Peter E. Matthews (Founder/Chief Executive Officer) Peter is an Itinerant Elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and currently serves as the Founder/CEO of Holistic, Inc. In this position, his primary responsibilities include, but are not limited to: fund raising, life coaching, think-tank organizer, capacity building, and strategic business development.
Matthews received his Bachelor of Arts Degree from Denison University where he had the opportunity to study abroad in both South Africa during the fall of 1993 and France during the spring of 1998. He received his Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary in the spring of 1999. During his formal education, Peter obtained practical administrative experience from working in the 3,000 member St. James AME Church (Newark, NJ), the 6,000-member Bright Hope Baptist Church (Philadelphia, PA), and the 18,000-member First AME Church (Los Angeles, CA) as youth pastor, Executive Minister, and Director of Youth Services & Programs respectively. Each experience would later come to serve Matthews well as he began his trek as the Senior Minister of two congregations.
Peter’s first appointment as Senior Minister came in November of 1999 in Oxford, Ohio (home of Miami of Ohio University) at the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Fifteen new programs during his tenure were added including the construction of an administrative office to transform the church into a seven-day a week institution. He was installed as the first chaplain in the history of Miami University’s Men’s Basketball program and he was also frequently called upon by the city’s newspaper to be an op-ed journalist. During his tenure, the church completed $30,000 in renovations, grew by over 500%, and raised some $260,000. Finally, it should be duly noted that Rev. Matthews also taught African American History at the nationally acclaimed Seven Hills Upper School and was the founding Executive Director of the Love Foundation for the legendary urban radio personality Walt Baby Love. The primary mission of the Love Foundation is to heighten awareness in the African American community on the perils of Cancer and Lupus. During his tenure as Executive Director, Matthews arranged and coordinated concerts with celebrated gospel artists in some of America’s premier churches.
In September of 2001, Peter was appointed to his 2nd church at St. Stephen African Methodist Episcopal in Cincinnati, Ohio. There he continued to pursue his passions of civic engagement and innovative programming by initiating over 20 programs during his tenure. With the support of his church leadership, he oversaw phenomenal spiritual and numerical growth in the church. During his tenure, over $70,000 in past due bills were paid, and the church grew from 22 to 350 members during his tenure. Matthews was selected as the only religious leader on Cincinnati’s Free Store/Food Bank Board of Trustees during the spring of 2003. His weekly column Confessions was read by more than 125,000 people weekly Ohio’s largest African-American newspaper, The Herald. To date, he has published three books including; Confessions: Inside The Soul of A Complex Pastor (2004), and Passin’ The Plate: Offerings of Hope and Healing for Humanity (2005). His current work Envision: Experiencing the World from the Inside Out (2006) is a guided academic meditation of his participation in the first half of the joint MA/PhD program in Ecumenical Studies at the University of Geneva with the Bossey Ecumenical Institute. Envision attempts to introduce the ethic globalization spirituality to “everyday people”.
Matthews, who started at the University of Geneva during the fall of 2005, is the first African American to be admitted and enrolled in the history of the program. As such he is also the inaugural Vinton R. Anderson fellow in the field of Ecumenical Studies. Anderson, a retired presiding prelate in the African Methodist Episcopal and former President of the World Council of Churches, started the fellowship to encourage and foster the study of ecumenism amongst a new generation of African-American religious leaders.
Dr. Taylor Thompson (Co-Founder/Chairman of The Board) – Dr. Thompson currently serves as the pastor of St. John AME Church in Cleveland, Ohio. Dr. Thompson has over twenty-five years of national and international experience in relationship to faith based social entrepreneurship. His doctorial thesis entitled “The Preacher as agent for Economic and Social Justice” has been widely referred in ecumenical circles., During his appointed tenure as treasure of the 30 million dollar Cincinnati Hamilton County Community Action Agency, he assisted in the purchase and renovation of their current 17 million dollar home offices. St. John is the oldest African American congregation (175 years) in the city of Cleveland and the MIT graduate has recently launched the congregation’s largest renovation in their history. Thompson’s responsibilities for Holistic, Inc include, but are not limited to board development and strategic planning.
Renée A. Lunceford (President/Chief Operations Officer) - Renee brings over 15 years of award-winning work in the areas of strategic marketing and brand development, operational analysis, consulting and project management to the Holistic, Inc. team. A graduate of Carnegie Mellon University, Renee’s unique contribution includes handling Holistic Inc.'s day to day operations. She has created a unique training seminar for Holistic Inc.’s HUSTLE program that has already garnered requests for implementation in as far away places as China and Mexico. Renee's primary responsibilities include supporting the CEO's strategic plan for continued growth, ensuring that all goals and objectives are met in addition to efficiently and effectively maximizing the quality of Holistic Inc.'s programs, products and services to meet the needs of Holistic Inc.'s partners and clients.
Denise Woods (Vice President/Chief Financial Officer) - Denise is a retired qualitative research specialist from the Procter & Gamble Corporation, Denise has 26 years of experience in the financial/marketing services industry. She brings a wealth of knowledge in discovering market-based (non-grant) methodologies for non-profits. This University of Cincinnati graduate’s responsibilities include managing the Holistic, Inc’s financial portfolio, human resources management, and producing the necessary deliverables for all of the Holistic’s clients as well as benefactors.