Church...

Before we got here, we were asked twice to sign a contract to attend an assigned church. This was not a requirement of the school district that pays us but by KNU. 

The contract said the following: I agree to attend an assigned Korean church for the duration of my contract with Cheonan City Schools since I am not only going to S. Korea to work at my job and be a teacher in mission at the workplace but also reach out into my community and assist the development of the Christian church as well as learn about the culture and the people of the country. 

On the surface, this does not seem that bad. However, we felt that we should not be forced to go to a particular church. We think it's very important to attend a church but also church that will help support us through this transition into another country. And we feel that that church should be a place of like minded people who have been or are going through the same changes. With this said we are not apposed to being involved in the local church or visiting churches to experience the culture. The aversion to being force to attend a particular church let alone a Korean church, may be due to our American desire to be independent and not to be controlled. This is something that even as we attend a Korea church we are trying to figure out.

When we asked why we needed to sign the contract, we were told by an American staff member because the KNU president want us to and that if we wanted outside activities with other American Christians, we could attend that activity on a different day of the week. We initially forgot about the contract then 2 weeks before we arrived, the American asked again for the contract and this time we said that we would wait until we got to Korea to sign a contract. Really we wanted to talk to someone who could explain a little more about the contract, why we were signing it and what it entailed about us attending church. A lot of the other American teachers have told us that this contract has been a big problem since they started enforcing it.

After we got here we went into a meeting where we met our pastor. We thought it was just a meet and greet with all the community pastors but no, even though we had not signed the contract, we were assigned a church to attend. The pastor was super nice but it was so hard to talk to him. He taught himself English but his English is very broken, plus his accent is hard to understand. We were told that he would pick us up at 9:50 am every Sunday and he showed us where we would meet to be picked up. After dropping us off the pastor also said that he has to pick up other church members.

The first Sunday, we got to church at 10:15 and the pastor did not return with the other church members until 10:45, we ate lunch by 1:00 and did not get home until 2:30 pm. During service the pastor tried very hard to translate his sermon, the worship songs they picked were both in Korean and English, so we could sing a long but there were only 10 people at the church, we made 12. They fed us lunch, there were 3 other people that spoke some English and we tried very hard to hold a conversation but there was a lot of smiling and nodding. The second Sunday, there was almost no translation, lunch was not good at all but the post lunch conversation was a little better. However, there is one guy at church that knows English, who hoovers over us. Literally we will be sitting and he will be standing very closely and slightly bending over us. Remember that in Asian culture there is NO personal space. Also after every service they give us what ever is left over from dessert. After 4 weeks at this church we decided that we are in desperate need for a church we can understand and be fed from. 

Really, I am super home sick. Not the home sick as in I miss my family. Even though I do miss them I get to talk to them every week or so. I am home sick for Catalina Church of Midtown. Not only do I miss the worship and sermons, I miss our connect group. I miss the friends we made, who were all in similar life stages as us and who I enjoyed immensely. I wish I could duplicate that here. We have thought of other ways but we also only know a handful of people and there is only one other married couple in our TESOL group. So we have come to the conclusion that we will slowly move away from the Korean church so that we can see if we like the English church at KNU or at least find our own church.... Some where. 

As nice as this church is, it is just so hard to go somewhere were we are not being fed, we have little in common and we aren't meeting more people. Maybe in 6 months when we feel more comfortable with living in Korea and will need less contact with English speakers and maybe will be able to attend the Korean church again. 

Please pray that the the transition from the Korean Church will go smoothly, and that we will find a church were we fit and will be fed. Please pray for us as we finish TESOL and start teaching next week. 

Much Love,

Lisa and David