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About Us
Incorporated in the State of Arkansas as of August 28, 2006, Hope
Humanist Ministry is an IRS tax-exempt church. At this time weekly
services, announcements, ordination applications, and daily pastoral
care are managed through the HHM Website and HHM Forum. Doing this allows us to reach the largest number of Humanists possible, no matter where they live. Although we do hope to eventually have a building that will serve as our primary edifice, we will always maintain our web presence as well.
Furthermore, while we do need financial support from our members to maintain our operational expenses, conducting the bulk of our affairs through the Internet allows us to hold down those costs to about 10% of the costs associated with owning or renting a building, utilities, insurance, and more. This means we spend less time on fund-raising and more time on spirituality, education, awareness, and growing our ministry. We will, of course, be conducting fund-raising to help us launch the various humanitarian projects we have planned -- but again, managing these functions through the Internet allows us to keep administrative costs low, thereby leaving much more resources available to actually help those who need it.
Most of the administrative and operational management functions are conducted in New York City, where our Founder and Executive Director, Rev. Maureen Mower, who is also the Senior Pastor of our church, resides. The management of our finances is also conducted in New York City, by Ephraim Mower, who has more than a decade of banking experience, and has served on the boards of several non-profit organizations.
Website design and management, as well as graphic arts and other functions, are handled by Rev. Misty "Nic" Floyd, who currently resides in Hawaii. As our Associate Director and Wiccan Liaison, Rev. Dody Bush-Retherford is our contact person with the state of Arkansas, and helps ensure that our Pagan and Wiccan members are well supported as they explore humanism. Publication and Editing are supervised by Rev. Shirley Lake, out of her New Jersey residence. Rev. Lake is also serving as Liaison to our Atheist and Agnostic members.
Hope Humanist Ministry has two distinct aspects:
• The Church, which handles all spiritual services including the weekly reflections, ordinations, pastoral counseling, and spiritual guidance
• The Ministry, which is responsible for managing and implementing the various humanitarian projects we are planning.
In order to fulfill our mission, we offer weekly reflections on various topics related to Humanism, presented by one or more of our clergy. Members may then reflect on the week’s topic on their own, or use the forum to discuss and debate the issue with other members and with our clergy. In addition, both through the website and the forum, members and clergy can get involved in the projects we plan to implement, and can network with each other to coordinate local projects, fund-raising events, meet-ups, or other humanist-oriented activities (such as cleaning up a park). Some of these member-driven activities will be featured on our website in the future, so please take pictures that can be posted with the news of your event.
In the future, we hope to expand our services to include a youth ministry and youth education program, an online seminary for our clergy, an annual Gathering, and more. We ask your patience and support as we continue to add content to the website, begin implementing our projects, and continue growing our ministry. Finally, we hope you are as excited as we are to embark on this journey of spiritual fulfillment as we work to make our world a better place.
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