Couple’s generous gift launched the Baptist foundation

Life-changing endeavors grow, like the mustard seed of Jesus’s parable (Mark 4:31–32), from seemingly tiny decisions of faith. Just ask Pat Gallier.

When Pat and her late husband Paul (shown above, center) moved in 1977 from Missouri to metro Boston for a temporary job assignment, little did they realize that they were planting the seeds of lives that one day would grow to impact numerous churches and ministries from Maine to Connecticut. In 1993, their generous gift helped New England Baptists launch the Baptist Foundation of New England. As one of the most prosperous regions in the United States, there are many others in New England who have the ability to follow the Gallier’s example.

Paul Gallier, who died suddenly while on a bicycle in 2007, was a chemical engineer for Aspen Tech in Cambridge. He and Pat, a retired hospital nurse who now lives in Northborough, settled in Marlborough after five years in Newton. They joined First Baptist Church of Sudbury and, after participating in short-term mission projects around the region, and making a three-month trip to Melbourne, caught a vision for what might be accomplished if churches were undergirded financially by a sustainable source.

“Paul was taken with the potential for doing Kingdom good when he rolled up his sleeves to help a church” as a volunteer, Pat said.

Kenneth Lyle, then-executive director-treasurer of the Baptist Convention of New England, appointed Gallier the first foundation board chairman. With the Gallier’s seed money, they established endowed funds for New England church planting, church growth/health, evangelism, and collegiate outreach.

Paul had invested wisely and found that they were “blessed by greater resources,” Pat commented. Wanting “to put their money where our heart was,” Pat said her husband “explored ways to give back to God’s work”–in the spirit of Phil 4:15–18–in their adopted home region.

Paul researched ministry endowments and was “amazed,” Pat added, by just how much Southern Baptist state conventions elsewhere could accomplish for the Kingdom of God by giving foundation grants to new churches and innovative ministries–which the BFNE does every year.

Later the couple included the BFNE in their will and encouraged others to do the same, thus making a sustainable investment in New England ministry for years to come.

What became of the endowed gift from the Galliers? Terry Dorsett, the current executive director-treasurer and a former church planter/associational leader in Vermont, reports that their investment–and the generous gifts from many others over the years–has grown to more than a half-million dollars held in a series of endowed accounts.

As of December 31, 2021, the unaudited endowment fund totals are:

Church Planting, $93,690;

Church Growth, $250,580;

Collegiate Ministry, $102,965;

Scholarships, $39,204;

Ministerial Education, $28,655.

That does not include fourteen smaller funds such as the Rice Lodge Memorial fund and the innovative fund that provides for sponsoring one hour ($125) or one day ($3,000) of New England Baptist ministry.

“Reaching New England with the good news of Jesus Christ,” Dorsett says, “is the key to reaching America because of our region’s world-class educational institutions, economic power, and cultural diversity.” He notes that the myriad of requests to give to not-for-profits over and above the church tithe can seem overwhelming, but the BFNE can “help you match your passion to the causes you care about, so you can maximize the impact of your gift for New England, and then for the rest of the nation.”