Questionnaire to your pastors
1. How is your church reaching out to new immigrants?
2. What are you using as a means of communicating the Gospel to new immigrants? (Alpha program/ hospitality/ investigative Bible Study/ other tool?)
3. What has been successful?
4. Can you describe any other approach that you've found effective?
5. In your opinion, what are the difficulties in reaching out to new immigrants?
6. What do you think would be helpful to your new immigrants ministry if it were available? [eg. a resource, tool, training material, etc.]
Questionnaire closes Nov 12
Labels: church reaching out to immigrants, new country new life, opinions, Questionnaire, successes
posted by Shirlock @ 10:47 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
1. Not actively.
2. We tried to offer an ESL small group, but did not have enough interest to start it.
3. Well, of the very few things we tried in our church's history, having a bilingual pastor was probably the most effective.
4. In my observations, the churches that seem to draw new immigrants are either: a) a new immigrant church where they connect with other new immigrants (in other words, very limited in focus), or b) a multi-staffed church with at least one quasi-new immigrant pastor (at least someone who was familiar enough with the culture and context to help new immigrants adapt to living in Canada).
5. It seems that new immigrants are looking for a safe place - which they naturally assume to be with people who they are familiar with (same ethnic background). However, I have seen occasions where a "Canadian" church (i.e. caucasian) is able to reach out to new immigrants through genuine friendships and services (e.g. daycare) that help new immigrants get acclimated to North American living.
6. Not sure. I think pastors of new immigrant churches seem to have a much better understanding of what resources speak to their congregation.
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