HISTORY OF THE COUNCIL

The Inter-Church Council of Greater New Bedford is one of the oldest continuing inter-denominational ecumenical organizations in the Northeast United States. The Council serves the ethnically and culturally diverse population of the New Bedford area, the fourth largest city in Massachusetts. New Bedford experienced great prosperity in the mid to late nineteenth century but has been declining economically since the early twentieth century. Since its founding in 1765, New Bedford was outside the influence of the religiously restrictive governance of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The early settlement was dominated by Quakers but welcomed Baptists, Methodists, Jews and other forced out of the Bay Colony. The Greater New Bedford community has a history of religious tolerance and diversity and presently is home to 73 Protestant Churches, 36 Catholic Parishes and 2 Jewish synagogues serving close to 175,000 people.

The Inter-Church Council was originally founded as the "Federation of churches and Christian Organizations and Workers in New Bedford and Vicinity" and later became known as the New Bedford Council of Churches. The Federation merged in the spring of 1939 with the New Bedford Council of religious Education and the Inter - Church Council was created with 15 founding member churches. The constitution of the new organization declared the mission of the Council to be: to engage the churches of the area, commonly interested, in rendering such Christian service as can best be done cooperatively; and to promote in the community such subjects, educational, moral, social and spiritual, as will attain that end.

During the 1940's, the Council grew adding member churches and establishing committees on Social Action, Christian Education, Youth and Special Projects and in 1944 hired a paid executive secretary. The Council incorporated in 1955 and had 28 member churches by this time. By 1957, the Council had purchased a building for its permanent home and had 49 member churches, 13 of which included support for the Council "streamlined." Goals for 1963 were articulated at the Annual Meeting: Local Ecumenicity, Long Range Planning, Faith and Order, Ministry of the Laity and Crumbling the barrier between the Roman Catholic and Protestant Churches.

In 1965, during the ferment at the beginning of the Civil Rights era, the Council acquired grounds for a Conference Center which became the setting for ecumenical Catholic-Protestant meetings and discussions about the role of the Church in housing and in the war on poverty. Other forums on law enforcement, individual liberties and civil rights were held in 1966. The land was later sold.

In 1967, the council formed a new non-profit housing corporation, known as the Inter-Church Council Services Corporation, to build and administer a middle income housing project for retired people. The New Bedford Redevelopment Authority designated the new NPO as developer of an 8 acre air-rights site over roads and parking and a mixed use complex of elderly housing, office and retail space was built. In 1972, a Pastoral Counseling Group was started, to provide inter-faith counseling services for the community. This initiative grew into another separate non-profit corporation by 1977. 

By the early 1980's, the Council had conducted a major reassessment of its mission initiated prior to the death of its executive secretary of 20 years and leading to a search for an executive minister to provide enhanced leadership. Programs, real estate holdings, future directions and the need to focus on ministry in a metropolitan center were evaluated. Funding from the State Department of Mental Health (DMH) allowed the Council to open a Drop-in center as well as providing fiduciary services for de-institutionalized mental patients. In 1983 and 1984, two more non-profit housing corporations were initiated, Inter-Church Council Elderly Housing, Inc. and Inter-Church Council Realty Corporation bought and leased two half-way houses for de-institutionalized mental patients under a contract from DMH.

The untimely and unexpected death of Executive Minister, Lawrence Van Heerden in June 1991, brought about another intense period of introspection at the Council. An Envisioning / Search Committee was formed and produced a lengthy report on the organization and its goals, including the following mission statement:

The mission of the Inter-Church Council of Greater New Bedford is to be a cooperative vehicle for the expression and manifestation of the religious values of its member groups, relating the use of their resources and energies for encouraging collaborative spiritual, educational and social opportunities for the members, assisting members in meeting their particular needs and acting as a channel for community outreach to promote ecumenical cooperation, social and racial justice, service to those in need and to address other public issues.

This new mission statement was deliberated at a convocation in 1992 and was developed in recognition that the primary focus of the Inter-Church Council is three-fold: to serve individual needs of its member groups; to connect them with one another and to work on their behalf in the larger community. Part of the most recent re-envisioning was inspired by a desire of member churches to return to the Council's founding principles of ecumenicism and cooperation between member churches and to reduce the focus of the Council on administration of publicly funded social service programs. Another part was to reduce the "top-heavy" administrative structure dominated by the Board and the Executive Committee in isolation from the member churches. Finally, the new mission statement recognized the need to refocus on ministry in order to address concerns for social justice, religious celebration and spiritual growth. From 1997 to the present, the Council has experienced tremendous growth in service to its forty-five congregations and to the wider community across the Southcoast, including the City of New Bedford and the Towns of Acushnet, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Freetown, Marion, Mattapoisett, Rochester, Westport, and Wareham. 

Executive Ministers of the Council  

 The Reverend Sydney Adams

Lawrence Van Heerden

The Reverend John Douhan

The Reverend Dr. Edward R. Dufresne

The Reverend David A. Lima