Do you know about Theological Education Sunday, more commonly known as Theological Education Offering (TEO) Sunday?  For many years one Sunday a year has been designated as an opportunity for the entire church to invest in its future ordained leadership by dedicating parish offerings for theological education support.    
 
In 1976 the 65th General Convention requested parishes and missions to continue to annually set aside a Sunday as Theological Education Sunday and urged setting a goal of 1½% of their budgets for financial support of theological education.  This resolution, reaffirmed and refined in four subsequent General Conventions, most recently in 2006, now calls for a 1% guideline with the first Sunday in February designated as Theological Education Sunday.      
 
Despite TEO Sunday's history of more than 30 years, limited attention has been paid to TEO Sunday on a church-wide basis. The outcomes are predictable.  The financial challenges of our seminaries and seminarians would be vastly diminished if the church had heeded General Convention's wisdom in focusing on supporting theological education and the formation of her future ordained leaders.  
  
Tom Peters, author of In Search of Excellence and CEO of the Tom Peters Company, offers a business improvement tool based on characteristics drawn from his obsession with understanding contemporary business excellence. A primary question of Peters' "Excellence Audit" should make us realize that the church's persistent emphasis on theological education support is laudable: "Is the organization focused on finding, nurturing and making the most of the talent it needs?" 
 
Your support of theological education enables "finding, nurturing and making the most of the talent" The Episcopal Church needs to achieve organizational excellence.  TEO Sunday calls for our engagement with the church's future.  

This TEO Sunday please give to support an Episcopal seminary, or if not a seminary, please support our seminarians, our future ordained leaders, by giving to SIM www.simministry.org, whose ministry for over 150 years has been to "find suitable persons for the Episcopal ministry and aid them in acquiring a thorough education."  

Faithfully,

Tom Moore
Executive Director
SIM

PS.  Clearly, in light of the horrific tragedy in Haiti, donations to ERD https://www.er-d.org/index.php address today's most hurting part of Christ's body.   Please also realize that ordained leaders, such as the former rector of my home parish in Tennessee, was on mission in Haiti on the day of the major earthquake.  Contributing to theological education is another avenue of meeting the world's needs of the future.