Passionate Steward - 10th Anniversary Edition

84 THE PASSIONATE STEWARD
ask, “Then why would the Church use it?” The rationale is simple,
and regrettably, the Church has fallen for it: the gift chart allows an
organization to easily, quickly and efficiently estimate the maximum
amount of money that may be available to it through the minimum
effort possible.
How does the gift chart method work? First, a table is
assembled based on a decades old “expert” assumption about how
much money a parish of a given size might reasonably seek to raise.
In the following chart, the goal has been set at $500,000, and it is
estimated that it would take a parish of between 100–200 families
to reach that goal. The rest of the chart is simple arithmetic. The gift
chart implies that to raise any sum you must first find a single
household to provide 20% of the goal. Then another three
households must be found to provide another 30% of the goal; five
more to provide another 10% (theoretically the amount raised is
now at $300,000 or 60% of the goal from only nine households);
and finally, an undetermined number of households are required to
give smaller gifts until the parish reaches its target.
A Sample Essential Gifts Chart
(For A Goal of $500,000 / A Church of 100–200 Families)
Size of Gift # Needed Cumulative Total
$100,000 1 $ 100,000
$ 75,000 1 $ 175,000
$ 50,000 1 $ 225,000
$ 25,000 1 $ 250,000
$ 10,000 5 $ 300,000
$ 5,000 10 $ 350,000
$ 3,000 25 $ 425,000
$ 1,000 50 $ 475,000
Below $ 1,000 Many Goal Achieved