes; for the most part, many of the people who took these loans simply wanted a shot at the American Dream, and far too many of them were misled by those giving the loans. No, the greed here lies with those who made the loans knowing that they were predatory, and who then bundled them into investments wherein the investors were, seemingly cavalierly, gambling wildly with people’s lives.

Talking with some friends about this recently, I pointed out the worst tragedy of all:

Those who will suffer the most are those who are in the most need.

How so, my friends asked.

Well, if everyone in this country, the richest in the world, is worried about their money, never mind losing it hand over fist, if they fear for their jobs and their homes, they won’t be able to help those most in need. So the people with whom I serve in Sudan are going to be hurt the hardest.

How can I continue to buy medicine for people, for the women and children, with malaria and typhoid and diarrhea, the three biggest killers in Africa, if people in the United States aren’t able to help? I don’t buy medicine in Renk with my own money – I don’t have it. As a missionary of the Episcopal Church, I don’t receive much in the way of salary; in fact, what I receive actually doesn’t cover my expenses over there, never mind expenses in this country when I am here.

I receive money for medicine from generous churches, friends, family and strangers in this country. I take that money with me and invest it – yes, invest it – in the lives of those who aren’t even on the economic ladder, who have no way to buy desperately needed medicines to save the lives of their families.

All of that money comes from donations.

But … if in these dire economic times people here are worried, are scared, about their own futures, they won’t be able to help secure the future of those far away.

And that’s the real crime of this economic mess.

Those at the top of the economic ladder are suffering losses in their portfolios. Suddenly, they are worth a whole lot less than they were before. Whether that qualifies as suffering, I don’t know. I’ve never been that high on the ladder, and while I understand their anxieties, having that much money, never mind losing a huge chunk of it, is beyond my ken.

Those standing on the middle rungs are clinging to them tightly, knowing that one small misstep will hurt them dramatically. They worry about paying off bills, education for their children, mortgages, jobs … and they are the ones who are retrenching, cutting back on eating out, on Christmas gifts, on anything they can. They are the ones who normally give to those in need … and that giving is already plummeting as they strive to protect their own. Their needs and fears I understand completely, since I used to belong to that class myself. And I don’t like asking for money from folks who need it for themselves.

And then there are those who are already on the bottom rung, the ones who could barely make things work even in the best of times, the ones who each month have to balance paying bills vs. buying food for their children. They don’t have health care and live in true fear of illness. They also are the ones who give most generously – always, it is the poor who share the most – but now, they are in desperate, desperate shape, and I absolutely refuse to take money from them. No, they can’t really fall farther down the ladder, but they are close to falling off the ladder, and I will not jeopardize them.

All of which means that the people who need help most desperately, the poor all over the world who aren’t even on the economic ladder and who have no ability to make it on their own because there is no stability where they live, well … they are literally out of luck. What little help they’ve been getting probably will dry up. New donors will be hard to find. And so these people will continue to suffer, and their suffering will get worse, and there’s not going to be much that can be done about it.

All because someone somewhere decided to gamble, not with his or her own money, but with the money and lives of others, not thinking about the trickle-down hell into which so many would be thrown.

In the old days, most of those who invested funds did so by combining their own money with that of investors big and small. So the men in charge of all this investing actually had a stake in what they were doing. That made them, it seems, more conservative and a whole lot more caring. Now, the money managers get their fees and their exorbitant salaries and go before Congress crying about how they have been hurt by the losses and how they absolutely deserve every cent of their enormous paychecks and benefits … and not once – not once – do they talk about the hardest-hit, the ones suffering from their flawed policies of greed.

There’s very little justice in trickle-down economics.

There is no justice in trickle-down hell.

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an Appointed Missionary of the Episcopal Church serving in the Diocese of Renk, Sudan. She is a lecturer at the Renk Theological College, teaching Theology, Liturgy, Biblical Greek and English, and serves as chaplain for the students.

"In a forgotten corner of the world..." -- by the Rev. Lauren Stanley

RENK, Sudan – In 1922, the Soviet Union was born.

In 1948, three years after my parents got married and long before I was even a twinkle in their eyes, apartheid became the official policy of the Republic of South Africa.

In 1961, mere months after I was born, the Berlin Wall went up.

By 1968, the “Troubles” were well under way in Northern Ireland.

These were facts of life with which I grew up; I didn’t like any of them, but presumed that this simply was the way the world was, and I’d have to deal with them.

And then in 1989, the Wall came down in Berlin and I thought: My God, there is hope.

In 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed and the whole world was realigned, and hope grew. Then apartheid came to an end in South Africa, something I never thought would happen, and the hope grew some more. When Nelson Mandela was elected president of South Africa a few years later, I cried with joy.

And in April 1998, with the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, I knew that all things were possible.

But I still didn’t believe – not with my whole heart – that my country would elect a black man president.

Oh, I hoped. I believed – I knew – it would happen some day.

But I have to admit, I wasn’t confident that day would come in my lifetime. After all, I grew up in a country that didn’t even confirm the voting rights of African-Americans until I was 5 years old.

In January 2006, when Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois announced his candidacy for president, I thought there was a chance that once again, I would be wrong, and that that which I thought wouldn’t happen actually could happen. On that day, when Obama spoke with such power and clarity of restoring hope and seeking redemption, I knew, with all my heart, that I would have to support him.

After all, I’m a priest. I preach hope and redemption from the pulpit. I live in hope. I believe in hope. How could I not support someone who based his leadership on that same ideal? But even with all that hope, his and mine, I wasn’t sure it would happen. Not now. Not yet.

So when I woke up on that Wednesday morning here in Sudan, clutching my radio and trying to find a clear signal from the BBC, I was filled with hope, but still not quite believing.

Sudan is eight hours ahead of the East Coast, so waking up at 4:30 in the morning was a little silly. The polls were still open in the United States, and there would be no announcements for hours yet. Still, I woke again and again, seeking a radio signal, hoping to get some clue.

Finally, the BBC announced that the polls would close in California in “30 seconds,” and moments later, declared Obama’s victory. I let out a whispered shout of “YES!” (many of my neighbors were still sleeping), and felt a huge surge of joy.

My country had done something absolutely momentous: We had elected a black man president.

Within minutes, I received the first of many phone calls from Sudanese friends celebrating with me. “Mobruk! Mobruk! Congratulations! Congratulations!”

An hour later, when I heard Obama’s speech, I stood frozen in one spot, not daring to risk losing the signal, and cried … with joy, with some shame that it took so long for something so simple to happen, with pride because that simple thing had happened.

And when Obama spoke directly to those of us “huddled around our radios in forgotten corners of the world,” the tears flowed even more freely. For half the year, I live and move and have my being in one of those forgotten corners, and to be remembered at the moment of his greatest victory spoke to my heart, and to the hearts of so many people here. To hear the new president-elect remember those of us who live so far away in such different and difficult circumstances means more to us here than he will ever imagine.

You see, for the past six months or so, most of the Sudanese I know actually have supported Sen. John McCain. For a variety of reasons, they thought Obama would never win, and thus decided he shouldn’t win.

But today, the day after Obama’s election, those same Sudanese are celebrating. For in Obama, they see hope, and hope is something they most definitely understand. Sudan is a land that has been torn apart by war for most of the past five decades. Death still stalks the people daily. There is not enough food or clean water or health care or education. Malaria and typhoid kill people here daily. It’s hot and dirty and dirt-poor to boot.

The only thing most Sudanese have, really, is hope. Hope that their lives one day will improve and their children will live to adulthood. Hope that the fragile peace we have here will grow and expand into a real, lasting peace.

So they’ve been calling to tell me, “Mobruk! Mobruk! Congratulations! Congratulations!” Not just because Obama’s election is historic and almost unbelievable, but also because his election gives them hope as well.

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an Appointed Missionary of the Episcopal Church serving in the Diocese of Renk, Sudan. She is a lecturer at the Renk Theological College, teaching Theology, Liturgy and English, and serves as chaplain for the students.

"If only that were true..." -- by the Rev. Lauren Stanley

By Lauren R. Stanley
McClatchy-Tribune News Service

RENK, Sudan – So what would you do if someone told you that something you believed to be a true and accurate fact, something you held near and dear to your heart, wasn’t true?

Would you believe this new version of truth? Or would you fight it and be upset?

Nearly every day as a lecturer at the Renk Theological College in Sudan, I have to deal with the varied reactions of my students to “new” truths.

The first time I told the students, most of whom are already ordained as priests and deacons of the Episcopal Church of Sudan, that Matthew’s Gospel was not the first one written, that Paul’s Letter to the Romans was not his first letter, that scholars don’t know for sure who wrote the Epistle to the Hebrews, that Moses did not write the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible, and that David is not the author of all the psalms was an eye-opener for both the students and myself.

The students sat there in disbelief. No one had told them anything about how the Bible was put together, just that this was the Bible, the holy word of God. No one had explained that numerous authors were involved in writing the Scriptures, and that there were many things we did not know about authorship or the timing of the writings.

Me? As a lecturer in a theological college, I was stunned to find out that the students had no background in biblical studies. Most of the students were already ordained; most had been preaching to and teaching their congregations for years. How could they not know?

And then I realized that in Sudan, which has been torn apart by war for decades, education was a rare and precious commodity, and that these men and women had not been able to go to school. They were ordained because they knew the story, the Good News of God in Christ Jesus, and they could tell that story, sometimes very well indeed.

Finding out that all they held near and dear wasn’t quite true was hard.

Some of them were curious and immediately wanted to know more. But some were absolutely aghast – how could this be true? And still others refused to believe, no matter what I said that day.

Even after a year and a half, they are still surprised when I give them new information. Recently, we had a long, lively discussion about whether John the Baptist actually baptized Jesus in Luke’s Gospel. In Matthew and Mark, there is no doubt: John baptizes Jesus. In Luke’s Gospel, that’s not the case. The Scriptures clearly say that John was arrested in prison, then tell of Jesus’ baptism. I pointed this out to the students in class, and for over an hour, we debated on this.

Because Matthew and Mark have John baptizing Jesus, they said, it must be true of Luke. Then they said that since Luke was writing for the Gentiles, it was obvious he didn’t know. The debate went all over the place. I kept pointing out what that they had to read what Luke said, not what they wanted Luke to say. In the end, the students agreed – I think – to accept that in Luke’s Gospel (as well as in John’s), it’s not clear who baptized Jesus, and furthermore, it’s not important.

The hardest part about being the person who gives out new information is realizing that sometimes, the people getting that information don’t want it. It’s not that they don’t want to learn – these students wouldn’t have traveled here to live in less-than-stunning conditions, many without their families, if they were desperate to learn more.

What’s hard for them is that new information, especially about things they thought they already knew, means change. It means changing basic beliefs sometimes. It means looking at the world in a new way. It means allowing yourself to be transformed.

And transformation … well, that’s just hard. There aren’t many of us who want to go through that, fewer still who are willing to set aside long-held beliefs to accept new ones. No one likes being told that the truth he holds isn’t true. No one likes finding out that she has been wrong all along.

But if we aren’t willing to be transformed, both as teachers and as students, then we won’t even be able to hear new things, much less accept them. And if we aren’t able to hear new things, how can we grow in Christ? How can we tell the good news of God’s love for us if hearing about that love is too frightening?

So we walk a tightrope, my students and I, between wanting to hear in new ways the love of God, and wanting to stick with what we’ve always known, whether it’s true or not. On our worst days, we reject anything the new and pretend the old is good enough. But on our best and bravest days, we accept the new and go forth from there, changed and transformed for the better.

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an appointed missionary serving in the Diocese of Renk in the Episcopal Church of Sudan, where she is a lecturer and chaplain at the Renk Theological College.

"Dean Martha heralds new day for women in Sudan" -- by the Rev. Lauren Stanley

RENK, Sudan – We made history in Sudan the other day, installing the Very Rev. Martha Deng Nhial as the first dean of the Cathedral of St. Matthew, Diocese of Renk, Episcopal Church of Sudan.

But being the first was not how the real history was made.

No, the real history was making a woman priest dean of a cathedral in Sudan. Dean Martha is the first to hold that office, just eight years after the Episcopal Church of Sudan decided to begin ordaining women as deacons and priest, just five years after Dean Martha was ordained a deacon, and only three years after she was ordained a priest.

Dean Martha is also one of the first African women to be dean of an African cathedral in the history of Christianity.

We’re feeling pretty good about ourselves right now. And not just about the history-making. We are looking around and seeing women being educated and starting businesses and taking leadership positions all over the country. In the Diocese of Renk, our schools are filled with girls, who make up close to 50 percent of the school population in some cases. Girls are taking and passing their Sudan Junior Certificates at the end of eighth grade, and taking and passing their Sudan Certificates at the end of senior secondary school. They are becoming teachers and in some cases, head teachers. They are learning to speak, read and write English and Arabic and their tribal languages, many of them from the Mothers’ Union, a powerful force in Sudan.

Women may not yet rule in Sudan, but some days, it sure seems that way.

A week after Dean Martha was installed, special prayers were offered at her home. Fifty women gathered to praise her, to praise the Church, and to thank God and the Church for lifting her up, and for her ability to lift all of us up in our lives.

Even before she became dean, Martha was a force to be reckoned with in Renk. She was a nurse, as well as a member and then leader of the Mothers Union here. When she walked through town, with a purposeful stride, everyone could see that she was a woman of strength. (I once was compared to her because of the speed with which I walk, as well as my long stride. It was quite the compliment.) When Martha spoke, everyone listened, because they knew she was a woman of faith. When she became one of the first women priests ordained in Sudan, all applauded her for her courage.

Culturally, Sudan is still a land where women are expected to do certain kinds of work, none of which involve leadership. In the countryside, it is still not unusual to see the boys being educated while the girls are kept at home. In Renk, boys can pretty much roam the streets at will; girls, on the other hand, are kept under tighter supervision. (All of my young playmates, who come to hang out with me, play games, teach me Arabic, learn English from me and just keep me company, are boys. The girls are not allowed by their families to come play with me.)

So to see Dean Martha being installed – to see her daughters weep at her service – to hear the women in town sing her praises and encourage her to greater heights for herself and beg her to lead them to greater heights – was awe-inspiring.

Forget the history.

This was about women being shown that they, too, can lead, they, too, have something great to offer, they, too, deserve to be honored.

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an Appointed Missionary of the Episcopal Church serving in the Diocese of Renk, Sudan. She is a lecturer at the Renk Theological College, teaching Theology, Liturgy and English, and serves as chaplain for the students.

Photo: The Very Rev. Martha Deng Nhial, the new Dean of St. Matthew Cathedral, Diocese of Renk, Episcopal Church of Sudan, addressed the congregation after being installed on 17 August 2008 in Renk, Sudan. (Photo by Moses Anuur Ayom.)

"Linguistic Disarmament" -- by the Rev. Lauren Stanley

The Rev. Jesse Jackson could probably stand a good visit from Cher right now. She could sing to him and if necessary, spend some time explaining what she meant when she sang If I Could Turn Back Time.

You remember the song, right? The lyrics from which Rev. Jackson could benefit?

“If I could find a way I’d take back those words that hurt you and you’d stay. I don’t know why I did the things I did. I don’t know why I said the things I said. Pride’s like a knife; it can cut deep inside. Words are like weapons; they wound sometimes.”

Perhaps if Rev. Jackson took those words to heart all the time, he wouldn’t have said that nasty thing he said about Sen. Barack Obama last week, and then he would not have had to apologize – before his statement was even aired – and then, of course, half the country would not be excoriating Rev. Jackson for saying such nasty things in the first place.

When we were children, our parents told us, “Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words will never hurt you.” But we all knew that wasn’t true. The first time anyone said anything nasty about us, we were hurt. And for some, if the words were strong enough and the tone harsh enough, they never left us. Their memory still burns in our hearts. Ask anyone who’s ever been denigrated by an ethnic or racial slur, anyone who has been told she or he is a lesser human being, anyone who has been called “stupid” or “useless.”

Words are weapons.

And we use them all the time.

Sometimes, we get caught using them, as Rev. Jackson did. All too often, we don’t get caught, or no one complains about what we’ve said, which is even worse, but that only serves to twist the knife deeper and make the wound more permanent.

Perhaps because I live part-time in Sudan, a country that has suffered greatly through three civil wars in the last five decades, where genocide continues at this very moment, where tribalism regrettably still reigns, and where hatred runs rampant, I am more attuned to how we use words to hurt and subjugate others all too frequently.

Perhaps living in that land has made me more sensitive to how we speak here in the United States, calling people names and making derogatory remarks about people. I hear this from children and adults alike, in public and in private, from people whom I know are hate-filled and people who I know even more are filled with love, as least in the general sense.

I don’t know why I’m more sensitive now, I only know that I am. And that it is more important than ever for me to not only pay attention to and control what I say, but to pay attention to and control what I think.

I do know this: Whenever we neglect to guard our hearts and minds as well as our tongues, we break the community in which we live, and for which we were created. Whenever we call someone a name, silently or aloud, whenever we denigrate someone as being lesser than ourselves in some way, shape or form, we break God’s love as well. And in doing so, we thus have broken the two Great Commandments, to love God and love our neighbor.

I may not like someone, I may not like what someone has done, but if I am to live in God’s love in God’s community, I have to control my impulses to lash out, and guide my heart and my mind and my mouth to at least try to love God’s beloved children.

Years ago, I lived with my brother and sister-in-law and their children while attending university. Because the children were young, the adults had to guard what we said, not only to protect the children from hearing bad language, but also to keep them from repeating it, usually at the most inopportune times. When it came to driving, all of us adults had the tendency to make, shall we say, less than kind remarks about other drivers. The problem was, the little ones repeated whatever we said, and often asked what certain words meant. So we invented words, one in particular that lasts to this day: “Dingeldoof”, “Dingeldoofen” for the plural. (We lived in Milwaukee; the Germanic culture must have influenced us.) “Dingeldoof,” we decided, was safe. Said in the right one of voice, it conveyed our meaning, our disgust with someone else, quite clearly. And if one of the children repeated it somewhere, we were, we figured, safe.

A decade later, working in Washington, D.C., I was still using this word to convey my, shall we say, dismay with certain people with whom I had to work – not in my office, but throughout my nationwide corporation. I never said it directly to anyone; I always waited until I had hung up the phone. One day, after working in this particular office for years, one of my co-workers, whom I had never heard curse, who had never in my hearing used a “bad” word for someone else in the corporation, in great frustration suddenly shouted, “Dingeldoof!”

At the time, it was funny. Finally, this co-worker had broken down and joined the rest of us crass human beings.

Now, I’m sorry I ever taught that co-worker that word. Because in doing so, I gave my co-worker the ability to denigrate another human being.

Which breaks God’s image of love and community.

We live in times when denigrating others is so common we often fail to even notice it. Somehow, our public discourse has become overloaded with these kinds of remarks; if you’re not with me, you must be somehow lesser than me, which makes me superior, which means I can say nasty things about you.

This has to stop. This does not please God, and is not why we were created.

Perhaps our discourse, public and private, would improve if we would take the time to curb our worst impulses, to do as Paul instructed, looking for whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable. As he wrote, if there is any excellence, anything worthy of praise, we should think of those things, even if it means we have to really work at it.

God would be much happier, don’t you think?

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an Appointed Missionary of the Episcopal Church serving in the Diocese of Renk, Sudan. She is a lecturer at the Renk Theological College, teaching Theology, Liturgy and English, and serves as chaplain for the students.

"Spreading the Gospel on the Cheap" -- by the Rev. Lauren Stanley

Quick: How many missionaries does the Episcopal Church have serving full-time overseas?

If you don’t know the answer to that question, don’t worry: Most Episcopalians aren’t even aware that the Episcopal Church has full-time overseas missionaries. Not because they aren’t paying attention, but because, sad to say, we don’t tell the story well enough (and by “we,” I mean the entire Church, top to bottom).

The fact is, the Episcopal Church has 70 missionaries serving full-time around the world in more than 30 countries. Each missionary is sent forth by the Episcopal Church of the United States, and thus represents not just his or her sending diocese, but the entire church.

The issue is not how many missionaries we as a Church have; there are far too few laborers in this field. The issue is how they are supported, or not supported, by the very same Church that is sending them forth.

(Full disclosure: I am one of those 70 missionaries, serving in the Diocese of Renk in South Sudan. This is not a letter from an unbiased observer, but from one who is affected deeply by the issues here.)

Each missionary gets some financial support from the Episcopal Church. Appointed Missionaries, who are commissioned directly by the Presiding Bishop, receive more than others, including stipends (which are small), transportation, visa fees, language training, and full participation in the Pension Fund, which depends on whether that missionary is lay or ordained. Volunteers for Mission receive health benefits only. Any shortfalls in expenses are covered by the missionaries themselves, who have to raise the rest.

The brutal truth is this: The Episcopal Church, which says that mission is its heart and soul, and both proclaims and encourages mission constantly, does not provide enough funding for the missionaries it has.

No missionary gives up everything the United States has to offer – jobs, security, safety and job benefits, not to mention such niceties as clean, running water, decent food, health care that you can trust, etc. – to make money, to live high on the hog, or to pump up the résumé. Being a full-time missionary overseas means living closely with the people of God as one of them, often in circumstances that would appall most Americans.

It is not easy to be a missionary overseas. It means leaving behind family and friends and jobs and security and sometimes safety. It means brushing your teeth using bottled water because the water you have will kill you, or cooking over charcoal stoves, or having electricity at most just a few hours per day, or bathing out of buckets, and then washing your clothes in those same buckets. It means setting aside the taken-for-granted privileges of the Global North to live as the majority of people do in the Global South.

Admittedly, few missionaries live on less than $1 per day, which is the truth for so many Global Southerners, but all live on considerably less than they would in the United States, and many missionaries live very close to the bone financially.

And yet, while the Episcopal Church proclaims that mission is at the very heart of our ministry, that same Church is not supporting those willing to go the farthest for the longest period of time.

Once again, by “Church,” I do not mean the “national Church” or “those folks at 815 in New York.” I mean the whole Church, the 2 million-plus members of this portion of the Anglican Communion. I mean all of us.

Earlier this year, the Mission Personnel Office in New York, looking at the budget that was set for missionaries, tried to figure out a way to make the pay system more equitable. In an effort to ensure that lay missionaries had access to the Pension Fund, it proposed that henceforth, all missionaries would receive full benefits and Pension Fund benefits, and that’s it. No longer would there be a differentiation between Volunteers for Mission and Appointed Missionaries; all would be treated equally in the financial realm. All other money – for stipends, living expenses, travel, visas, language training, etc. – had to be raised by the missionaries themselves. In essence, the Mission Personnel Office was trying to make the best of a bad situation. That plan, thankfully, has been removed from the table. The Standing Commission on World Mission now is seeking a different way to fund the missionaries more fully.

The question is, why was the Mission Personnel Office put in that position in the first place? Why isn’t the Episcopal Church more willing to fully fund missionaries, so that they don’t have to raise money to go off and answer the call God has issued to them? The Church allocates less than $1million per year for these 70 people. To fully fund them all – so that missionaries would receive full health and pension benefits, a stipend (which hasn’t changed in years, despite the constantly rising costs in living expenses), support, travel, visa fees, language training, etc. – would cost approximately another $1.8 million per year.

That sounds like a lot of money, and in overall scheme of the Church’s budget, it is. But if instead of looking at the “Church” as just those folks in New York, we looked at the “Church” as all of us, it would mean, literally, pennies per year per person. Really. Raising that amount of money would mean asking each Episcopalian in this country to give eighty cents per year just for missionaries.

Read the entire piece on Episcopal Cafe.

The Rev. Lauren R. Stanley is an Appointed Missionary of the Episcopal Church serving in the Diocese of Renk, Sudan. She is a lecturer at the Renk Theological College, teaching Theology, Liturgy and English, and serves as chaplain for the students.