Being Trauma-Informed in Ministry
Understanding trauma and its far-reaching effects is important in ministry today, adopting a trauma-informed posture can transform the way you offer care and connection.
Below we want to highlight several resources to help you take next steps in learning how trauma shapes experience, and how you can respond with grace, presence, and understanding.
Burn Out & Finding Mental Health Support In Ministry for 2026
This week, we’re naming the heaviness of what it means to serve in a care-based vocation. We hold stories of grief and celebration, navigate complex dynamics, and try to remain faithful in contexts that are often under-resourced and deeply in flux. And it’s hard work.
Our Ministry Forum team is working on something to help in this area — the Listening Support Network - which you can read more about in our companion post. This is an area of ministy we are deeply passionate about and one we’ve talked about before. Below is a post we shared a while back and for this week’s theme of “finding support” we decided to revisit with a few updated resources you can dig into today.
We hope something here will help you tend your own soul, support those around you, and maybe even discern new ways to give back.
Listening Partner Support Network
One of the things we heard in our listening sessions was this sense that ministry leaders are "running around trying to do their best... and they're being forgotten." The people who serve are somehow left out of the serving. There's a divide between the work of ministry and the care of the ministers.
This initiative exists because we believe that divide shouldn't exist. You deserve to have someone in your corner. Someone who will hold space for you the way you hold space for everyone else.
Yes, the Rumours Are True, Google Gives Churches $10K/Month (Sort Of)
Okay, so let’s talk about something you may have vaguely heard of in a hallway at a conference… or maybe even looked into once, got overwhelmed, and promptly closed the tab.
Google Ads.
The Google Ads Grant.
That free $10,000/month thing.
Yes — it’s real. Yes — it’s monthly. Yes — your church probably qualifies.
(Seriously.)
So let’s break it down.
Virtual Front Door - Practical Tools to Start With
This week, we're letting you in on the details of one of the first of four major initiatives that we’ll be launching through the support of the Lilly Endowment. This one is all about digital ministry, and we’re calling it the Virtual Front Porch Initiative. For those of you wondering what small steps you could take right now to improve your church’s website, experiment with social media, or think differently about your digital welcome we’ve gathered a few trusted resources.
Virtual Front Porch Initiative
Here's what we heard over and over: It's not that you don't care about your digital presence. It's that there's already so much to manage. And for many of you, this kind of work just isn't your best gift. (That's okay. Neither am I. That’s why I contracted with Lauren three weeks into the COVID shutdown of 2020 - more about her in a second.)
But here's the thing. Google and social media are the first places people look when they're searching for a faith community. Your church's digital presence isn't just a nice-to-have anymore — it's your front porch. It's where people decide whether to come closer or keep walking by.
Season of Renewal In The Anglican Diocese of Toronto
This week on the Ministry Forum Podcast, we’re hosting a conversation between Rev. John and Rev. Canon Dr. Judy Paulsen.
Judy is an Anglican priest who has spent years teaching, preaching, and leading across a variety of church and academic settings, always with a heart for equipping the church in its witness and worship. In 2024, she released her latest book, A New and Ancient Evangelism: Rediscovering the Ways God Calls and Sends, which explores how we can recover timeless practices of faith and mission in our current moment. She now serves as the coordinator of the “Season of Spiritual Renewal” for the Diocese of Toronto.
Canada’s Theological Schools Are on the Move… and We’re in Great Company
When we shared that Knox College had received nearly $1 million USD from the Lilly Endowment’s Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative, we hinted that this was part of something even bigger. So let’s zoom out for a second, because what’s happening here isn’t just about us. Thirteen Canadian theological schools received substantial grants through the 2025 round of Pathways funding
If We Had A Million Dollars… wait, we do!
“If I had a MILLION dollars…” Wait… I DO!
What?! Read on, my friend.
I’ve been wanting to share this news with you for a while now. I’ve been bursting to tell you! You know how I keep saying "you are not alone"? How the Centre for Lifelong Learning at Knox College exists because we believe no ministry leader should face their calling in isolation? Well, here's what happens when other people start believing that too.
How To: Share The Stories Of Your Congregation
What if you could show people the life behind the numbers? What if, instead of just stating that “85 people attended the Easter sunrise service,” you also shared the story of one woman who found deep comfort in that gathering after a hard season of grief? Now that’s a testimony. That’s a window into the Spirit at work.
That’s why we want to encourage (and resource) you to share the stories behind your church’s ministry. Whether you use a video interview, a print out, a live testimony or a slide show, storytelling brings your ministry to life in a way data can’t.
A Deeper Way to Connect: What I Learned from Amber Johnson
Amber offers a two step plan to connect more deeply with your loved ones, work colleagues, and new acquaintances. And, you know what, it might also make you feel less alone despite the multiplicity of connections you may have.
Tell Stories that Bear Witness To Your Numbers
It’s the start of Annual Meeting season both in the non-profit and church world. It is where, despite how many words may appear in an annual report, the numbers reign supreme - in most contexts!
But if you’d like to change that dynamic… I’d encourage you to fight the powers and principalities by crafting a narrative budget or a pictorial slide show of the life of your ministry or tell stories and share testimonies, or why not just do all of it?! Celebrate.
Winners Announced: 2025 New Subscribers Contest
We had 12 people from Central sign up for the Ministry Forum email list—12! From one congregation! That’s amazing, and we’re so thankful to each one of you who newly subscribed in the months of November and December.
New Models for Ministry in 2026?
I’m often in spaces where people are wondering about new models for ministry. Here is one area I’ve been thinking a lot of about…
Theology In The Margins
A free, fully virtual event where we’ll be exploring what it means to think about theology from the perspective of people and places often left out of the conversation. It’s for anyone who cares about faith, justice, cities, and building community. No degrees required - just curiosity and openness.
Becoming Intercultural - Online Learning Journey from the PCC
In February 2026, the PCC’s Intercultural Office will launch Becoming Intercultural, the first in a new three-part online learning series designed to help participants grow in intercultural awareness and engagement. This 8-module course This 8-module course introduces key concepts like cultural humility, unconscious bias, and intercultural communication. The material is grounded in a theological framework and supported by stories, reflection questions, and practical tools.
Pet Ministry - It’s a thing!
I recently learned of a new book that celebrates this ministry and offers some amazingly practical advice and ideas for integrating this outreach to pet people and their animals. It’s called, New Tricks: How Pet Ministry Can Transform Faith Communities and Change Lives by pastor Betsy Singleton Snyder and longtime animal advocate Gayle McKuin Fiser.
Growing and Maintaining Hope in Uncertain Times
It's getting harder and harder to maintain hope in our world. As many of us grow more skeptical about the possibility of change, leaders in many spaces are compelled to continue to preach hope, to hold hope, to model hope. How do we do it? Is hope even practical? Join us as we explore the intersection of faith, hope, and justice, and dive into Hope Theory to learn together how to grow and foster hope in ourselves and in those we lead.
Ministry Forum Wrapped 2025
As 2025 draws to a close, we’re celebrating a year of growth, connection, and faithful engagement across the Ministry Forum community. From a 200% increase in site traffic to deep conversations around spiritual care, creativity, and land stewardship, the data affirms what we’ve sensed all along—ministry is diverse, dynamic, and deeply needed. This year-end reflection offers a snapshot of what resonated, what surprised us (hello, Bible Study Printables!), and why we believe the strength of Ministry Forum lies in the web of connection we’re building together. Join us in looking back with gratitude—and ahead with hope.
Theology from the Margins: Laidlaw Lectureship 2026
Coming up in January 2026, the R. Laidlaw Memorial Lectureship will feature South African theologian and activist Dr. Stephan de Beer, along with the work of the Centre for Faith and Community at the University of Pretoria.