The Spirituality of Fund-Raising

Henri Nouwen’s brief meditation on fund-raising occupies a curious space in the literature on Christian stewardship. At only 37 pages of actual content, it manages to be both genuinely insightful and frustratingly incomplete. Originally delivered as a talk in 1992, the text retains the warmth and urgency of spoken address while suffering from the limitations of that genre. What emerges is a work that succeeds in re-framing fund-raising as spiritual practice, yet stumbles when confronting the material realities that make such fund-raising necessary.

The Central Insight

Nouwen’s core contribution is his insistence that fund-raising need not be understood primarily as a necessary evil or pragmatic response to financial crisis. Instead, he articulates a vision that is genuinely transformative:

Fund-raising is first and foremost a form of ministry. It is a way of announcing our vision and inviting other people into our mission. Vision and mission are so central to the life of God’s people that without vision we perish and without mission we lose our way... Fund-raising is proclaiming what we believe in such a way that we offer other people an opportunity to participate with us in our vision and mission. (p. 3)

This re-framing is genuinely helpful. Too often, Christian organisations approach fund-raising with an apologetic posture, as if asking for money represents a failure of faith or planning. Nouwen rightly challenges this assumption.

The strength of this approach lies in its theological grounding. When we ask someone to support our work financially, we are not merely extracting resources but offering them a chance to align their material goods with their spiritual commitments. This is sound theology. What makes this re-framing powerful is Nouwen’s emphasis on conversion—not just the conversion of potential donors, but of those doing the asking. Both parties are invited into deeper faithfulness through the encounter.

He pushes this further with a claim that fundamentally distinguishes his approach from mere fundraising technique:

Fund-raising is also always a call to conversion. And this call comes to both those who seek funds and those who have funds. Whether we are asking for money or giving money we are drawn together by God, who is about to do a new thing through our collaboration... "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect." (p. 4)

This mutuality is important. It prevents fund-raising from becoming simply manipulative or transactional. Both parties are invited into deeper faithfulness through the encounter.

The Problem of the Poor

Yet here we encounter the first significant weakness in Nouwen’s approach. While he acknowledges that "the Bible is unambiguous about God’s concern for the poor" (p. 17), he moves remarkably quickly to centre the experience and needs of the wealthy. The transition is jarring:

Sometimes our concern for the poor may carry with it a prejudice against the rich. But sometimes our concern for the poor may carry with it a prejudice against the rich. We may feel that they are not as good as the poor... But nobody says we should love the rich less than we love the poor. The poor are indeed held in the heart of God. We need to remember that the rich are held there too. I have met a number of wealthy people over the years. More and more, my experience is that rich people are also poor, but in other ways. Many rich people are very lonely. Many struggle with a sense of being used. Others suffer from feelings of rejection or depression. (pp. 17-18)

All of this may be true. Wealth does not immunise anyone from human suffering. But the question is one of proportion and priority. In a 37-page booklet about fund-raising—an activity that exists precisely because resources are unevenly distributed—dedicating substantial space to the emotional needs of the wealthy feels like a misallocation of pastoral concern.

The issue becomes more pronounced when Nouwen instructs fund-raisers: "We must have the courage to go to the rich and say, 'I love you, and it is not because of your money but because of who you are'" (p. 21). Again, this may be psychologically astute advice for navigating the complexities of donor relationships. But it risks obscuring a more fundamental truth: we are asking for their money precisely because they have it and we need it for the work of the Kingdom. The relationship is not symmetrical, and pretending otherwise seems dishonest.

Security and Wealth

Nouwen’s treatment of money and security contains both profound insight and troubling gaps. He asks the right questions: "What is the place of money in our lives?... How does having, or not having, money affect our self-esteem, our sense of value?" His exploration of money as taboo—"a greater taboo than conversations about sex or religion" (p. 13)—names something real about how we avoid honest engagement with our material lives.

His theological claim is clear and uncompromising:

What is our security base? God or Mammon? That is what Jesus would ask. He says that we cannot put our security in God and also in money. We have to make a choice. Jesus counsels: "Put your security in God." We have to make a choice where we want to belong, to the world or to God. Our trust, our basic trust, Jesus teaches, has to be in God. As long as our real trust is in money, we cannot be true members of the Kingdom. (p. 15)

This binary is biblical, drawn from Jesus’s own teaching. And Nouwen is right to insist that "only when our security is totally in God are we free to ask for money."

But what does it mean to say our security is "totally in God" while simultaneously managing budgets, payroll, and operational expenses? Nouwen writes from a position of relative privilege—a well-known author and speaker whose own material needs were met by institutions and benefactors. His confidence that "we are free to ask for whatever we need with the confidence that we will get it" feels disconnected from the experience of many small non-profits and churches struggling to meet basic obligations.

This is not to say that Nouwen’s theology of trust is wrong. Jesus does command his followers to seek first the Kingdom and trust that other things will be provided. But the gap between this spiritual principle and the practical realities of organisational leadership deserves more attention than Nouwen gives it. How do we hold together trust in God’s provision with fiduciary responsibility? When is anxiety about funding a failure of faith, and when is it appropriate stewardship? Nouwen gestures toward these tensions but doesn’t adequately address them.

The Practice of Asking

On the practical mechanics of fund-raising, Nouwen is at his most helpful. His emphasis on relationship over transaction is exactly right. "Fund-raising must always aim to create new, lasting relationships" (p. 30), he writes. This is wisdom born from experience. The best fund-raising is indeed community-building; it draws people into deeper connection with a mission and with one another.

His insistence that fund-raisers must examine their own relationships with money before asking others to give is also valuable. Too often, institutional fund-raising becomes professionalised in ways that sever the connection between the asker’s own spiritual life and the ask itself. Nouwen rightly demands integration: "If we come back from asking someone for money and we feel exhausted and somehow tainted by unspiritual activity, there is something wrong" (p. 6).

The section on asking contains one of the book’s most striking claims about accountability and integrity: "Every time we approach people for money, we must be sure that we are inviting them into this vision of fruitfulness and into a vision that is fruitful" (p. 30). This raises an important accountability question. Are we offering people the opportunity to participate in something genuinely life-giving and Kingdom-building, or are we merely perpetuating institutional survival? Nouwen doesn’t develop this criterion sufficiently, but it’s a crucial test for any fund-raising appeal.

Prayer, Gratitude, and Conversion

The final section, on prayer and gratitude as the ground of fund-raising ministry, represents Nouwen at his spiritual best. Here his contemplative depth serves the practical task at hand. He writes with characteristic clarity about the relationship between inner transformation and outer action:

Prayer is the radical starting point of fund-raising because in prayer we slowly experience a reorientation of all our thoughts and feelings about ourselves and others. To pray is to desire to know more fully the truth that sets us free... Prayer is radical because it uncovers the deepest roots of our identity in God. In prayer we seek God’s voice and allow God’s word to penetrate our fear and resistance so that we can begin to hear what God wants us to know. And what God wants us to know is that before we think or do or accomplish anything, before we have much money or little money, the deepest truth of our human identity is this: "You are my beloved son. You are my beloved daughter. With you I am well pleased." (p. 34)

This is the heart of Nouwen’s spirituality—the claim that our beloved-ness precedes and grounds all our doing. Applied to fund-raising, it means that neither the fund-raiser’s worth nor the donor’s worth is determined by the outcome of their interaction. Both stand before God as beloved children, and the fund-raising encounter becomes an opportunity for both to live more fully in that identity.

The emphasis on gratitude as the fruit of this prayerful stance is equally important. "Gratitude flows from the recognition that who we are and what we have are gifts to be received and shared" (p. 35), Nouwen writes. When fund-raising flows from gratitude rather than scarcity or anxiety, it changes the entire tenor of the interaction. The fund-raiser approaches the donor not as a solution to a problem but as a fellow participant in God’s abundant provision.

What’s Missing

Despite these genuine strengths, the book’s brevity becomes a liability. Several crucial topics receive inadequate treatment or are omitted entirely.

First, there is no serious engagement with the structural injustices that create the wealth disparities fund-raising assumes. Nouwen acknowledges that some might question whether wealthy people "made all that money in an honest way," but he frames this as an obstacle to overcome rather than a legitimate concern to address. A more robust theology of fund-raising would need to reckon with questions of economic justice, not merely bracket them as potential sources of "jealousy" or "anger" that prevent us from being "free."

Second, Nouwen’s focus on individual donors means he largely ignores questions about institutional wealth, endowments, and systemic approaches to funding. His model seems to assume a personal, relational approach to fund-raising—which is valuable but incomplete. What about capital campaigns, foundation grants, or donor-advised funds? How does his spiritual framework apply to these less personal forms of resource development?

Third, there is insufficient attention to the power dynamics inherent in donor relationships. Nouwen rightly emphasises mutuality and conversion, but he doesn’t adequately address the reality that donors often exercise significant influence over organisational priorities and decisions. How do we maintain the spiritual integrity of our mission when major donors have expectations or agendas that may not fully align with our vision? This is not a hypothetical concern but a lived reality for many non-profits and churches.

Finally, Nouwen’s treatment of failure—when donors say no, when campaigns fall short, when organisations face genuine financial crisis—is too brief. His confidence that "we are free to respond gratefully" when someone declines to give is spiritually mature but practically underdeveloped. What does faithful fund-raising look like when the money doesn’t come? How do we discern between a call to trust and a signal that our vision needs revision or our organisation needs restructuring?

A Limited but Valuable Contribution

The Spirituality of Fund-Raising succeeds in its modest goal: to reframe fund-raising as a form of ministry rather than a necessary evil. For those who approach fund-raising with anxiety, shame, or resentment, Nouwen offers a more life-giving alternative. His insistence on prayer, gratitude, and conversion as the foundation for asking provides a genuinely spiritual framework for this work.

But the book’s limitations are significant. Its brevity prevents deep engagement with complex questions. Its emphasis on the experience of wealthy donors, while psychologically astute, risks losing sight of God’s preferential concern for the poor. Its confident assertions about trust and provision may ring hollow for those facing genuine organisational crisis. And its relative silence on questions of economic justice and structural inequality feels like a missed opportunity.

What we’re left with is a helpful starting point rather than a comprehensive guide. Nouwen opens up a conversation about fund-raising as spiritual practice, but that conversation needs to continue with more attention to the difficult questions he leaves unaddressed. The spirituality of fund-raising must include not only prayer and gratitude but also prophetic critique, structural analysis, and honest wrestling with the ways wealth and power shape our institutions and relationships.

For those new to thinking about fund-raising theologically, this slim volume offers an accessible entry point and some genuine wisdom. For those with more experience, it provides language and framework for what they may already intuitively practice. But for anyone seeking a thorough theological and practical guide to Christian fund-raising, this book is only the beginning.