Pastors'
Consultation on Local Church Research
On
9-10 September 2002, the Pastoral Care Unit of the CCT sponsored
the fourth in a series of seminar-workshop-consultations on
training and encouraging pastors to conduct research into local
issues and needs. As reported in HeRB
2, the results have been mixed. As many as 30 pastors, in
total, have been involved in the process at one point or another.
Nearly all evinced interest. Yet, of those 30 only three have
successfully completed projects, while a fourth is nearing completion
of his church's project.
Another
pastor adapted the questionnaire developed by the students and
staff of the Office of History's student hot season in Phrae
(also see HeRB 2) and had two members
of his congregation conduct the research. Finally, yet another
pastor used the Phrae questionnaire in his own church. That
is to say, this process has led to local research of some type
being conducted in a total of six churches. The results, as
would be expected, are mixed; but this series of events cannot,
in total, be considered a failure. It is not a smashing success,
either.
When
one of the three who fully completed a project of their own
devising was asked to evaluate his experience, he observed that
it had been very helpful. His church is in the unusual position
of being housed on the same compounded as a Korean missionary
establishment, and there have been issues involved in their
relationship, most specifically in the use of facilities and
equipment. The pastor wanted to know how his parishioners felt
about the relationship. He said that the research process helped
him a great deal because it allowed him to learn how his members
felt in a non-antagonist way. When one participant responded
that such research was a good tool for congregational democracy,
this pastor agreed and further noted that it was also a "non-political"
tool. If he had asked for a vote in a meeting with a show of
hands, the members would have felt constrained to see how certain
"phu yai" (big shots) vote and raise their hands accordingly.
The questionnaire, filled out at home, avoided that political
pitfall.
The pastor
who has nearly finished his project picked up on this theme.
The subject of his research is whether the church he serves
should build a new church building. Plans for one have been
in the works for nearly a decade, but nothing has been done
because the issue is controversial. This pastor wants to find
out how his members feel in a way that does not raise tempers
or lead to confrontations. A questionnaire, he stated, that
is distributed to the member's homes is the best way to learn
what he wants to learn without causing trouble. I would further
observe that the process of preparing, reviewing, and distributing
the questionnaire has been entirely a local one, other than
advice the pastor has received in these training events. This
is important, first for the learning experience involved in
using local-based research to address local issues, and, second,
because it lends substantial credibility to the process itself.
However, one group or another feels about the results, they
cannot argue that those results do not reflect the voice of
the church.
None
of the questionnaires involved are professional products, and
even after review in the seminars, they have obvious problems
that limit the reliability of the
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data
on some points. Yet, over all, the questionnaires do reveal
important data that is generally clear and reliable. There are
patterns. The distribution of answers seems typical. The data
gathered by the pastors reflects general trends seen elsewhere
in northern Thai churches. My personal sense is that in all
of these cases locally produced instruments and data, with sufficient
training and some continuing advice, is preferable to that done
by outside professional research agencies.
Local
Research Projects
The
Office of History is currently running two local church research
projects aimed at developing research skills in local church
members themselves. Thra'mu Chitlada Kankaew, a temporary staff
researcher employed with funds provided by the Baptist Union
of Sweden, is working with a research team of nine members of
the Mae Wae Church, District 19 (Karen tribal). Acharn Sukonrak
Panya, our field researcher located in Uttaradit Province, is
conducting a church & community project at Ban Nam Pai in
that province.
The Mae
Wae Project is proceeding generally in the direction
originally envisioned for it by the Office. As conceived, the
project will lead the local research team through a three step
reflection and evaluation process aimed at defining what the
church thinks it would be like if it was "healthy,"
discerning its current state of health, and identifying particular
issues for research and action that will help the church improve
its health. The Mae Wae Church is a poor congregation and more
than half of the congregation is illiterate. It should also
be noted that the village of Mae Wae is entirely Christian,
mostly Protestant but with a small number of Catholic families
living in the community.
Thra'mu
Chitlada ("thra'mu" is a Karen honorific for those
with education") reports that the church has been supportive
of her work and the research team has been generally responsible
and hardworking. She has asked them to conduct interviews with
members, to collect various kinds of data, and to prepare a
questionnaire on what constitutes a healthy church. She says
that her main job has not been to teach the skills needed for
these tasks but to encourage the team and build up its confidence.
The most highly educated member of the team (and the village)
is a high school graduate, who got her degree through the government's
correspondence curriculum. She is impressed with the team's
desire to learn and to do well and their overall commitment
to the research process.
The
Ban Nam Pai was originally designed
to carry out the same set of tasks as the Mae Wae Project, but
for a number of reasons it took on a quite different focus.
Ban Nam Pai is a larger village that includes numerous Buddhist
families as well as families that belong to other churches than
the Ban Nam Pai Church (District 4); and the project conducted
by Acharn Sukonrak has become a community project run by a team
of 12 members of the community. This research team decided that
before it tried to do the multi-stage project described above,
it should do a smaller project directed towards solving a particular
problem. Nearly 70 families in the village raise corn (maize)
and struggle to make even a small profit from their labors,
and the research team wanted to know why. This team has also
been active in collecting data and designed its own questionnaire.
It has shown, perhaps, more of a sense of ownership of the research
process than the Mae Wae team.
The
most important consequence of the Ban Nam Pai project to date,
however, is not directly related to the research project as
such. The community has had a long
39
history
of interfaith antagonism between Christians and Buddhists, a
history of division and mistrust that has made it hard to conduct
community-wide activities. When the church first approached
the larger community with the idea of a community research project,
the idea was taken up with some enthusiasm and led to a series
of community meetings that, in turn, have fostered a new sense
of mutual trust. The Buddhist segment of the community was startled
to see the Christians actually reach out to them and to propose
that they work together on such a project. The mended sense
of trust is now seen in a number of ways, not least of which
is the willingness of the Christians to involve themselves in
specifically Buddhist activities.
Both
of these projects are in their early stages, and it is not clear
where they will lead. They have started well, however, and what
is particularly enlightening and heartening is the serious-minded
desire of local people in both communities to learn research
skills. They do not have to be convinced that basic research
can be useful to them and their communities. They do have to
be encouraged to believe that they can do research for themselves.
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