In the News
News, Essays, Podcasts and More
about the Work of Invested Faith
Read “what they’re saying” about Invested Faith
Good Faith Media, January 25, 2024
Are Social Entrepreneurs the New Church?
In the context of the changing church, the Holy Spirit appears to be moving outside the church’s doors into the community. From the work of social entrepreneurs to protest marches, the evolving church can now be seen in neighborhoods and streets. Churches following the Holy Spirit’s lead are discovering new opportunities to engage and love their neighbors.
The Invested Faith social entrepreneurs are doing just that.
Baptist News Global, May 25, 2023
New documentary series shows how churches that close can keep ministry open
Invested Faith will premiere a mini-documentary series to inspire closing churches to donate assets to help social entrepreneurs bring about change in the communities they serve.
The faith-based organization launched by Amy Butler announced the first video in the series focuses on Tiffany Terrell, founder of a nonprofit mobile grocery business that uses buses to deliver healthy, low-cost vegetables, meats and other commodities to food-desert communities in Southwest Georgia.
Presbyterian Outlook, May 17, 2023
Invested Faith Announces 7th Class of Fellows
“A seventh class of faith-rooted Fellows has been named by Invested Faith. These five social innovators are working to address systemic issues of injustice in their communities while building a sustainable financial model. Each Fellow receives a $5,000 unrestricted grant and an invitation to tell their story through the Invested Faith community and website.…”
Maui News, May 26, 2023
Pahukoa named Invested Faith Fellow
Maui resident Kamaile Pahukoa, creator of the Ke’anae Market at Ke’anae Congregational Church, was named as one of five faith-rooted Invested Faith Fellows.
Baptist News Global, November 28, 2022
Latest Invested Faith Fellows Range from Mobile Grocer to Beekeeper
Five social innovators have been recognized by the new nonprofit Invested Faith with $5,000 grants and an invitation to tell their stories nationwide. Invested Faith, founded in 2019 by Baptist pastor Amy Butler, seeks out faith-rooted social innovators who are working to address systemic issues of justice in their communities while building sustainable financial models.
The Christian Citizen, July 27, 2022
“In 2019 I started a donor-advised fund called Invested Faith. What follows is the story of how Invested Faith was born, and why a pastor like me, who barely passed my one required college math course, would ever try something as crazy as starting an investment fund.
Any faithful church member or pastoral leader paying attention these days has some level of concern about the decline of the institution of the church. I am among that group, and I’ve been thinking about this intensely since I first became a pastor in 2003 at the historic Calvary Baptist Church in Washington, DC.”
Baptist News Global, June 13, 2022
Invested Faith Announces Fourth Class of Fellows
The 17 grant recipients chosen to date are a diverse group of young innovators working in a variety of fields. “In these moments when hope seems hard to come by, meeting these fellows and learning about their work sustains and encourages me,” said Butler, currently interim senior minister at National City Christian Church in Washington, D.C.
Washington Post, April 15, 2022
How money from dying churches could breathe new life into communities by Marisa Iati
“Invested Faith is founded on a different approach. Redirecting money from struggling churches to entrepreneurs focused on social justice, Butler said, is a way of embracing the abundance of God. It’s also a way of ensuring that those institutions leave a legacy,”
“From a spiritual and community standpoint, placing assets with Invested Faith would optimally be a shared decision made to celebrate the past witness of a congregation,” she said, and to ensure “the work of faith that congregation has held so dear for so long continues” even after “the life of the institution comes to an end.”
CueCast, May 18, 2022
Pastor Amy Butler on CueCast podcast
Pastor Amy Butler discusses the power of communication as we seek to lead people through the communities of faith we serve
Baptist News Global, April 4, 2022
The Temptation of a Single Story by Dr. Amy Butler
“So with all the love, respect and experiential understanding I can muster, I want to say to all of us people who deeply love our faith institutions just as they always have been, forever and ever amen: With increasing desperation we are telling a single story about the institutions that have guided and housed our faith practice for so long.”
Good Faith Media, February 11, 2022
Good Faith Weekly Chats with Dr. Amy Butler,
Podcast with Mitch Randall and Autumn Lockett
Baptist News Global, January 28, 2022:
Invested Faith announces third round of Fellows and new partnership. By Mark Wingfield
In less than a year, the new Invested Faith organization has issued three rounds of grants to faith-influenced social innovators, bringing the total number of recipients to 13 The work of these social entrepreneurs is filled with hope. To come alongside and support them in their efforts is a true honor and, I believe, the holy work of faith institutions in this moment,” Butler said.
Good Faith Media, July 23, 2021:
Invested Financial, Moral Capital Beyond Stained Glass Walls by Zach Dawes, Jr.
In a culture in which institutions of faith are closing their doors at an alarming rate, the church in America stands to lose significant assets that have served communities in countless redemptive ways,” Butler, an ordained Baptist minister who is currently serving as the intentional interim senior minister at National City Christian Church in Washington, D.C., told Good Faith Media.
“Instead of spending down assets and closing the doors in sad resignation, what if we were to hold out our assets, believing that God’s work in the world continues, and the legacies of our communities live on as we make possible the work of social entrepreneurs imagining gospel in new ways?”
Corsicana Daily Sun, July 30, 2021
Corsicana Entrepreneur Awarded Grant
Invested Faith announced the inaugural round of grants of $5,000 to five social entrepreneurs, including Dr. Alysia Nicole Harris, of Corsicana, who is restoring the East Side Chapel, a historically significant Black church built in 1905.
"Dr. Harris’ efforts are grounded in the belief that the thriving of a community requires creative preservation of its stories of the past. In historically Black worship spaces, past meets future in the craft and enterprise of community artists and storytellers," said Rev. Dr. Amy Butler, founder of Invested Faith.