This July, Lay Readers from the Diocese of Ontario—and beyond—will gather at Queen’s University for a week of renewal, education, and spiritual formation through a long-standing ministry development initiative: Summer Fruit for Souls. Now in its third decade, this year’s event is being scaled up with help from a $10,000 grant from the Anglican Foundation of Canada (AFC).

Organized by the Lay Readers Association of the Diocese of Ontario, the conference is built on the conviction that lay leaders need ongoing education and spiritual refreshment to faithfully serve today’s Church. The Diocese supports more than 130 Lay Readers across its four deaneries. These volunteers assist with preaching and prayer leadership and are increasingly taking on catechist and other pastoral roles in their communities.

The Rt. Rev. William Cliff, Bishop of Ontario, at the 2024 Summer Fruit for Souls event. Photo courtesy of Mark Hauser.
But the impact of Summer Fruit for Souls extends far beyond diocesan boundaries. “We’re growing into something more provincial,” says Dr. Laurel Dempsey, co-chair of the Lay Readers Association. “We had participants from five dioceses last year. There’s a real hunger among Lay Readers across the Province of Ontario for this kind of formation—and a real shortage of comparable opportunities.”

This year’s conference, to be held July 22–25 at Queen’s University, will feature Bishop William Cliff leading daily sessions on preaching and Dr. Grayhame Bowcott offering workshops on parish development and community leadership. The program will welcome up to 50 in-person attendees, as well as a broader online audience through livestreamed and recorded sessions.

Organizers say relocating the event to Queen’s has helped make it more accessible and central to participants from across the province, but the move has also added to logistical and financial costs. AFC’s grant will help keep registration fees manageable for participants—many of whom serve in rural or resource-constrained contexts.

“This grant gives us breathing room,” says Dempsey. “It allows us to keep the doors open for people who might not otherwise be able to attend. That’s critical to our goal of creating a truly inclusive, accessible space for lay formation.”

To register for Summer Fruit For Souls visit: Summer Fruit for Souls | Lay Readers | Anglican Diocese of Ontario.
To learn more about upcoming funding opportunities visit anglicanfoundation.org/apply.

Every AFC grant is made possible through the generosity of our donor family. By becoming a member of the Anglican Foundation of Canada, you are investing in the Church of tomorrow—today, helping to fund creative, compassionate, and courageous ministry in your diocese and across the country. Membership starts at just $100/year. Learn more and join us at www.anglicanfoundation.org/membership.

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Since it was launched in 2021, SYTK has provided over $640,000 to more than 100 unique beneficiaries and fundraising partners in support of youth-focused ministry and outreach from coast to coast to coast. We are grateful to our supporters in the Diocese of Ontario who have given so generously to help launch and sustain this movement.

The 4th annual Say Yes! to Kids campaign runs until the end of June and we currently have two teams in the Diocese of Ontario!

St. Mary Magdalene Picton Says Yes! to County Kids Read

Since 2009, St. Mary Magdalene Picton has been a champion for the County Kids Read program which now distributes about 500 books per month to local children and youth. By supporting County Kids Read, the church hopes to continue to build relationships with children and families while doing their part to address the link between poverty and literacy by providing books to at-risk children and youth in Prince Edward County.

St. Mary Magdalene Napanee Says Yes! to Kids

This is SMMAC Napanee’s third annual Say Yes! to Kids campaign. Proceeds will increase the church’s support for The Heard Youth by once again sponsoring their annual retreat. Funds will also support the church’s Harmony Lounge & Music Club, a thriving music outreach program that provides free music lessons and arts enrichment to app. 70 youth, ages 12 to 16.

You can visit our campaign hub at www.anglicanfoundation.org/sytkdonate to see all 25 teams that are campaigning this year. You can also support our efforts by celebrating a Say Yes! to Kids Sunday in your parish, and praying for local, diocesan, and national outreach to children, youth, and young adults. Remember that for every $20 donated to this year’s campaign, $4 will support the Anglican Foundation’s grants to national youth ministries.

Please give generously to a Say Yes! to Kids team and help to grow a brighter future for young people, today!

P.S. You can also mail a cheque payable to the Anglican Foundation of Canada, with the name of the team you wish to support in the memo line to this address:
The Anglican Foundation of Canada
80 Hayden Street
Toronto, Ontario,
M4Y 3G2
Canada

Or watch for your Spring AFC newsletter and make your donation using the donation form and business reply envelope.

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“Say Yes! to Kids is a hopeful and ambitious program that aligns with AFC’s vision to increase community connectedness and fund transformational ministry across Canada,” says Dr. Scott Brubacher, Executive Director. “On an almost weekly basis, AFC receives another impact story of how SYTK initiatives have revitalized ministry and created new opportunities to engage youth and young adults with mentors, their peers, and the church.”

While SYTK was prompted by the pandemic, Brubacher says that the challenges facing young people are no less urgent today. “There is an increasing body of evidence that points to loneliness and isolation as epidemics arising from the pandemic and that younger Canadians are among the hardest-hit demographics,” says Brubacher. “As a church, we can choose to receive that bad news by responding with good news: claiming our place at the table and answering the call to champion community-based solutions to this epidemic.” According to data collected by AFC since 2021, virtually every SYTK program has helped to create a more youth-centred climate in its church or diocese, thereby breaking the cycle of loneliness impacting youth and young adults in their community.

The 2024 SYTK campaign will launch on Tuesday, April 2 and close on Sunday, June 30. A new campaign component will be a liturgical resource to promote the celebration of Say Yes! to Kids Sunday on June 2. “This will provide a spiritual focal point for the SYTK movement,” says Brubacher, “and will be a flexible, adaptable resource that any church can use, whether it has an active campaign or not.”

The hope is that Anglican parishes across Canada will join forces on that Sunday, or another Sunday in the season of Pentecost. Brubacher explains that the resource is intended to be used by all churches, whether they have young people in the congregation or not. “If you don’t have youth to involve as readers, greeters, or elsewhere, the service can be a time of prayer for children and youth in your community and across the country. What matters most is rallying Canadian Anglicans to celebrate children, youth, and young adults in our midst and praying for the creativity and compassion to make young people a vital part of the fabric of our church now and in the future.”

As with the 2022 and 2023 SYTK campaigns, AFC will continue to support parishes who wish to take part in the online, team-based fundraising component, but that is not a requirement to use the SYTK liturgical resource. “Parishes can use the Sunday’s offertory to support their SYTK fundraising campaign, if they are participating as a fundraising partner,” explains Brubacher, “or they can simply use it for their own purposes—to support local or diocesan outreach to children, youth, and young adults. Or parishes may wish to use the offering to make a gift to AFC’s Kids Helping Kids Fund to support ongoing grants for youth-focused programs and initiatives.”

All Canadian Anglicans are invited to be part of the SYTK movement by:

•Pre-registering a 2024 fundraising team

•Learning more about SYTK Sunday

•Reading stories about SYTK ministries in action

•Downloading the FAQs Sheet

•Donating to SYTK

For more information about the 2024 Say Yes! to Kids campaign, download the media backgrounder or contact Michelle Hauser, AFC’s Development & Communications officer.

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“The generosity which arose from Ted Fulford’s desire to foster musical education and training in Canada allows churches and other music programs to reduce or eliminate financial barriers for young people who are seeking musical training,” says Dr. Scott Brubacher, Executive Director, AFC. On the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the Fulford Trust, AFC is celebrating Ted’s generosity by encouraging Anglicans to name your passion and grow your legacy.

“Ted Fulford’s philanthropic spirit, and that of hundreds of other Canadian Anglicans, have formed the bedrock of AFC’s $15 million endowment,” says Brubacher. “These legacies have varied in size and do not come exclusively from wealthy philanthropists. The thread that unites them all, is a passion to make a difference.” AFC’s capacity to weather the pandemic, while also pushing its grants program to new heights in recent years is directly attributable to the “growing impact of enduring gifts.”

Whether motivated by their love for sacred music, belief in the value of leadership and education, a vision to reduce poverty, or a desire to support the Indigenous church, an increasing number of Canadian Anglicans are choosing to remember the church in their wills.

Brubacher says that among the many bequests it has received in recent decades, AFC is rarely the sole faith-related beneficiary. “Our experience has been that legacy gifts typically lift all boats by supporting the church at various levels—locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally. It is especially heartening to see the benefit to the local church as well as to a donor’s family and charities. From hospitals to universities to animal shelters, Canadian Anglicans are putting a great deal of care, compassion, and consideration into how they put their wills to work.”

This year, AFC is joining the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund as well as dioceses across Canada to partner with Will Power, a national campaign of the Canadian Association of Gift Planners (CAGP) that educates Canadians about the power of leaving a charitable gift in their will.

In the Diocese of Ontario, for guidance on how to make your church part of your estate plans you can contact: The Ven. John Robertson at johnm.robertson@sympatico.ca.

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“Two thirds of the Say Yes! to Kids teams reached or surpassed their goals,” says Michelle Hauser, development and communications officer for AFC, “and the remaining third achieved between 50% and 80% of their targets.“ Hauser says each team received a $1,000 AFC Angel Donor match thanks to this year’s $25,000 matching sponsor. “And many others benefited from the growing friends of the SYTK community which includes diocesan ACWs and the Ecclesiastical Provinces of Ontario and Rupert’s Land, whose gifts were shared among the teams campaigning in their regions.”

Of the 17 teams in this year’s campaign, more than half were returning participants, like St. Mary Magdalene Anglican Church (SMMAC) in Napanee. “Like many Anglican churches across Canada, SMMAC relies heavily on fundraisers for our core youth program,” says Anne Alkenbrack, Chair of the Children, Youth & Family Ministry Committee. “This was our 2nd Say Yes! to Kids campaign. We raised $5,000, an increase from last year’s campaign, and thanks to Say Yes! to Kids we can fund both our annual youth retreat and launch The Ben Rose Memorial Scholarship.”

The scholarship award was established this year in support of local High School students who are pursuing post-secondary studies in music. “There were three applicants,” says Chris Yeomans, churchwarden, and SMMAC Grants Committee chair. In the end, Yeomans says, the Committee voted unanimously to award a scholarship of $1,000 to each applicant. 

Yeomans explains all three applicants were involved as student mentors in the Harmony Lounge and Music Club, which is a community program of SMMAC that provides free music lessons and an after-school drop-in program to area youth between the ages of 12 and 16. “Our student mentors were so incredibly helpful in launching the church’s music outreach program last year—we could not have done it without them.”  

The scholarship was named in memory of Benjamin (Ben) Rose, a former organist and music director, who was known to many as the ‘Piano Man’ for his dedication to sharing his love of music. “We are grateful to all the parishioners and many other people in our community who gave so generously to this year’s Say Yes! to Kids (SYTK) campaign so that we could raise the funds that enabled us to establish this scholarship,” says Yeomans. “It gave Ben great joy to help nurture the musical talent of young people and he would be so pleased to know his music teaching legacy continues through this scholarship.”

Elsewhere in Canada, music was also a theme for other SYTK fundraising teams as well. The Diocese of Edmonton, which had the top fundraising team in the country, raised just over $10,000 for their Diocesan Children’s Choir. “Established in 2021, with the help of Say Yes! to Kids, this choir is thriving and singing at worship services and liturgical events across our diocese,” says the Ven. Susan Oliver, Archdeacon for Children, Youth, and Family Ministry. “In addition to the musical and choral knowledge, we often hear from parents that our choristers experience improved self-confidence and an overall sense of well-being and belonging. It is important, for many reasons, that we make this choir a sustainable part of our worship life in the Diocese of Edmonton.” 

Since it was launched in 2021 SYTK has provided over $710,000 to more than 100 unique beneficiaries and fundraising partners in support of youth-focused ministry and outreach from coast to coast to coast. If you would like more information on becoming a Say Yes! to Kids sponsor or partner for the 2024 campaign, please contact Michelle Hauser at mhauser@anglicanfoundation.org.

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“We are pleased to have been able to award a total of $35,000 for three Diverse Infrastructure projects in the Diocese of Ontario,” says Dr. Scott Brubacher, executive director. “When combined with an earlier discretionary grant of $5,000 to Morningstar Relief Mission in Napanee, this brings the 2023 disbursements total to $40,000.” Projects funded include:

• St. Lawrence Church, Brockville, St. Lawrence Accessibility Project, $15,000
• St. Mark’s Church, Barriefield, Essential Repairs to Church Tower, $10,000
• St. James Church, Kingston, Rehabilitation of St. James Nave below-grade foundation walls, $10,000
• Morningstar Relief Mission, Napanee, High School Hot Meal Program, $5,000.

Since 2010, AFC has provided $181,500 in funding to 28 recipients in the Diocese of Ontario—$44,000 of which has support youth-oriented projects. “We are tremendously grateful for the support of the Anglican Foundation of Canada,” says the Ven. David Selzer, diocesan executive officer. “By investing generously in our churches—so that our buildings are safe, accessible, and welcoming—and by driving innovation with their special focus on children and youth through the Say Yes! to Kids program, AFC is not just a dependable partner in ministry, but a visionary one as well.”

Brubacher says that nationally, the Board and the Grants Committee commented on the size and scope of many of the projects. “The 2nd quarter grants cycle has been the most robust for infrastructure projects since prior to the COVID-19 Pandemic,” says Brubacher. “It’s exciting to see so many ambitious capital accessibility projects coming forward.”

Noteworthy, too, Brubacher says has been the new focus on choral scholarships as more parishes see the potential to grow their music programs and make their membership more inter-generational. “Both of the Sacred Music & Liturgical Arts grants this cycle were for choral scholarships,” says Brubacher. “More and more small choirs are experiencing growth and new life thanks to these grants through the A.E.J. Fulford Trust.”

The next AFC grant application deadline is July 1. For more information on AFC’s new grant categories or to apply for an AFC grant, visit www.anglicanfoundation.org/apply.

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According to AFC, there are approximately 20 fundraising teams nationwide. Campaign goals range from $2,500 up to $25,000 and programs include: learning enrichment for newcomers to Canada, support for young people who are experiencing homelessness, music and drama, student bursary funds, youth retreats, and summer camps. 

In the Diocese of Ontario St. Mary Magdalene Anglican Church (SMMAC) in Napanee is currently the flagship team. They launched their campaign with a Say Yes! to Kids and Sing! benefit concert on Saturday, May 7. “More than 80 people came to enjoy a variety of church and community performers singing both sacred and secular music,” says Chris Yeomans, Warden, SMMAC. “With the generosity of our parishioners, people in the community, and a $1,000 match from AFC we have already raised $2,400 towards our $3,500 goal.” 

Yeomans says the church is determined to see youth programs come back from the pandemic stronger than before. “Funds from the Say Yes! to Kids campaign will increase our church’s support for The Heard Youth—investing in some outdoor recreation equipment and helping to subsidize their annual retreat—while also helping to sponsor Morningstar Relief Mission’s High School lunch program.”

For every $10 donated to a Say Yes! to Kids fundraising team, $4 will be shared between youth-focused ministry at the diocesan and national levels. This year the diocesan share of Say Yes! to Kids campaigns will support the Anglican Diocese of Ontario Foundation (ADOF). “In 2021, we partnered with AFC and the Say Yes! To Kids movement with a gift of $5,000 to help fund two youth-focused food security programs in the diocese,” says the Ven. Bill Clarke, Chair, ADOF. “This year, the diocesan proceeds from Say Yes! To Kids fundraisers will help us launch our very own Ontario Says Yes! To Kids Fund. Whether we are helping a young person to live a life of unlimited potential, or break a cycle of hardship, or when our churches need support for their ministry and outreach to young people, we want to be able to say ‘Yes!’” 

Nationally, funds raised through Say Yes! to Kids will support Indigenous youth initiatives that are national in scope, and that complement the transformational work being done at both the local and diocesan levels. Primate of the Anglican Church of Canada and Chair of AFC’s Board of Directors, Linda Nicholls, says, “Our Say Yes! to Kids champions are wonderful examples of sacrificial love and service, showing us in ways large and small how to be adaptable, how to persevere, and how to keep the faith amid uncertainty.” 

For more information on registering a fundraising team for the 2023 Say Yes! to Kids campaign, contact Michelle Hauser at mhauser@anglicanfoundation.org.

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At its November meeting, the AFC Board approved a campaign plan for Say Yes! to Kids 2022, setting a $500,000 goal and introducing an innovative partnership model of fundraising. “Our hope is that this campaign will be both empowering and energizing,” says Dr. Scott Brubacher, Executive Director, “enabling our churches to harness the power of peer-to-peer (P2P) fundraising to grow sustainable revenue streams for youth programs, while connecting them with other churches across Canada, as well as diocesan and national ministries, that are growing a brighter future for young people, today.”

Brubacher says that the 2021 campaign and Request for Proposals (RFPs)—where 79 projects received a total of $470,000 in funding—was a valuable learning experience for AFC. “Grant recipients demonstrated a stunning combination of compassion and creative thinking. They also showed us the depth of relationships that exist between churches and their communities.” Brubacher says Say Yes! to Kids will help to provide the resources needed to strengthen these connections and partnerships so the church can “continue to be a catalyst for re-engaging with children and families in a time of pandemic recovery.”

The Very Rev. Peter Wall, AFC’s Gift Consultant, is excited about this campaign’s potential to attract leadership gifts. “There was, and is, a real appetite among donors to support a community-based movement for youth. We believe a national campaign that is strong in its numbers and coordinated in its approach can connect money to mission in a truly transformational way.” 

Michelle Hauser, AFC’s Development and Communications Consultant says, “Any Anglican parish in Canada with a vision for outreach to young people is eligible to apply to form a fundraising team and campaign alongside like-minded parishes nationwide from April 1 to June 30.” Hauser says teams will be able to set their own fundraising goals, and they will receive support with communications, case development, and training from AFC throughout the campaign. “Teams will also benefit from an AFC-led leadership giving campaign that will boost their efforts, including matching gifts.” 

Those who wish to learn more about Say Yes! to Kids should visit anglicanfoundation.org/say-yes-to-kids to register for an upcoming webinar and download AFC’s campaign FAQs sheet. “I also encourage anyone who has questions to reach out to me directly,” says Hauser, who can be reached at mhauser@anglicanfoundation.org. 

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