ABHMS names Hawaii attorney, social justice advocate Leslee Matthews as Invested Faith Fellow

VALLEY FORGE, PA (01/02/2025)—Invested Faith is a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit fund designed to help churches, institutions, and individuals rethink how faith communities can contribute to healing the world, extending their impact beyond traditional institutional roles. The assets contributed by the donors, called Invested Faith partners, are placed in a growth fund and allocated as small, unrestricted grants to faith-driven social entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs develop businesses that serve as innovative models of faith, community, and justice across the nation.

The Rev. Lisa Harris-Lee, ABHMS’ director of Healing & Transforming Communities, and the Rev. Rothangliani Chhangte, ABHMS’ senior associate for Grants, Partnerships & Strategy Alignment, named Leslee Matthews as an ABHMS fellow in the thirteenth cohort of Invested Faith Fellows. Based in Hawaiian on the island of Maui, Matthews is a staunch social justice advocate who founded and is the managing attorney of Speak Out & Up Law, LLC. She is also vice-president of legal services at The Domestic Violence Action Center and president of the African American Lawyers Association of Hawaiʻi.

Founder of Speak Out & Up Law, LLC, attorney Leslee Matthews, lower left, appears with volunteers from The Living Way Church on the Island of Maui, Hawaii, prior to embarking on clean-up efforts following the deadly 2023 wildfire that destroyed the historic town of Lahaina.

Harris-Lee and Chhangte selected Matthews to become an Invested Faith Fellow at the invitation of the Rev. Amy Butler, founder of Invested Faith. Butler, a life-long Baptist, participated in ABHMS’ 2023 Co-Creators Launch Summit as a part of her book tour. ABHMS further partnered with Invested Faith by funding individual $5000 grants awarded to the fellows to continue their social justice work.

Many Invested Faith fellows are former ABHMS Co-Creators, including Carmelle Beaugelin, Torie Zeiner, Garry Mills, and Calvin Lee and Marisa Prince. Matthews’ selection this year dovetails with ABHMS’ commitment to supporting Maui following disastrous wildfires that ravaged the island in 2023.

Fellows joining the Invested Faith community of social entrepreneurs receive support through the nonprofit’s programming. “The relationships that blossom through the connections are remarkable and lead to new partnerships between Fellows themselves,” said Butler. “Invested Faith is working with faith-rooted social entrepreneurs to imagine a future where people of faith embrace an expansive view of what it means to embody the teachings of Jesus. ABHMS has been an enthusiastic supporter of this vision, enabling prophetic leaders like Leslee to live into their calling to change the world.”

Matthews’ work is guided by Proverbs 31:8-9: “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.” She said: “I really just wanted to have this law firm be able to meet directly with the people who have been historically excluded from receiving services and are thereby left vulnerable. To bring this level of resources directly to the people in need and who have so long gone without legal support, is what’s really special to me.”

She continued: “We’ve been able to bring on some new team members to exclusively work with people that have an inability to pay and design more programs around this work, so that we can help more people. We can have a clinic helping people through our re-entry program, we can have a clinic for survivors of violence, and so on. It gives us greater opportunity to narrow our focus, to be able to better help people in that space. I’m really thrilled to be selected as the ABHMS Invested Faith Fellow.”

She sees being a part of the cohort as a unique opportunity: “I’m so thrilled to be a part of the cohort and learn from the other fellows, to be able to meet with them and hear about their disciplines: technology, education, businesses. Being a law firm that helps people who don’t have the money to pay, we don’t always have loads and loads of money coming in, but I think there’s so much wealth in knowledge and sharing that knowledge.”

Programs such as the Invested Faith Fellows cohort are made possible by the generous support of readers like you. You can support our programs through our website: abhms.org.

By Rev. Dr. Anna Piela, ABHMS senior writer and associate editor of The Christian Citizen