For the past 20 years, the Boston Women’s Fund (BWF) has been the only foundation in northeastern Massachusetts to exclusively support community-based organizations run by women and girls. BWF funds low-income women, women of color, lesbians, women with disabilities, older women and girls who are working to create a society based on racial, social and economic justice.

As a result of the initial findings, BWF now wants to do more focused research on the giving of faith-based, African-American women in Boston who make significant financial contributions to churches or other religious institutions. It would seem that the primary reason for giving to their religious institutions was because of the long-term relationship-building that had taken place. Over time, these relationships result in a mutuality of trust and respect as equal partners in giving. In turn, their practice of giving becomes an act of “faith.” This commitment of giving to churches is corroborated by other studies. In 1999, Ariel-Schwab conducted a study and found that African-Americans gave $4.8 billion to churches in that year.