new church life: jan uary/february 2016
China
Tim, the first General Church minister in China, continues beautifully to direct
his student care center. This program supports the poorest areas in China by
offering education and New Church teachings. It has already been three years
since Tim started this program with 12 students and now he has 54 students
under his wing! In addition to the regular academics, they are learning New
Church teachings and English on the weekends. Seventeen senior high school
students are studying in Jiujiang and 37 junior and senior students study in
Quanzhou.
Tim is preparing to open a public church under the name of Swedenborgian
Society as a first step in Jiujiang, where members will meet and worship.
The New Church in China has also been working on translating and
publishing the Writings, as well as uploading them onto the internet. This
year the China New Church published Heaven and Hell and True Christian
Religion, volume one, and is working on translating Divine Love and Wisdom
and Divine Providence. One very exciting development has been a group of
about 300 young people who meet online to discuss the Writings.
In October Rev. Jin visited China and the four cities where New Church
people live. As a result he and Tim decided that there will be an annual
gathering every October to bring these people together to discuss the Writings.
Japan
The Tokyo group, under the Rev. Seiich Sakae, continues to worship twice a
month. The Hokkaido group, under the Rev. Shiro Matsumoto, continues to
worship once a month. Since the Japanese groups are still quite small – in part
due to the fact that fewer than 1% of the Japanese population is Christian –
Japanese ministers and lay leaders have a small group that continues to gather
and diligently discuss ways to grow the New Church in Japan.
One of the best ways this is happening is through translation work. Lay
members, such as Mr. Suzuki’s team, have been working on translating and
publishing the Writings, which they have been able to do without any financial
support from the General Church. The team has translated and published
several books of the Writings and secondary books into Japanese every year.
Korea
The Korean New Church is relatively larger than the other Asian New Churches,
with eight churches and three groups that sustain themselves without financial
assistance for the minister from the General Church. For this reason they have
begun to work on a self-supporting project – called the Korean Project – with
the help of the General Church Healthy Church Match. The goal is to raise $3
million and truly become a self-supporting church model.
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