Does your church give a gift or anything to visitors? I am pondering welcome/evangelism. I remember one Christmas Eve I visited a parish out of town gave me a small olive wood cross. I still have it and I think of them each time I see it. 🕯️
Comments
Log in with your Bluesky account to leave a comment
Our church has water bottles that have stuff in it including Starbursts. I think the Starbursts are in there because our pastor likes to eat the rest of the bag of them after he puts them in the bottles.
I received a handmade Christmas card from someone at a 6 person Evensong service last night. The cards were clearly made for their fellow small group members and I was so touched that I received one despite being late and an interloping visitor
Hi Fr. Scott, I kinda fan girled out when I saw your name. 😅We have FDBD available on the table in the narthex now. 🙂 Great idea to include in the welcome bag project. We are a distinctly Anglo-Catholic parish so I purchased bulk rosaries as a sacramental gift for visitors, and brainstorming more…
We have these little gift bags with a cup and a bunch of other various things in them. I always thought we should put a penny in each one and then say "there's money in it!".
Since I left (I was assigned to a different congregation for internship and kept there after ordination) I've noticed quite a few new faces when I've been back.
I was also given a mug 15 years ago and I still use it! It was a college town (I was there for grad school) and even without the gift I was going to attend there regularly.
I think our parish excels in good old fashioned smiles, welcomes, and convo with visitors to listen to them 1 on 1 and invite them to visit again. My charism is sitting with first-timers and sharing my missal with them so they don't get lost trying to flip through the pages of our service book.
TEC in Fairbanks recognized visitors and gave a can of Spam (if you’ve lived in AK or HI, you know) to the visitor from the furthest away. It was memorable
My home United Methodist church used to have someone drop off a loaf of fresh baked bread to first time guests, assuming they left a physical address. We had a woman join our church a couple years later, tears in her eyes, as she recounted what a lifeline that bread was to her as a poor grad student
This is a truly great idea. While I love the bread symbolism and gesture I wonder if a grocery or restaurant gift card may also be an impactful “follow up” since I’m a hit or miss baker 🧑🍳 lol 😂
Comments
And you can find more exciting people to fangirl over than this pamphlet seller. 🤪
I give St. Augustine’s to catechumens! It’s a main stay in my spiritual life since it was gifted to me, as a catechumen, decades ago 🤭🤫