Our Beloved Community is in trouble. Unlike the religious institutions that can finance all or some of their operations from enormous endowments, UUSP relies almost completely on pledges of financial support from members and friends. Along with offerings, fundraising and rental income, that’s IT. 



Our pledge drive for the upcoming (2024/2025) fiscal year is wrapping up and – despite the monumental efforts of Pat Fling and her pledge team – the preliminary results are disappointing. Pledge totals for the upcoming fiscal year are not even close to the totals for our current year – and as you may know, we’ve been running (gradually declining) deficits for the past several years. We would need to raise another $22,000 in pledges just to match this year’s pledge income!

But that is not a growth scenario for the Church. Even if we reached our current year pledge levels, we would need to make some cuts to next year’s spending. 

We dream of expanding our religious education program to serve our families – and attract more families. 

We need to provide our newly settled minister with health insurance – and provide fair wages and benefits to our employees. 

And we have so many worthwhile projects to maintain and enhance our beautiful Church building and grounds – an architectural gem on Mirror Lake. In order to achieve these and other goals, we would need around $250,000 in pledges, which was the pledge drive’s worthy target. 

Please consider increasing your pledge if it is at all possible for you – and if you have not yet pledged, please do so as soon as you can. Please let me know if you have any trouble and I will follow up.

As you consider increasing your current pledge (or pledge for the first time) please think about UUSP’s Beloved Community and its place in your life – the spiritual value, the social opportunities and support, and the many ways we band together to work for social justice. That’s all worth SO MUCH to me!

With love,

Ellen ellen.hays@uustpete.org