The Church offers divine services and pastoral care. Everybody knows that. Yet, offering divine services that everybody can attend or providing individual pastoral care can be quite challenging. Especially when unusual circumstances come into the picture.
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Photo: NAK NRW
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Photo: NAC Singepore
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Photo: NAC Cape
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Photo: NAC Cape
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Photo: NAC Cape
Pastoral care for addicts
The New Apostolic Church North Rhine-Westphalia is currently offering courses to its ministers on how to care for addicts and those at high risk of addiction. A working group is offering courses and seminars on addiction counselling and prevention. The objective of the seminars is to familiarize the ministers with the District Church’s current guidelines on pastoral care of addicts. Three seminars of 90 minutes each are to give the participants an indepth look at the challenges posed by caring for addicts. The organizers are sure that the ministers will in future be more confident in their dealings with people who are affected.
New church in Singapore
Singapore is a trendy and modern city-state in the heart of Asia. There are not many Christian churches there. Several denominations, especially smaller ones, rent premises such as apartments, halls, or hotels to celebrate their services in. Services of the New Apostolic congregation have until now been taking place at the Bayview Hotel. On 5 June the congregation will be moving to the sixth floor of a building called The Verge—a fine address. It is a shopping mall that caters to locals and people from all over the world who visit or stay in Singapore. And this is what our services do too: they serve a very international congregation.
Divine services for Sunday workers
Special early morning services are held for brothers and sisters in the Cape district (South Africa) who work on Sundays. This has been taking place since 2008. These services normally commence at 7 a.m. and last for a maximum of 40 minutes. They are known as Sunday Workers Divine Services and take place at various strategically identified church buildings. There is even a service point at the Cape Town International Airport for the benefit of the staff. Sometimes early morning passengers attend too. Welcome Estate Congregation received a surprise visit from District Apostle Noel Barnes on 24 April 2016 for the 7 a.m. service. Everyone was delighted.