猎魔人

Church parking near stadiums scores big in win-win for congregations and sports fans_我的网站

一 |     CHESTER, Pa. -- The Eagles and the NFL might still be the sports favorites at Calvary Baptist Church, just outside Philadelphia. But many here are also rooting for a neighboring team which last year reached the championship game of Major League Soccer.Their new-found fandom is all about location — and revenue from parking. The Philadelphia Union plays at Subaru Park, a stadium beside the Delaware River just a few blocks from Calvary in the economically challenged city of Chester. Its poverty rate is among the highest in the metro area.As the Union continues to attract loyal fans and reach new heights, so have the blessings bestowed on this historic church where Martin Luther King Jr. attended as a seminarian.It has been crucial. Like many other Black Protestant churches, Calvary Baptist struggled financially during the coronavirus pandemic. Attendance fell, and along with it, funding. But the church has transformed its parking lot to accommodate game-day fundraisers, with volunteers from the congregation staffing the lots and selling spaces for $15 per vehicle.These days, the church raises up to $3,000 per game — about half of what goes into the collection plate on Sundays, said its pastor, Keith Dickens. The welcome influx of extra money is being used to pay for utilities, ministries and a new speaker system that will allow Calvary to reach a broader audience by broadcasting its services online.“It’s been a blessing,” said Dickens, who on a recent game day proudly sported a Philadelphia Union hat. "Not only just to generate funding, but also to meet and minister to new people.”Across the nation, houses of worship located near stadiums — from Boston’s Fenway Park to the Green Bay Packers’ Lambeau Field — have opened their parking lots to legions of fans.For churches offering parking near pro-soccer stadiums, their coffers recently received an assist from the world’s best active player, Lionel Messi who joined an MLS roster this year. All 250 parking spaces at the Calvary lot were full when Messi’s Inter Miami played the Union.Jeffrey Scholes, co-author of “Religion and Sports in American Culture,” said churches like Calvary show a growing willingness to use “secular entities like sport for religious purposes” including, “continuing a ministry, feeding the poor, keeping the lights on, things that ideally churches do."In the past, Scholes said clergy might have preferred the “old-fashioned way” of getting churchgoers to donate while shunning the sports-fan parking business as too “worldly."“There’s just much more openness to different kinds of nonreligious tactics to perform the necessary functions of a church or synagogue or mosque,” Scholes said. It also offers an opportunity to share with fans the history of congregations like Calvary, which was founded in 1879 by a group of formerly enslaved Africans seeking freedom to worship.On a recent game day, fans decked in the Union's navy, signal blue and gold colors pulled into parking spots in front of Calvary's colorful mural that pays homage to King. The civil rights leader worshipped at the church from 1948-1951, when he attended Chester’s Crozer Theological Seminary. Chester has a notable cultural and industrial history, but now has economic difficulties that make Calvary's new parking revenue all the more appreciated.“For us, if it gives back to a cause, it makes it all the better,” Abe Gitterman, age 37 and Jewish, said before he paid the parking fee. Next to him, his 6-and 7-year-old sons pointed to the mural and asked parking attendant and church member Lisa Lewis if this was the same man they had learned about in school. “Yes,” she replied, smiling. “It feels good,” she later said, “to tell them the history about the church.”It can also be fun. In Lubbock, Texas, Leslie Cranford, a parishioner at St. John’s United Methodist Church, said Texas Tech football fans have tailgated with RVs — taking up to four spots ($10 each) — in the church parking lot, near the Red Raiders' Jones AT&T Stadium. Sometimes, rival fans park at the church. “We tell them: we got to charge you extra!” Cranford said, laughing. She introduced the parking program at her congregation two decades ago. On a good season, they make up to $2,000 per game. “Dwindling attendance is a problem," Cranford said. "So, this helps us maintain our ministries.” In Boston, the Christian Science Church opened its parking garage to the public in 2014. That includes Red Sox fans who can park for $30 — a lower rate than closer to Fenway Park. Kevin Ness, manager of the Christian Science Committees on Publication, said the revenue helps cover the operating expenses of Christian Science Plaza, a popular tourist attraction which sits on top of the garage in the Fenway neighborhood. “This in turn allows the contributions from members to directly support the worldwide healing mission of the church,” he said. In Green Bay, Wisconsin, Bethany Church began its Packers parking program in 2010.“We thought it would be a great avenue for outreach, and a way to get funds to help support the growing ministries,” Bethany’s administrative assistant, Jill Connerym said via email. The church doesn’t have a set charge, and instead asks for donation, Connery said, adding that “many people are very generous.”Packers parking helps fund programs, including youth ministries, small group learning and building facility upgrades, Connery said. The church parking lot is often full on game days.“We are known for our hospitality,” she said. “We had a volunteer who began giving rides to Lambeau from our parking lot, free of charge to whoever didn’t want to walk the .5 miles to the stadium. So, now we are known for our shuttle service, and friendly volunteers.”Churches also have embraced other fans. Nashville First Church of the Nazarene offered their parking lots for three shows attended by thousands at nearby Nissan Stadium during the Nashville leg of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. The parking program ($30 a spot) also is popular during Tennessee Titans games and has helped fund ministries in Nashville and missions in Haiti and Kenya.“Every one of these dollars comes right back in to help people,” said its senior pastor, Kevin Ulmet. “When people hear that, they love that, they say ‘we want to be a part of that.’ And that, to me, is the classic definition of win-win.”__Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.。    울산지법, 전자장치 부착법 위반 혐의 70대 남성에 징역 8개월 선고2030년까지 음주·야간외출 금지 명령…측정 거부 과정서 보호관찰관 부상재판부 “준수사항 상습 위반해 처벌 전력 다수…실형 불가피”                   울산지방법원성범죄로 징역형을 복역하고 출소한 뒤 법원의 준수사항 명령을 어기고 보호관찰관의 음주 측정을 거부한 70대 남성이 다시 실형을 선고받았다.울산지법 형사4단독 임정윤 부장판사는 전자장치 부착 등에 관한 법률 위반 혐의로 기소된 70대 A씨에게 징역 8개월을 선고했다고 26일 밝혔다.A씨는 2019년 장애인 강제추행 혐의로 징역 3년을 복역한 뒤 2021년 출소했다. 출소 당시 법원으로부터 2030년까지 위치추적 전자장치(전자발찌) 부착을 비롯해 혈중알코올농도 0.05% 이상 음주 금지, 보호관찰관의 음주 측정 지시 순응 등의 준수사항을 부과받았다.하지만 A씨는 올해 2월 중순 야간에 울산 남구의 한 식당 앞 도로에서 울산보호관찰소 소속 보호관찰관이 음주 측정을 요구하자 이에 응하지 않았다. A씨는 측정기에 호흡을 짧게 불어넣고 곧바로 입을 떼는 수법으로 총 3차례에 걸쳐 음주 측정을 방해 및 거부했다. 이 과정에서 단속 업무를 수행하던 보호관찰관이 다치기도 했다.재판부는 “피고인은 과거에도 보호관찰 준수사항 위반으로 여러 차례 처벌받은 전력이 있음에도 또다시 범행을 저질렀다”며 “측정 거부 과정에서 담당 보호관찰관이 상해를 입은 점 등을 고려할 때 실형 선고가 불가피하다”고 양형 이유를 밝혔다.。

Current article:http://www.zhouangnaoguangsundianzhenmou.cfd/5cn/tweo.html

Published on:18:03:04