The Duke Endowment

With a theme of “Rebuild My Church,” the 2026 Annual Conference of the Western NC Conference, United Methodist Church (WNCC) explored how churches can use their buildings and land to meet changing community needs.

This article from our Reimagining Church Real Estate series, recently featured on the WNCC website, explores how congregations in Kannapolis and Cramerton, N.C., are transforming underused church spaces into ministries that support caregivers, individuals living with dementia, mental health services and community connection.

Their stories offer practical, low-cost examples of how churches can strengthen their communities by rethinking the role of church property.

Read the article: https://bit.ly/439JlQK

Simple Adaptations to Expand Church Ministries While the notion of repurposing space may conjure up images of expensive renovations, many adaptive reuse projects can be relatively simple. For active congregations, it can be as straightforward as launching a new program to serve the community in an existing, underused space. Where congregations h...

ECU Health has received more than $4 million in grants from The Duke Endowment to expand access to care across eastern North Carolina.

The funding will support maternal health services, school-based telehealth, transitional care for high-risk patients and a new primary care teaching clinic in north Greenville.

Together, these initiatives aim to improve health outcomes, strengthen the healthcare workforce and reduce barriers to care in rural and underserved communities.

Read more about the investment and how it is increasing access to care across the region in a recent article by The Daily Reflector. https://bit.ly/4uWZ5Tv

The Duke Endowment recognizes the importance of child advocacy centers, which use a no-cost, trauma-informed model to support children’s long-term well-being.

Without these centers, children and their families would have limited access to mental health care, forensic interviews and child medical examinations that are vital in detecting and prosecuting child abuse cases.

Learn more about the value of child advocacy centers like Children's Advocacy Centers of North Carolina in this video: https://bit.ly/4dNT3hN

Children's Advocacy Centers: Providing Safety and Help for Abused and Neglected Children Children's Advocacy Centers across the Carolinas provide trauma-foc...