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OTTAWA ALPHA PROMOTION COMMITTEE MEETING April 16, 2004, All Saints Lutheran Church, 1061 Pinecrest Rd.
MINUTES Attenders: Apologies: Barrie Davies, Alpha Director Ontario 905-342-5352 Paul Dumbrille 225-0806 Dave & Carol Atkins, Advisors 591-2932 Ed Plett 592-7635 Tony & Laurie-Ann Copple, Advisors 591-3903 Padre Michel Dion, Advisor 995-6755 Anastasie Xavier 270-8333 Carole Cox 752-2827 Chris Slojewski 749-8092 Pastor Dorothy Janes 829-2362 Don & Valery Kettle 824-7938 Rev Laurie Taylor 819-685-1301 Lynn Williams (Sec) 592-5310 Michel Savard 819-684-1275 Celine Weitzel 829-7026 Gillian Mattock 832-0552 Gordon Moore 243-8361 Barrie Gauthier 692-5324 Sally Stinson 692-2335 Paul Moylan 260-2640 Yvette Depestre 830-4714 Trevor Owen 837-7815 Mary Wells 270-8813 Richard Gillman 837-6778 Ian MacKay 746-6964 Cindy & John Detombe 599-1132 Paul Webber 741-9843 Adeluisa Juane 824-7453 Bob and Pat Horsey 592-5419 Ethel Mahoney 599-5975 Allen & Denise McCartney 825-0818 Tony Liuzzo 228-1633 Ron Sargent 580-2424x21613 David Walsh 823-7114
Items were covered by Tony Copple unless otherwise indicated Opening prayer - Laurie-Ann Copple
Review of Minutes of March 24, 02 meeting, January 30, 03 (and 22 AIfEO meetings from Jan 30, 03 – Jan 8, 04) The minutes were accepted (proposer Gord Moore, seconder Carol Atkins). Please note that these minutes will also be posted on the web, accessible from the contacts, resources and minutes page of the Alpha Ottawa site. The minutes of the 22 AIfEO meetings in 2003 are accessible at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/alphaottawa . Contact Tony Copple to request access to this restricted access site for local Alpha projects
Membership of OAPC Invited local Alpha leaders, may vary from meeting to meeting.
The view from Alpha Canada - And the vision for Ontario Barrie Davies, Director, Ontario Barrie introduced himself and the role of the Ontario Alpha Director. He then presented the growth statistics for Alpha in Canada, and Ontario – about 939 courses currently – and the future growth expectations. Barrie is moving house, but after April 30 his tel no will be as above (attenders list).
Financial report Dave Atkins Dave reported a balance in of $2,500, of which $2,200 is in GICs and the rest in cash. In addition there is also nearly $2,500 “in trust” at Alpha Canada for Alpha Ottawa for use in future local initiatives (see below).
The Passion Ads Shortly after “The Passion of The Christ” opened in Ottawa, we were able to arrange Alpha advertisements to run as screen ads in 58 screens in three cinema complexes in Ottawa: Famous Players Britannia and Silver City, and AMC 24 Kanata. Thousands saw these ads, which were based on the 2003 Alpha Initiative billboards artwork. This was made possible by one extremely generous donation from an Alpha leader from Deep River. Not all of his $4,000 gift was used in paying for the month of ads. Two other donors gave a total of $125 towards the ads – for which we are also very grateful.
The 2004 Initiative Alpha Canada has announced very similar national advertising for 2004 on billboards etc, and lawn signs, as we saw in 2003. This is due to the great generosity of a major Alpha supporter in Vancouver who owns a billboard company (among other businesses). Key dates are: May 10: packages to Advisors May – June: Presentations to potential new Alpha churches by local leaders, Advisors By Jul 1: churches order additional materials not already owned from 2003 (eg banners) Aug 15: high gear promotion Sept 11 week: local team training Sept 16: National day of prayer Sept 19 – 25: Initiative introductory dinners (preferred time slot)
The question put to our group tonight was what we should do locally in additional awareness of the Initiative. Last year we raised and spent more than $20,000, and our results were well reflected in increased and new courses in the fall. This was not without a huge amount of effort by a small band of dedicated individuals, the AIfEO committee, led by Helen Lenthall.
Your Alpha advisors expressed reluctance to attempt anything on this scale in 2004. However, we have already achieved a good result with the advertisements for “The Passion.”
Instead, they suggested that the best use of our money without the organizational effort of last year would be to run cinema ads again for a month in August/September, preparatory for the fall courses. Although “The Passion” will probably not still be running (at the time of writing it is the 7th biggest box-office hit in USA movie history), the cinema audience is exactly the demographic we should be targeting for Alpha courses.
After some discussion, this plan was agreed. The remainder of the donation and most of the surplus from last year will be spent on this. While there is insufficient to pay for all 58 screens, we can afford the 34 Famous Players screens, and this will leave about $700 in our account with Alpha Canada.
This does not preclude the local organizing of additional Initiative events and fundraising by local church groups – in fact we strongly encourage it.
Information from the Alpha Advisors Pit Stop March 26,27,04, Toronto Tony reported on a number of items from the Alpha Advisors meeting, including: We have a copy of the Alpha Canada 2003 Annual report – excellent reading. Padre Michel Dion has been made Alpha Advisor for the Forces. He is based in ND Ottawa. As more advisors are appointed, we should change the name of our “area” and our website from Alpha Eastern Ontario to something less extensive, such as Alpha Ottawa, Alpha Ottawa Valley, or Alpha National Capital Region. Barrie will take this to Alpha Canada for their input. (Personally I favour returning to “Alpha Ottawa”). Please promote the Kitchener Waterloo Alpha Conference June 18-19. It is the best upcoming chance to train local Leaders. Details on Alphacanada.org. Also there is a conference in Sault St. Marie Oct 15-16. Your donations of ~$150 are earnestly requested to permit local pastors to attend this conference. Marriage Course Conferences with Nicky & Sila Lee will be held in several Canadian cities this year, including Mississauga, Oct 22. Strongly recommended for would-be marriage course leaders. Please encourage your church to have an Alpha budget head. This facilitates the flowthrough of donations from local supporters, who can then receive charitable receipts from the church. Distribute brochures for your next course in the session “Telling others” of this one, to encourage inviting. 17% of Alpha funding comes from sales of resources. The rest comes from a small band of major donors. In the future this unstable situation will be addressed, widening the donor base. Alpha Canada send out “information forms” direct to courses from time to time, gathering feedback and experience from local key leaders. These requests are not widely distributed, so if you get one, please be sure to respond.
Psychic Fairs Mary Wells made a strong case for requesting booth space for Alpha in psychic fairs. She has experience of this with a Christian group in Montreal some years ago, and not only were they welcome in the fairs, but clearly filled a need from people with desperate spiritual needs. Mary had more recently (when she chaired KAIPC, the forerunner to OAPC) asked for and received sanction from Alpha UK to pursue this. It was agreed that we should seriously consider this when next the event comes to Ottawa (it was here 16-18 April 2004 as we spoke).
Ottawa Inner City Ministries www.ottawainnercityministries.ca Working with street kids Dave Atkins Dave reported on his current liaison with Rev Ken McLaren of Ottawa Inner City Ministries in their outreach to street kids, and the potential for Alpha to meet some of their needs.
Ottawa Lay School of Theology www.olst.ca Tony reported that Alpha and the Ottawa Lay School of Theology have agreed to swap web links on our respective sites, which as now been done. The Lay School would like to promote Alpha to their students, and some Lay School courses (not all) are suitable for Alpha graduates to add to their knowledge base in Christian theology. Discussion group leaders should be aware of this and of the courses on offer so as to make recommendations.
The World for You Today, and UCB UCB Canada runs a Christian radio station out of Belleville on 102.3 FM. They also distribute an excellent daily reading booklet “The Word for You Today.” They will supply in bulk to Alpha courses, free, on request to 1-866-388-4488. This is a good resource to give to Alpha grads. Listen to 102.3 FM next time you drive to Toronto; you’ll enjoy it.
Web Site: alpha.ncf.ca There is a lot of out-of-date course information on the Alpha Ottawa site. Please update! Use the on-line form on the courses page. It is necessary to fill in the form completely when updating. Also update your course info on Alphacanada.org., particularly if you have recently done so on, since they have changed the format to allow introductory evening dates. Note that the Alpha Ottawa resource library, listed on the web site, has much material you can tap into (other than Alpha tapes).
Closing prayer Barrie Davies
Minutes written by Tony Copple 26 April 2004
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