HOLY CROSS ANGLICAN CHURCH Evangelism and Communications Strategy Department of Evangelism and Communications
Introduction In Matthew 28: 19-20, Jesus said Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. This is our great commission we have been set to achieve as individuals and a Church. Of course, the question is how best we can do this in our modern societies. The answer may not be clear but certain things can be done to evangelize people and communicate the vision & mission of the parish and bring back confidence to those whom have lost hope. Evangelism Evangelism is the preaching of the Christian Gospel or the practice of relaying information about a particular set of beliefs to others with the object of conversion. While in the olden days people would stand at the cross roads and preach the Risen Christ s message to the people in our modern world that seems to be a challenging thing to do. Therefore, a Church needs to find new ways of getting the message to its people and other people using modern technology. Communication Communication (from Latin "communis", meaning to share) is the activity of conveying information through the exchange of thoughts, messages, or information, as by speech, visuals, signals, writing, or behaviour. The modern Church is in need to change the way it communicates with its members by using all available resources to communicate its vision, mission, and objectives to its members and beyond in order to retain old members and gain new members. Link between Evangelism and Communication The church is the hope of the world. As church leaders, we have the responsibility of communicating the greatest message known to humankind; the only message capable of changing a person s entire eternity. The weight of that responsibility is both profound and incredible. It moves us to action, and demands that we communicate it well. 1
Proposed Action Plan The following are mediums & strategies that are proposed for the approval of the Council in order to retain our membership, gain new members and bring back the fallen members. It is to help bring back the lost confidence and hope to our people, the people of God. Mission/Objective: To be a welcoming and nurturing family of faith, by proclaiming the Gospel and sharing in an active faith with those in our community at large. Rational: Baptism calls us to share our faith and to serve God by serving those around us. Action Step 1: Increase communication with current parish community in various ways (Website, newsletters, phones, etc.). Action Step 2: Create a sustained program of welcoming new parishioners, expanding beyond the initial registration. Develop systems for follow-up and contact through the first 2 months after the person has joined. Action Step 3: Explore and develop ways to reach out to those members of our parish who are no longer attending. Action Step 4: Make increased use of technology, enabling us to reach out to the community to bring awareness of church activities, opportunities and religious resources. To achieve this, the following sub-committees within this department will be established or re-established: Welcoming Committee Team Newsletter Editors Team IT/Website Team Home Visits Team 2
I. Reviving the Welcoming Committee (Action Step 2) Welcoming Committees are important in evangelizing because they are able to either make sure that people are welcomed properly which will in turn make those people appreciate the parish and join it. If they fail to welcome people properly then those potential new members would be lost to other parishes or denominations that would appreciate them. Thus, our current way of welcoming our visitors and those who wants to join the parish needs to be reformed with immediate effect. This following is the proposed reform to the Welcoming Committee: Introduce welcoming forms that will be distributed to each person visiting. Sending a gratitude message to all visitors within 2 days after they visited. Phone those who showed interest of joining and ask them to attend Orientation Day, which will happen within 2 months after they have accepted to join. Form template Date: Name: Contact Number: E-mail Address: Physical Address: HOLY CROSS ANGLICAN CHURCH ORLANDO WEST Purpose of Attending (tick the Appropriate Box) Visiting Joining 3
Orientation Day and Welcoming Sunday The following will take place at the Orientation Day: This day should be a Saturday. Invite all those who showed interest to join on their visitors form and relevant Zones and Group representatives. Start the gathering with a prayer. Welcome the potential members. Introduce the potential members to the parish by outlining the history of the parish, policies, etc. Giving few minutes to relevant Zone & Group representatives. Give (if they did not receive them prior this day) them membership forms to fill and sign. Close with prayer. On Sunday, the Rector or Celebrant priest would welcome them formally by giving the new members certificates of membership. By implementing the above, we would have given a proper welcome to the new members and they will feel at home in this parish. A short history and policy document must be compiled for this purpose. II. Saturday Home Visits (Action Step 3) The rector with some parish council members must visit homes. The zone members must lead these home visits. Each zone would be requested to prepare refreshments. We will gather in the morning at the first home and spend at most 10 minutes in each home. We would greet the people, pray with them and the rector would give a blessing to each home. At the last home to be visited, we may have a short Eucharist service to celebrate and give thanks to God for the people of that particular Zone. The Mixed Zone would be done differently because of its vast jurisdiction area. We will organise with them to visit one of their meetings to spend time with them and pray with them. 4
In all the homes to be visited, our task would be to bring to the people a message of hope. We have no doubt that by doing this we would bring hope and confidence in our parish people. This will be done between July and October 2013. III. Introducing a Parish Newsletter (Action Step 1) A 16 pages or so quarterly/half yearly newsletter will be introduced. The purpose of the newsletter would be to communicate news within our parish and beyond. The newsletter will include: Editor s note Rector s Message Parish Council Portfolio article Groups and Zones articles Individual articles Spirituality articles Community news or Politics article Diocesan news Provincial and Anglican Communion news Portfolio, groups and zones will have an opportunity to publish their articles. The newsletter will be on a colour and people will be asked to contribute R20 per person towards its production. It will cost R15 per copy to produce which will give our parish a profit of +-R8 000 a year if all 2 000 copies are sold a year. This will be launched in June. 5
IV. Parish Website (Action Step 4) A parish website will be created within 4 weeks. It will be created by an Anglican Provincial organisation called Growing the Church (GtC). They do not charge any fee for creating the website. However, a hosting monthly fee of R250 is charged. Boipelo Rapudungoane will sponsor the cost of hosting our website for the next 12 months. Should she not renew her sponsorship after that the parish will have to pay for it. The website will be launched in June. It will have the following links/pages: Home Parish history Rectors (Biography and regular messages) Parish Council (Members and their Portfolio Objectives) Groups Latest News (Parish, Diocesan and Provincial) Resources Contact V. Medium/Long Term Strategic Planning Strategic Planning in a parish is a matter which concerns all the departments especially the Evangelism and Communication Department. The purpose of engaging and producing a long term strategic plan is the following: Gather data (Survey) Identify and analyse our problems Set a clear mission, vision and short & long term objectives Produce a parish profile Getting everyone to pull in the same direction Gaining and retaining membership. Everyone interested must be invited to attend the strategic sessions because it will allow us to get information from our stakeholders. 6
Conclusion Implementation is the most difficult part of the planning process. It is actually achieving the goals set out in the plan while remaining alert and flexible to new opportunities as they unfold. All the best missions and strategies in the world are a waste of time if they are not implemented. Therefore, may God help us to plan things and implement them so that we move His Kingdom in this parish into another level. 7