Alder Advocates

 Spring semester is now halfway through with our ministry of teaching, preaching, and leadership training in and around New York City. This past season we have seen an increase in the number of churches we have been able to assist in teaching and training. Here is a snapshot of them and what we are doing in them.

Christian Cultural Center (Brooklyn, NY): This African American charismatic mega-church of 22,000 members in Brooklyn led by Dr. A.R. Bernard has a multi-faceted ministry in the community of Canarsie and the broader metro area. Cheryl is the primary instructor for the next 14 months for a Tuesday evening leadership class in partnership with Nyack College. There are 25 students in this large class.

Allen AME Church (Queens, NY): This is another African-American African Methodist-Episcopal congregation of approx. 18,000 members that has a deep history of social justice and community development under the leadership of Pastor and former-Senator Rev. Dr. Floyd Flake. Cheryl Tokke is teaching a 6 week course in Organizational Behavior, and Hans a 6 week course on Christian worldviews in a global marketplace.

Triumphant Church of God (Brooklyn, NY): Pastor Eric McLeod leads this classic black Pentecostal urban congregation of transplanted Caribbean folk and locals in the inner city neighborhood of Brownsville. Hans has preached on Sunday numerous times and we are working alongside Pastor McLeod to encourage and strategize their community development ideas and leadership training and discipleship. With sister congregations in Kingston, Jamaica, Toronto, and London global missions networking will be a result. We are planning a leadership conference for this church an others in the neighborhood.

Brooklyn Tabernacle (Brooklyn, NY): This is a well-known multi-cultural church in Brooklyn, NY best known for its choir. Our team taught a month-long Christian leadership course to adult students from the church.

Christian Community Church (Middletown, NY): A congregation of about 1800 members reaches out to a diverse community of rural, and suburban people with a message of hope. Students are being encouraged to implement ethical behavior in their work and family lives, led by Cheryl Tokke.

Solid Rock Church of God (Newburgh, NY): This is a Pentecostal congregation about 90 minutes north of New York City of 400 members. We taught a six week Christian discipleship course to a group of 10 people both from in the church and outside it. Solid Rock Church uses these courses as an ongoing outreach to people in the community.

Montvale Evangelical Free Church: (Montvale, NJ): Hans Tokke preached a series of messages over the Christmas season at this well-established middle-class evangelical church in suburban New Jersey of about 600 members. He was able to encourage them in seeking the Lord in building the vision for the future as they search for a new pastor.

Alder Advocates work in the community has broadened into the commmunity based arena. Hans Tokke has been teaching sociology and Marriage and Family at State University of New York Rockland Community College and City University of New York New York City College of Technology (CityTech). Cheryl has returned to some early career roots working in a hospital. For the next year she will be leading an onsite cohort of management students from St. Luke Hospital in Newburgh, NY.

Our Alder Advocates team taught a course in Ethics and Leadership at the Brooklyn Marriott hotel to a group of business students.

In 1994 the Rwandan genocide killed one million people in just three months. Since then, AIDS and other issues have ravaged the country. There are over 300,000 orphans in Rwanda and 70% of the women are widows.

In Canada, Alder Foundation has assisted Youth for Christ (Greater Vancouver) in establishing a partnership with Youth for Christ Rwanda and establishing the Elevation Project. This project has now established a child sponsorship program enabling children to attend Kigali Christian School, run by Rwanda Youth For Christ.

It costs just $360 per year Canadian for a child to receive education at this school, providing them with books, materials, clothing, food and all necessary items. Now, through YFC in Canada, children can be sponsored for $30 per month.

Bringing life back from tragedy…even in Rwanda! Providing the seed to help initiate this project is another way that the Alder Foundation reaches out across the globe. While Alder will not play a role in the maintenance of the project, we are priviledged to be part of its creation!

During the last week of September, International Chairman Noel Walker attended a conference in Argentina hosted by Harvest Evangelism and the International Transformation Network (ITN).

ITN is a strategic alliance of Christians from the marketplace and the pulpit who are building prototypes for city and nation transformation that bring the presence and the power of God to meet the felt needs and the systemic challenges of our communities and countries.

Attended by 425 delegates including pastors, business people, entertainers, politicians from five different continents, Noel reports back that the movement to fulfill the great commission of “discipling all nations” through a combined focus of pulpit ministers and market-place ministers is under way. Cities in various countries are being transformed!

 Imagine a mega city where the mayor decides to throw a party for both poor and rich, great and small, in the grand central plaza to celebrate… Jesus! That happened last year in Buenos Aires, when the Mayor of the city invited people to come celebrate the One who recently transformed his life!

While attending the conference, Noel and the other delegates had the opportunity to visit the prison at Olmos, where both guards and prisoners are Christians! The name of the prison, believe it or not, is “Christ the Only Hope”, and is located next to a higher security prison where 1400 of 3000 inmates have turned their lives over to Christ. At the Olmos prison, guards, visitors and prisoners all worshiped together in one service led by the worship team and musicians whom are all inmates!

For the rest of the week, the conference featured speakers from around the globe teaching and sharing transformation stories… cities, districts, even countries. The Senator from Hawaii was on hand as well as the Finance Minister from Uganda, and many local politicians from Argentina also joined in.

How can we see a sustainable transformation? There are Five Paradigms:

1. The Great Commission is about discipling nations, not just individuals.

2. The marketplace (the heart of the nation) has already been redeemed by Jesus and now needs to be reclaimed by His followers.

3. Labor is the premier expressions of worship on Earth, and every believer is a minister.

4. Our primary call is not to build the Church but to take the kingdom of God where the kingdom of darkness is still entrenched in order for Jesus to build His church.

5. The premier social indicator that transformation has taken place is the elimination of systemic poverty.

As the church steps up to take on the challenge of discipling nations, not just individuals, and as business/market place ministers team with church/pulpit ministers to labor together and take the kingdom of God into the world (kingdom of darkness) rather than trying to herd potential converts into church buildings, then transformation will take place. What better social indicator of transformation than the elimination of systemic poverty. The Alder Foundation is committed to see sustainable transformation take place in our cities, our states and provinces, and our nations!

October 15, 16 2007. Hans Tokke presented the workshop ‘Conspicuous Consumption: The Prophetic Challenge of Urban Marketing” and Cheryl Tokke presented the workshop “The Value of Volunteerism” at the National Conference of the Christian Community Development Association in St. Louis, Missouri.October 20, 2007. Pete Olsen will present a workshop on “Social Networking: Internet and Online Identity” at Rockland Community College as a participant in a county wide teacher and student conference.10/25 - 28 Vilma Balmaceda and Jose Mendoza will be making presentions at the Latin American Christian Lawyer’s Association Conference in Equador.

November 17, 2007. Hans Tokke will be working alongside Rev. Steve Kulish, urban missionary of the Assemblies of God, and Pastor Lal Singh of Holy Family Assembly in Jamaica, Queens to bring in about 30 college students for social research, work projects, outreach projects, and social justice training.

Valerie Weaver-Zercher: Suburban Spirituality
Prompted by the ubiquitous bracelets and bumper stickers, many Christians are asking (or being annoyed by) the question, “What Would Jesus Do?” Thanks to the creative folks at the Evangelical Environmental Network, we’ve also been encouraged to ask, “What Would Jesus Drive?” So here’s another pithy iteration to ponder: “Where Would Jesus Live?” If you’re like most Christians concerned about justice and peace, “the suburbs” would probably not appear in your answer. You might say the city, where Jesus could minister to the poor and the oppressed and walk downtown to preach to corrupt politicians. Or perhaps you think of the country, where he and his disciples could raise organic tomatoes and share their free-range chickens with the hungry. But Jesus in a split-level, mowing his lawn on Saturdays and waving to the neighbor kids on their trampoline? Hmmmmmm….

 www.sojourners.com

 It seems like powerful interests in Vancouver are trying to turn this 
place into New Babylon.

Some highlights:

A lot (if not most) of the detox and treatment centers are operated 
by Christians (Salvation Army, WISH, UGM, Covenant House, etc).

The medical community is informally, but almost universally hostile 
to Christianity.

Methadone-based treatment centers have zero funding, and are 
therefore reliant on patients’ welfare checks for operating costs.

Treatment generally is grossly underfunded. A typical result of 
understaffing is that drugs are readily available within treatment 
centers.

The Vancouver Agreement is a three-way alliance between federal, 
provincial and city authorities, and has recently announced funding 
for Onsite, a sort of holding area for addicts considering treatment 
and awaiting a bed in detox, above the SIS. This is costing $2M for 
renos, plus $350K per year operating costs. The latter is funded by 
Coastal Health. At the same meeting where Onsite was approved, ALL 
requests for additional funding for existing detox beds (some 
currently closed due to lack of money) and any detox or treatment 
expansion were denied. Wait times are currently about 1-2 weeks for 
detox and 6-8 weeks for recovery/treatment.

The SIS continues to publish bogus science “proving” its value and 
validity. A recent poll found the majority of BC residents want to 
keep it, and think that marijuana should be legalized. A recent peer-
reviewed, scientific study of the SIS research (Colin Mangham) found 
it to be very bad science, exaggerating claims (by orders of 
magnitude), misleading, and misstating the truth. This report was 
pilloried in the press.

Victoria is trying to establish three more needle exchanges. 
Meanwhile, the one they have is seeking to get out of its lease 
because of too many problems with addicts damaging property, 
defecating on the steps, threatening passers-by, et cetera.

An Australian study showed the addicts were using the SIS there as a 
sort  of experimentation facility to try more and more potent dosages 
and blends of drugs, while supervised by medical personnel. According 
to Australian surveys, addicts were about 40 times more likely to OD 
within the facility than outside. Here in BC the OD rates (per 
injection) in the SIS are nowhere near as high (about 1/9th) but 
still four times higher than the Australian base rate. There is no 
base rate for overdose in Vancouver. That little gem was left out of 
the studies done here.

The Portland Hotel Society and the City of Vancouver have been 
amassing real estate on the DTES at fire-sale prices. This could be 
innocent, but it looks fishy. Buy out the whole block, evict all the 
junkies, sell for a massive profit. Prices would probably triple 
overnight. It could be worth billions.

Marijuana, especially the super-potent BC Bud varieties, has been 
shown in test after test to cause serious mental impairment and 
psychosis.

Politicians are considering a ban on all tobacco smoking in public 
places, inside or outside, anywhere in Vancouver.

More people in BC smoke marijuana than tobacco. More teenagers in BC 
use almost all kinds of drugs than any other jurisdiction in North 
America.

Alcohol is the primary gateway drug in youth. Tobacco also has a 
gateway effect. being extremely strongly linked to cannabis use among 
teens. Teenagers start using alcohol at median age 13.9, marijuana at 
14.1, “hard” drugs at 14.7 (hard in quotes because marijuana is 
considered a hard drug in some circles). More than 80% of people 25 
an under have used marijuana at least once in their life. 57% of 
marijuana seized in the GVRD was laced with crystal meth. Marijuana 
is 10-30 times more potent than when I went to school.

Drug-related property crime is soaring in the GVRD, especially in the 
Central Business District (includes the DTES and Granville Mall 
area). Auto crime is dropping significantly, due to the world’s most 
aggressive bait-car program.

Violent crime and property crime in this area are worse than any 
American city. They are worse than New York at its worst. The murder 
rate is lower, but firearm-related crime is soaring.

The mayor has been backing away from the SIS, calling it a “temporary 
measure” and intends to “replace” it with drug substitution therapy, 
in a program called CAST (Chronic Addiction Substitution Treatment) 
which is an expensive research trial of substituting stimulants in 
the way that Methadone is currently used to substitute heroin. There 
is very little research to show that this can work. The mayor is 
essentially volunteering Vancouver addicts to be guinea pigs.

On the other hand,

Lorne Mayencourt, MLA for Vancouver-Burrard, is moving ahead with a 
San Patrignano - styled long-term addiction rehabilitation center 
near Prince George.

And that’s the news.

Steve Plitt, Media and Film

Alder Advocates is now live on web. Thanks Daisy for your work! Updates and additions will continue.

September 2007. Noel Walker and Kelly Peters attended a management conference in Argentina. They were able to network with other Christians from around the world whom are involved in giving and caring, and share about Alder Advocate’s vision and mission.

October 15, 16 2007. Hans Tokke presented the workshop ‘Conspicuous Consumption: The Prophetic Challenge of Urban Marketing” and Cheryl Tokke presented the workshop “The Value of Volunteerism” at the National Conference of the Christian Community Development Association in St. Louis, Missouri.

October 20, 2007. Pete Olsen will present a workshop on “Social Networking: Internet and Online Identity” at Rockland Community College as a participant in a county wide teacher and student conference.

10/25 - 28 Vilma Balmaceda and Jose Mendoza will be making presentions at the Latin American Christian Lawyer’s Association Conference in Equador.

November 17, 2007. Hans Tokke will be working alongside Rev. Steve Kulish, urban missionary of the Assemblies of God, and Pastor Lal Singh of Holy Family Assembly in Jamaica, Queens to bring in about 30 college students for social research, work projects, outreach projects, and social justice training.

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Roberto Chia and Vilma Balmaceda have just arrived at Notre Dame University. Vilma will be spending a year completing her doctorate. She flew right off to Korea to teach a summerterm weeklong course.

Steve Plitt: I’ve been rather buried doing the post on Tears for April: Beyond the  Blue Lens. This is going to be an AMAZING feature-length documentary,  chronicling the lives (and sometimes deaths) of six addicts, and how  a handful of police officers became involved with their lives.Also, I’ve been networking with people in the area on the subject of  the DTES drug culture and the political situation here. I’ve learned  a lot.

Pete Olsen is working on an internet education website during his summer break. He is laid up with a knee injury.

6/28 Johanthan Sampson submitted edited US incorporation papers. Alder Advocates is already a registered charity in Canada as Alder Foundation.

Hans Tokke will be traveling to Vancouver, Canada July 7 - 15. Here is a current itinerary. 7/8 AM Presentation at Broadway Church PM Luncheon with Estonian Evangelical Baptist Church. 7/10 - 11 “Escape From Estonia Filming” 7/12 TBA Meeting with Estonian Cultural Association.

7/22 Hans Tokke speaking at Washington Alliance Church, Washington, NJ

9/1 Hans Tokke speaking at New York Chinese Baptist Church

In a world of inequality, Paris Hilton will leave LA jail tomorrow while others whom don’t have the economic, cultural, or media power will remain locked up. Surely now her jailtime will be used to “improve” her personal image as a “changed person”. There will be monetary payoff as a result with greater commercial endorsements, media saturation, and party appearance fees.

 Why am I concerned about this? Because it will once again illustrate clearly how American young adult society is enamored with hedonism and wealth, while at the same time advocating for environmental and social causes as they participate in philanthropic events to “save” the poor and disadvantaged from their plight.

It seems there is an inconsistent lifestyle in this vein. On the one side, there are protests for the causes of civil rights, economic injustice, corporate domination, and moral liberalism with signs, chants, and blocking traffic in Union Square. On the other side, shopping at Gap, Urban Outfitters, or a Soho boutique for the “just right” protesting outfit, and buying yet another copy of Self or InStyle or People, to find the gritty details of Paris and her Party Clan.

I’m looking for more consistent living.

 Hans Tokke, Urban Sociologist