Healthy Congregations In Action

In 2004, the Kansas Bishop of the United Methodist Church appointed the Kansas Area Healthy Lifestyles Advisory Committee to facilitate implementation of the elements of the Healthy Lifestyles Resolution passed by both the Kansas East and Kansas West Conferences.

Healthy Congregations in Action was a pilot project of the Committee. Coordinated with the Health Fund's Healthy Congregations Grants, Recognition, and Retreat programs, Healthy Congregations in Action aimed to work within and through local United Methodist churches to promote healthy nutrition and physical activity habits.

1. Encouragement of self-care
2. Provision of accessible exercise venues and healthy eating knowledge and experiences
3. Development of local partnerships to increase opportunities
4. Increased communication in churches concerning health
5. Development of policies and activities which support and model health
6. Collection of church-specific health behavior data
7. Networking United Methodists who are active in health issues for additional training and support

The first projects of the Healthy Congregations in Action initiative were designed to address these points by developing model programs in pilot congregations across Kansas to demonstrate both the value of and techniques for personal and professional self-care to persons who will in turn pass the word on to others. 27 congregations participated in the 18-month HCIA pilot program, providing detailed evaluation data. The learnings from the HCIA pilot have helped shape the Health Fund's Healthy Congregations Covenant program, new for 2009.

If you'd like to read more about the specifics of the HCIA projects, a compendium of the work plans submitted by the pilot congregations has been compiled and is available here: [Adobe PDF Format]

Related information about HCIA:

Healthy Congregations in Action pilot projects news release

Presentations from HCIA pilot projects launch event, Nov. 4, 2005