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CAIM Relatives Program

Be one of the 500

The Council for American Indian Ministry of the United Church of Christ invites you to become a relative.

CAIM has 23 American Indian ministries on the reservations of North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Wisconsin and the inner city of Minneapolis, Minnesota. These significant ministries whose struggles are numerous: pastors serving in harsh social conditions, where distance, roads and weather make travel burdensome; people whose incomes are far below the poverty level of others, where unemployment is between 50 and 90 percent; where health care is made impossible because of lack of service and ability to buy wholesome foods. Alcoholism, drug addiction, domestic abuse all play different roles to destroy life affirming lifeways. To address each of these needs, financial support is needed for pastors and programs for congregations and for pastoral education such as that provided by the Eagle Butte Learning Center, a ministry of CAIM designed for the education of pastors and lay leaders on the reservations.

The board of directors of CAIM conceived the CAIM Relatives campaign in order to enlist the financial support of brothers and sisters in Christ  across the UCC. We are seeking 500 individuals or churches pledge a 5 year commitment of $25 per month, or $300 per year. With this support CAIM can make a difference in the lives of the American Indian ministries we serve.

Please e-mail info@caimucc.org for more information or call 612-721-4393.

Letter from CAIM Executive Committee

Greetings,

My name is Mike Goze. I am a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation and the All Nation's Indian Church in Minneapolis, MN. Previously, I served as Chairperson of the Council for American Indian Ministry (CAIM); and currently, I am on the Executive Council of the United Church of Christ and completed my time on the Search Committee for the General Minister and President. Did I mention I have a full-time job at the American Indian Community Development Corporation? I also have a wife and children. Like you, I enjoy my local church family and my personal family. Like many of you, I appreciate the ability to serve in the larger settings of the UCC church. I also appreciate working within my Ho-Chunk nation and in CAIM.

When I served as the Chairperson of CAIM we set some main goals. First was to provide a financial accounting that would give the folks of CAIM an understanding of the revenue and assets of CAIM. Today, we can say CAIM is in much better financial shape. We have trimmed the central operations so that the majority of revenue goes out to CAIM's units of ministry. This is a delicate balance of keeping the presence of an executive director in the larger church body to be the voice and face of CAIM who is validated by the church collegium. On the other side of the scales is realizing all the time that the Units of Ministry are underfunded and folks of our churches are under served. How can the family of CAIM and the family of the whole United Church of Christ balance the scales?

Thus, the idea of a Relatives' Program fund-raising campaign was born. It is through the mutual care of one another that we can thrive and grow as the family of God in the household of the United Church of Christ. I hope and pray that you will read our campaign material and look at our website (www.caimucc.org) for how to become a relative of the CAIM family. Come to the CAIM booth at General Synod and get to know us.

Sherman Alexie, a Spokane/Coeur d'Alene Indian, author of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, writes a fictionalized story of young Arnold Spirit, a reservation son who asked his parents who had the most hope and where he could find hope. A parent tells him you go where there is the most hope and add your hope to theirs and others will add their hope. You add hope upon hope and that is where there is the most hope. It seems obvious.

Our greatest hope of being and doing the ministry God calls us to be is to add our hopes together with yours and strengthen our whole human family. Our prayers is that you will add your hope to ours by joining us in the "Making Relatives" campaign.

Mike Goze
CAIM Executive Committee Member