Rick Warren Asks Saddleback for $900k, Receives over $2.4 million!
- Posted on January 04, 2010
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- (18) comments
It all started last Wednesday when Rick Warren posted an urgen plea on the Saddleback Church website: "THIS IS AN URGENT LETTER unlike any I've written in 30 years. Please read all of it and get back to me in the next 48 hours."
In the letter to the Saddleback family, Warren asked the church to help make up for a year-end $900k shortfall.
After a media and blog firestorm, an update to the initial post was made, giving some additional clarification:
BACKGROUND: The cause of our financial shortfall was NOT a management issue but simply by the way Christmas occurred in this year's calendar. After 10 packed Christmas services, and with Christmas Day on Friday, many people were out of town or too tired to come back for weekend services, so the unusually low attendance created an unusually low offering. That is understandable
MEDIA: Because our church attracts a lot of attention, the media will undoubtedly report my letter- but only partially, not telling the whole story. It is likely that none of the positive end-of-the-year reports of your service to the community and none of your amazing accomplishments as a church family in 2009 will be reported. They may get some facts wrong or even misjudge our motivations. I know this is frustrating, but don't let it bother you.
According to the LA Times, Saddleback brought in more and $2.4 million dollars as a result, since last Wednesday. Rick announced the total at services over the weekend, and confirmed that this was the amount that people had turned in so far in person, and did not include many other donations that had been mailed. Warren used the occasion to preach a message on 'Radical Generosity'.
Here's more from the LA Times story:
“I wasn’t surprised by this offering, as Saddleback is famous for radical generosity,” Warren said during tonight's service.
Warren represented the total with a display that included 24 parishioners rising to represent $100,000 each, said spokeswoman Kristin Cole. Virtually all of the individual donations were for less than $1,000, according to the church, she added. More donations remain to be counted.
The church has launched similar appeals before, raising $1.6 million for victims of the 2004 Asian tsunami and $1.7 million for victims of Hurricane Katrina, which struck New Orleans in 2005.
“I say without fear of contradiction that I don’t know of a more generous church,” Warren said in a news release.
The church does not release comprehensive information about its budget -- or even a budget total -- so it’s difficult for those outside the leadership to get a clear picture of church finances.
The church was never in danger of going under, Cole said. But without the infusion, the church would not have been able to accomplish its ministerial work as planned, she said.
Like other charitable organizations, Saddleback has had to do more with less, even as it expanded its work in some areas, Cole said.
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JOB on Mon, January 04, 2010
To whom it may be concerned,
I called Saddleback and asked if they released their request to the media, they said they did not. All this attention was solely on the request Rick Warren made on his News with Views website, the media ran with it. So really this is much to do about nothing. The church needed money and asked for it from their people. That’s been happening for 2000 years. Also read the enitre request, they had a shortfall because of low attendance Christmas Sunday, not because of poor management. Anywho a few things troubled me about this story but not worth following a comment thread or even stating here, have fun pouncing on each other, I’m out.
Anonymous on Tue, January 05, 2010
They did vote on whether they felt the program was worth while (enjoyable) by their giving! Most average churches that have problems with what leadership is doing will not emphatically bail them out at the ninth hour because of so called poor planning. They did so because they are obviously in a better position to measure the results and voted…voted…voted with their generous giving!
Jordan on Sat, January 09, 2010
I am a little confused by how you can be in ministry for over 30 years and not look at the calendar and realize that with Christmas on Friday, church attendance/giving is going to be way down on Sunday. When my church budgeted for this year we didn’t even include the last Sunday of the year in order to guarantee margin. Christmas is always on December 25th and calendars are always readily available to be able to look ahead. Anyone in ministry could tell you how this scenario was going to play out.
Plus, if they’re thrown into a deficit because of one bad week, they’re essentially living “paycheck to paycheck”. A church of this size should know to create much greater margin in a budget than just one week.
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