The Endowment Fund provides parishioners with the opportunity to make planned gifts for the long-term financial stability of their parish. The Fund is managed in cooperation with the Catholic Foundation of North Georgia. Questions about parish planned gifts can be directed to our business manager, Dennis Mallon.
To make a donation to the Endowment Fund, click here: St. Brendan the Navigator Catholic Church Endowment Fund
Not exactly sure what an Endowment Fund is?
An Endowment Fund helps our Catholic stewardship to provide for future generations. Unlike our offertory collection or annual appeal, an endowment is held in an investment fund set aside for the long-term support of our parish. A gift to the endowment is never spent. Instead, the gifts are protected by law, professionally invested and managed in accordance with Catholic values, and grow over time.
Our endowment fund was created to ensure that our parish is able to financially sustain our mission to leave a legacy long into the future. As the market grows over time, the value of the gifts to our fund grow and produce earnings that can be used by our parish to meet current needs.
How does it work?
Our parish endowment fund ensures the vitality of our parish long into the future. Because an endowment fund is intended to last forever, gifts to the endowment fund are never spent. The fund continues to grow so that our parish has support for years to come to continue the work of Christ in our community.
As our parish grows physically and spiritually thanks to the grace of God, our needs may exceed our financial means. Our endowment is a way to stabilize our parish income now and in the future so that we can carry out the work of Christ in our parish.
Gifts are used to establish and start the principal. Principal is protected, invested, and grows with additional gifts. Portions of the fund’s growth are distributed annually forever.
Do you know what Father Bob, Margaret Mitchell, and St. Brendan have in common?
In September of 2011, our interim and forward-thinking Pastor, Father Bob Frederick opened up the St. Brendan Endowment Fund with contributions from the parish totaling $5,000.00. This small, yet wonderful gift laid the foundation that our parish endowment fund would be built upon.
As fate would have it, the growth of the parish endowment fund tripled in within two years when the Archdiocese was the recipient of the estate of Joseph Mitchell, one of two nephews of famed author Margaret Mitchell of Gone With the Wind. As part of the bequest, various monetary donations were assigned to specific areas of the diocese. Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory asked the Catholic Foundation of North Georgia to create an endowment fund for each parish, mission, and Catholic School of the archdiocese with a $10,000 gift apiece from the Joseph Mitchell estate.
Due to Father Bob’s foresight, St. Brendan already had an established fund, so the gift of $10,000 from the Mitchell estate was added to our small, but growing amount. Because the endowment fund grows as the market grows, our fund was well on its way to the first goal of reaching $25,000.
Supporting the Parish Mission
Our parish endowment fund not only ensures that we can continue our mission to leave a legacy long into the future, but it also helps our parish right now! Because our endowment fund grows as the market grows, as a parish we are able to receive a distribution from the fund once a year, if we choose.
Between the years of 2013 and 2016, the St. Brendan Endowment Fund was growing. The market growth and the donations from parishioners were building a nice foundation. At the 2017 fiscal year end, St. Brendan began receiving distributions from the endowment fund. This first disbursement went toward much needed rectory repairs. In subsequent years, the endowment fund disbursements supported upgrading technology, replacing obsolete and outdated technology, building music ministry offices, and purchasing Faith Formation literature.
Recently, we have begun using the 2023 distributions for ceiling tile repair throughout the sanctuary and other parts of campus. Each of these disbursements enabled us to support a current need without using our offertory, making our experience at St. Brendan more fulfilling today.