Location: Hanover FG

It’s All in the Data: Optimizing the Information and Fields Within Your Data to IncreaseYour Annual Appeal Direct Mail Response Rates

Close examination of your data can assist you in the optimization of the direct mail component of your annual appeal. This session offers an approach that blends an understanding of best development and direct mail practice in diocesan appeals. Attendees will walk away with new approaches to a diocesan annual appeal to increase acquisition, retention, and major gifts donors.

Speaker: Kate McDonough Cominsky
Director of Nonprofit Direct Mail Solutions
Cathedral Corporation
Rome, New York

Moderator: Shannon Lee
Director of Business Development
ICSC
Dearborn Heights, Michigan

Kate McDonough Cominsky has been with Cathedral Corporation working with nonprofit, higher education and diocesan annual appeals since 2011. Previously, Ms. Cominsky spent nearly 30 years in higher education enrollment management, sales and marketing management with a Fortune 500 consumer products company, and educational advisory subcommittee work with U.S. Congressman Richard Hanna. Using her experience in higher education and corporate marketing, she has considerable insight into developing unique and creative communication plans for diocesan appeals that push beyond the norm of segmentation strategies of history and level of donor giving. She has presented at ICSC and national and international higher education conferences, nonprofit organizations, and teacher education consortiums.

Location: Regency VI

The spirituality of stewardship is anchored in the sacraments – especially Baptism, Confirmation and Eucharist – but certainly in Marriage, Ordination, Reconciliation and the Sacrament of the Sick. Come and explore how the seven signs of God’s ongoing love for us can make us better stewards of all His gifts.

Speaker: Reverend Joe Creedon
Pastor Emeritus
Christ the King Parish
Kingston, Rhode Island

Moderator: Reverend John Weatherill
Pastor St. John the Baptist Church
Purley, London, England

Reverend Joe Creedon is pastor emeritus of Christ the King Parish in Kingston, Rhode Island. He recently retired after 48 years of priestly ministry, 31 years as pastor of the parish.Author of 14 Advent and Lenten daily meditation booklets, Father Creedon has spoken on stewardship in the Archdiocese of Southwark in London, United Kingdom, the Dioceses of Hartford, Connecticut, Portland, Maine, San Diego, California, and Corner Brook in Newfoundland, Canada. He is a sought-after presenter of Advent and Lenten Parish Missions. Father Creedon was ordained in Louvain, Belgium, in 1968 for the Diocese of Providence, Rhode Island. Along with his distinguished service as a pastor, his priestly ministry has included service as a part-time associate pastor, high school teacher and campus minister. In 1980 he spent a year-long sabbatical as a fellow in psychiatry and religion at the Menninger Clinic, then located in Topeka, Kansas. Father Creedon also served on the ICSC board of directors.

Location: International North

There are many fruits a stewardship parish will harvest when they keep a continual focus on the stewardship way of life, including increases in evangelizing disciples, vocations, spirituality, ministries and offertory, just to name a few! In this session, attendees will learn some methods for best producing these fruits and for utilizing the rewards in order to grow Christ’s kingdom.

Speaker: Mila Glodava
Director of Stewardship and Communications
St. Vincent de Paul Parish
Denver, Colorado

Moderator: Gloria Carter
Stewardship Coordinator
St. Agnes Catholic Church
Naples, Florida

Ms. Mila Glodava Currently director of stewardship and administration at St. Vincent de Paul Parish in Denver, Colorado, Mila Glodava was director of communications and stewardship since 2014. She held the same position for more than 25 years at St. Thomas More Catholic Church in Centennial, Colorado. Under her leadership, along with the pastor, Father Andrew Kemberling, St. Thomas More received numerous awards including Archbishop Thomas Murphy Award in 2007. In addition, working with Socio Pastoral Institute since 2002, Ms. Glodava, who is a native of the Philippines, and Father Kemberling introduced stewardship in her home country. In 2009, she and Father Kemberling co-authored a book entitled, Making Stewardship a Way of Life: A Complete Guide for Catholic Parishes, published by Our Sunday Visitor. In 1969, Ms. Glodava received a bachelor’s degree in education from St. Paul College, now a university, in Manila, Philippines. And in 2015, at 70 years of age, she earned a master’s degree in theology from Augustine Institute in Denver, Colorado. Before coming to the United States in 1972, Ms. Glodava taught English in a Catholic high school in Quezon, Philippines. She and her husband Mark, a former Peace Corps volunteer from New Jersey, have two children and three grandchildren.

Location: Regency VII

Handout:

GP Catholic Spirituality of Stewardship

What Do I Own and What Owns Me? This question is key to the understanding and practice of stewardship as a way of life. Everything that we have, and all that we are, comes to us as a gift from our loving God, the true owner of all things. How do we live this profound spiritual insight? By following the example of Jesus, Mary, and all the saints. By making stewardship a way of life.

Speaker: Dan Conway
Senior Vice President, Pastoral Leadership
GP Catholic Services
Louisville, Kentucky

Moderator: Steve Homiack
Director of Parish Stewardship
Archdiocese of Seattle, Washington

Dan Conway is a leader in the field of mission advancement who has helped redefine the meaning of stewardship in the Catholic Church. Since 1979, Dan has worked with dozens of Catholic dioceses, seminaries, religious communities, parishes, and schools in the areas of planning, communications, stewardship education, and fundraising. He has served as chief development officer for Marian University and three Roman Catholic archdioceses (Louisville, Indianapolis, and Chicago), and has provided consulting leadership for diocesan capital stewardship campaigns throughout the United States. Dan has facilitated strategic planning for more than a dozen Catholic dioceses, religious communities, seminaries, colleges, and universities in the Midwest and South. Dan currently serves as senior vice president of GP Catholic Services, a company founded by the principals of GrahamPelton Consulting to provide professional services designed specifically for Catholic organizations. Dan also provides workshops for Catholic dioceses and seminaries in the United States and abroad. Dan writes a widely distributed monthly article, The Good Steward. He earned a bachelor’s degree at Saint Meinrad College, a master’s degree from Indiana University, and an MRE from Saint Meinrad School of Theology. He and his wife, Sharon, are members of Holy Trinity Parish in Louisville, Kentucky.