Frequently Asked Questions

1. How can I get involved?

2. How does physically expanding in Chinatown fit the vision? Why not expand into the suburbs where most of the Chinese live?

3. Given that Chinatown is a good location to minister, why do we need a new and larger building?

4. Why can’t we just continue to rent space as we have been doing?

1. How can I get involved?

If you would like to participate in this capital stewardship campaign through your time and talents, there are three easy way to contact us.

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2. How does physically expanding in Chinatown fit the vision? Why not expand into the suburbs where most of the Chinese live?

If reaching the Chinese in the Boston area is our primary goal, the location of the church building is of strategic importance. There are a number of factors that favor expanding in Chinatown.

A. Chinatown, as the population and cultural center of the Chinese community, provides the best opportunities for outreach.

Most Chinese in Massachusetts live in the city of Boston or near the city of Boston. In fact, 50,000 Chinese, or over half the Chinese population in the state, live in six cities and towns: Boston, Quincy, Cambridge, Malden, Newton, and Brookline. The city of Boston has the largest population of Chinese in the state at over 20,000. Over 5000 Chinese live in Chinatown. The number of residents in Chinatown is growing because of new housing developments that have been completed recently as well as others being planned. The Chinatown residents are also becoming more diverse ethnically and economically. Furthermore, the other five cities are all adjacent or very close to the city of Boston.

A church building located in Chinatown would be very accessible to most Chinese in the Boston area either by walking, public transportation, or by car. Those living in Chinatown or near Chinatown can walk to church. This is especially important for low income and elderly residents of Chinatown. Most of the college students in the area, as well as those without cars, can come to Chinatown by way of public transportation. The Orange Line, Silver Line, Red Line, and Green Line all feed into the downtown area and Chinatown. In addition, Chinatown, being at the crossroads of two interstate highways, is very accessible by car. Even those who live in Rhode Island and New Hampshire can drive to Chinatown in a reasonably short period of time.

Though most Chinese in the Boston area live outside of Chinatown, Chinatown is still seen by most as the cultural center of the Chinese community. Most Chinese in the Boston area know where Chinatown is and have visited there because it has the largest concentration of Chinese stores and services in the Boston area. Though there are growing numbers of Chinese businesses in the suburbs, many still like to come to Chinatown to utilize the restaurants, grocery stores, bakeries, hair salons, health care, or other services. This is not surprising since nearly 70% of Chinese in Massachusetts are foreign born and have a strong affinity to the Chinese culture. That is also why most Chinese social service and cultural organizations are based in Chinatown. Many have recently shown their long term commitment to the community by building new facilities in Chinatown. Even American born Chinese are attracted to Chinatown because of the food and the culture. Our church’s recent history has shown that even with a larger facility in Newton and easier parking, people in our church have overwhelmingly preferred to worship in Chinatown.

If the church’s long term goal is to reach more Chinese Americans for Christ, then expanding in Chinatown can take advantage of the fact that Chinatown is the population and cultural center of the Chinese community.

B. Chinatown has a need for more spiritual resources.

Chinatown is the population and cultural center of the Chinese community. The businesses and services in Chinatown serve not only those who live in Chinatown but also those who come to Chinatown. Yet there are only two evangelical Chinese churches located in Chinatown. This is different from the situation in New York’s Chinatown, for example, where there are many Chinese churches. In fact, the entire city of Boston, which has the largest Chinese population of any city in Massachusetts with over 20,000 Chinese, has only four evangelical Chinese churches.

Most of the Chinese churches in the Boston area are in the suburbs. Quincy, with over 10,000 Chinese residents, has four Chinese churches. Expanding in Boston Chinatown would provide more resources to reach the Chinese in the Boston area in the strategic location of Chinatown. Also as the Chinatown population is growing more ethnically diverse, the English speaking congregation of the church will also have more opportunities to reach other Asians and non-Asians.

C. Expanding our ministries in Chinatown can bring more blessings to the community.

The greatest blessing we can give to the residents of Chinatown and to those who come to Chinatown is to verbally share the life changing message of the Gospel. But we can also be a blessing by sharing the love of Christ by deed. By sharing God’s love in action, we can point them to God’s love and to the Gospel. It is not enough for the church building to be in a location accessible to most Chinese. We cannot expect people to just walk into our church to hear the Gospel. To be fishers of men and women, we must attract them to hear the Gospel. Sharing God’s love by deed will establish relationships and provide opportunities to share God’s love verbally. We have seen this happen already in our outreach ministries, such as our Community English Classes and Project Destiny.

Therefore, physically expanding in Chinatown and making it a center to meet community needs is an integral part of our plans. Within the community there are many needs among the children, the youth, the families, and the elderly. A new facility can be designed to share God’s love and to attract non-Christians to our church through various means such as recreational programs for youth and restaurant workers during the week, child care services, ESL and citizenship classes, senior citizen gatherings, youth tutoring, music lessons, counseling, or computer classes.

Expanding in Chinatown will also add to the life and vitality of Chinatown. Many of the 14 Chinatown organizations that supported our proposal for the land swap cited BCEC as a valuable member of the community. We can continue to support the local economy in Chinatown through the patronage of our members. Already we attract over 1000 people each week to Chinatown. Also, our presence and involvement in the community will help direct people with their time and talents to volunteer or work in Chinatown, especially in human services and education.

Expanding in Chinatown can also be a blessing to the whole region because of the strategic nature of the central city and urban ministry. Tim Keller, a well known pastor in New York City, wrote the following: “You can’t reach the urban centers from the suburbs, but you can most definitely reach the suburbs from the city…Ministries that begin and thrive in the city will eventually spread all through the suburbs, following their converts out to their new neighborhoods.”

D. Expanding in Chinatown will put more resources where we have seen the most growth.

We have seen God bless our ministries in Chinatown in the past 47 years. Based in Chinatown we have grown from 18 people to over 1000 people, growing to be the largest Chinese church in New England. While God has blessed both our Chinatown and Newton campuses, we have seen most of our baptismal growth come from Chinatown. Whether it is ministering to senior citizens, reaching out to immigrants through ESL, attracting students from area colleges, operating a day camp, or teaching children brought by immigrant parents to our Sunday Schools, BCEC’s ministries have shown the most fruit in Chinatown. Ministry in the suburbs is something we are still learning how to do. Now that there is finally an opportunity to expand in Chinatown it makes sense to put more resources into the location where we have seen more fruit.

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3. Given that Chinatown is a good location to minister, why do we need a new and larger building?

A. The present buildings that BCEC owns in Chinatown are inadequate for our present size.

Our present main building at 249 Harrison Ave. was completed in 1979 for a church no larger than 250 people. The purchase and renovation of 237 Harrison Ave. in 1993 provided additional offices and meeting rooms. Now we have 1000 adults and children in Chinatown. The adults meet in four worship services, two of which meet in rented facilities. The Cantonese 11am service has been overcrowded for several years. Eighty people have had to worship via closed circuit TV in the basement with no room for new people. We have had to rent or borrow space for over two decades.

B. We need to plan to accommodate our future members.

Not only are the existing facilities inadequate, but we must plan to accommodate new members into the church as we strive toward our long term goal. Just a doubling of the number of people coming to BCEC would mean adding another 1000 people to our facilities in Chinatown. Where would those people worship? How can we accommodate these people in our Sunday Schools and fellowships? We must seek to expand physically while the opportunity is available and not wait until there is a crisis.

C. A larger facility in Chinatown will allow our human resources to be utilized more efficiently.

A larger facility will allow for economies of scale, especially in terms of pastoral staff and key personnel. Instead of spreading our leadership across different locations at different times, we can concentrate our human resources for maximum impact. For instance, a sanctuary that can accommodate 700 people, instead of the present 350 in the 11am Cantonese service, would double the capacity of that service without adding much more preparation for the preacher, the choir, worship leaders, or the musicians. On the other hand, having two worship services of 350 would require two sets of gifted leaders or the overuse of the same set of leaders.

D. A larger facility in Chinatown will allow the church to send out larger “daughter churches.”

A larger facility in Chinatown will also allow the church to send out more people to start “daughter churches” (either independent church plants or congregations that are still part of BCEC). In the long term, even a larger facility in Chinatown will not be adequate for our long term future growth. It will be difficult to grow any more physically in Chinatown because of the lack of space and high building costs. Therefore, sending out people to start new churches or congregations in the suburbs must be part of the long term plan to achieve our vision.

Our elders believe sending out only a small group of believers to start a new church is not an effective strategy. They have observed that Chinese churches under 100 people seem to stay small for a long time. These small churches spend most of their energies just trying to survive. Our elders believe sending out 300-400 people to start a new church is a better strategy. Such a church right from the beginning would be able to offer ministries to meet the diverse needs within the Chinese family. However, sending out so many people from a “mother church” of 1000 people may hurt the mother church. With a larger facility in Chinatown, if the mother church has 2000 people, then it can more easily send out 300-400 people. This could happen multiple times in order to achieve our long term goal.

Therefore, a larger facility in Chinatown would help present needs, future needs, and long term needs.

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4. Why can’t we just continue to rent space as we have been doing?

A. Renting space has its limitations.

Our strategy for decades has been to rent or borrow facilities to make up for our inadequate facilities. Though we are grateful for the rented facilities, they have their limitations as related to effective worship, teaching, fellowship, and outreach. For instance, newcomers can be confused by the borrowed facilities where signage is limited. Parents must shuttle their children across busy streets in bad weather to drop off and pick up their children from Sunday Schools. Music and sound equipment must be set up and put away, taking time and energy. Bible story pictures and Bible verses cannot be hung on the walls of public school classrooms. Fellowship groups on Friday night cannot meet past a certain time as allowed by our rental agreement.

B. Renting space lacks stability and will cost more in the long run.

As we grow larger as a church, being able to count on facilities becomes more and more important. When the church was smaller, it was easier to rent or borrow space for 2-3 classes or a worship service of 75 people. Now with a lot more people including children and the elderly, the options are much more limited. A problem with our rental agreement could not only prevent us from making progress toward achieving our vision but it could even cause us to shrink.

We currently rent two facilities: the Quincy Upper School (behind 249 Harrison Ave.) and the Quincy Elementary School (across Washington St.). We use 4 large classrooms and the cafeteria at the Quincy Upper School. When the Quincy Upper School moves completely to their new site perhaps in the summer of 2009, these temporary classrooms will be removed. This means our rental use of that building – on Fridays (Fellowships), Saturdays (ESL), and Sundays (Sunday Schools) will definitely end. Ministries may have to be curtailed if alternate space is not found.

Our rental of the Quincy Elementary School is by yearly agreement.

We rent the auditorium, the gym, the cafeteria and 18 classrooms. We pay over $1000 per week for about 6 hours of use. The permission to rent and the rental fees are subject to change. The loss of use of that facility would mean we would have to find worship space to seat at least 300 people and at least 20 classes. Our rental requirements would be more in the future. Finding such spaces to rent are not easy in the Chinatown area, especially at an affordable price.

Owning our own space in Chinatown (249 Harrison Ave. and 237 Harrison Ave.) has given us a measure of stability even though the cost of those buildings seemed high at the time. Over the years, with the cost of real estate steadily going up, the price paid can be seen as relative bargains today.

The situation is analogous to why families try to buy homes. Single people usually rent. But families, especially those with children, usually try to buy a home not only because of the long term financial advantage but also because of the stability it affords in raising a family. These same advantages hold true for the church as we plan to grow.

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