Encounters around the world

Every island is a separate district

On his latest trip to the Cape Verde Islands in mid April, District Apostle Rainer Storck travelled from district to district by airplane and boat. There are nine inhabited islands in this island state in the Central Atlantic, some 570 kilometres off the coast of West Africa. The District Apostle visited five this time; three of them for the first time.

Nearly 6,000 New Apostolic Christians live in the Cape Verde Islands. They are spread over 69 congregations. Every island is a separate district, which is led by a District Elder. The distance between some of the islands is big and not all can be reached by airplane. On this trip to Cape Verde—it was his fourth—District Apostle Storck wanted to especially get to know the more remote islands.

Regional Youth Day on scenic Lake Sebu

A scenic lake surrounded by tropical rainforest at the foot of a volcano was the location of a regional youth gathering on Mindanao, the second largest island in the Philippines. Hosting the youth were members who belong to the T’boli peoples.

The T’boli are one of the approximately two dozen indigenous peoples who live in southern Mindanao, a rugged and remote mountain area. More than 30 years ago, three tribal leaders became acquainted with the New Apostolic Church while they were in Manila and brought this faith back to their villages. Today about 3,000 of a total of 70,000 T’boli are New Apostolic.

On 23 and 24 April 2016 they hosted some 600 youth from the area of Apostle Alfredo Pascual for their South Cotabato Youth Day. In addition to sports and games on Saturday, there were also discussions and an evening of music and dance, including the performance of a shadow theatre group. The topic in the divine service on Sunday was “Being a legible letter of Christ”.

Meeting the neighbours

The community centre of the New Apostolic Church Berlin-Brandenburg in Neukölln (Germany) lives up to its name. The orchestra of the district had come together for a rehearsal there on 9 April, a regular occurrence and nothing unusual. Only this time there was a little bit of a difference: for lunch there was Arabic food and 80 guests.

An initiative founded by members of the Berlin-Schöneberg congregation called “Step-by-Step” had invited a large number of refugees with the aim to get to know each other in a relaxed atmosphere. For days, Syrian cooks and bakers were at work preparing Arabic specialties for everyone. The orchestra expressed its thanks by opening the rehearsal and inviting everyone to attend.