Hello, Everyone!!!

Great news!!! On Saturday, May 16, a letter arrived from the IRS. Credible Faith is now a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, and donations to Credible Faith are accordingly tax-deductible in the US as permitted by law. In addition to that, after a lot of legal reading and examination of different credit card payment processors, I signed up with a credit card payment processor that charges a $10 flat fee per month plus interchange rate (which is actually a good deal), and I completed the coding for the Credible Faith donation page. The donation page is now connected to the credit card payment processor, and so someone can go here and donate to Credible Faith right now. I have SSL encryption for the page, and also built-in form validation, with red for invalid entry and a green check mark if one inputs something correctly, and a privacy policy has been developed and posted on the site. All of this taken together is a huge step, and an important foundation for the future. I can now do ministry at churches, and if someone wants to give on the spur of the moment while listening to a talk, they can go to the Credible Faith website and give immediately. Now, I can also start a significant fundraising campaign and be able to assure potential donors that their donations would be tax-deductible.

Many of the recipients of this email will also see that this monthly email looks significantly different from past ones. I took the time to do much of the coding and media development work for a more polished looking monthly email, and since much of that coding work was a one-time effort, I'll be able to simply copy much of the coding for future monthly emails. In other news, I've developed a bank donation authorization form such that monthly supporters would be able to donate by bank transfer, which would generally be less expensive to Credible Faith than monthly credit card donations.

On the family side, my sister Angela and brother-in-law Joseph have signed a contract for the sale of their home in Morton, IL, and they also have signed a contract for the purchase of a different home in Morton to which they will be moving. My brother Eric and his wife Jill will also be buying a home close to where Angela and Joseph will be living, and both of their homes will be close to the home of my brother Travis; the contract for that house has also been signed. In the end, my three older siblings and their families will all be living in relatively easy walking distance in Morton. In addition to that, we now have a new occupant of the home for now, a little golden doodle whom my brother Eric's boys have loved having here in the house. The dog, whom I call 'M', is a favorite of Silas, the youngest of my brother Eric's boys, whose term for a dog is 'woof woof'.

With much of the coding of the donation form and HTML email done, and other tasks completed, I am now very close to being back in development of resurrection talks and very close to being in full fundraising mode. Credible Faith will need to have a significant band of monthly supporters if Credible Faith is going to fully realize its mission. It's been over nine months since I finished the PhD program and came back to the US; I'm not sure that I realized how much work it would take to get to this point. Setting up a new 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, including coding and developing of a website (and learning how to code in the first place!!!), learning how to use graphic design software for website or other media needs, recruitment of board members, and development of bylaws and organization policies, is no small task. What is good is that I now have a more robust skill set in media and website development and production, and do not have the overhead that other ministries have. If a donor supports someone of a large ministry, some of those donations go to support office staff or other central overhead expenses. Credible Faith does not have many of those expenses, and so would be able to operate on a more lean basis than some big ministries. That, I think, is a good thing.



Sincerely,

Paul

Quote of the Month

A quote from Dr. Corey Miller, who is now president of the Ratio Christi apologetics organization: "For the believer, apologetics creates and reinforces confidence in their relationship with God and gives them more boldness to talk about their faith. For nonbelievers, it challenges their position that faith is blind rather than reasonable. It takes away the smoke screen erected by the non-believer so that they stand bare before God in need of the Gospel." Corey's purpose statement, 'so that they stand bare before God in need of the Gospel", is a good description of the proper place of scientific, historical, and philosophical argumentation with non-believers; it is to help the sinner reach the point of seeing clearly that he stands as a sinner before a holy God and accordingly needs salvation. For more remarks from Corey, click here.