Funding Urban Ministry

Funding Urban Ministry
by Rodolpho Carrasco
Note: This article first appeared in the January 2009 issue of Youthworker.

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Most urban youth workers I know serve in a volunteer capacity, even the ones getting paid. The pay is usually so low they might as well be volunteering. Urban youth workers serve out of love, passion and conviction. So, for the first year or two they don’t worry too much about cash. After a while, though, you have to do something if you are going to be around for the long haul.

“Long haul” is critical for urban ministry because we often are working with young people who have lots of brokenness, lots of interruptions and lots of in-and-outs in their relationships. They don’t need a Gospel Playboy who will be their spiritual parent and then abandon them. They need to feel, see and experience faithfulness year after year.

So how do you get the funding you need to stay in the urban discipleship game for the long haul? You can be bivocational. Hey, it works for thousands of Hispanic, African-American and immigrant pastors; it could work for you.

You could do like I did for eight years and live in intentional Christian community, sharing a house, kitchen and bank account. (I guess that’s a surprise to those in America who know me as an outspoken “urban minister for free-market capitalism and globalization.”) There are other ways. I suggest you think of how to diversify your funding streams. Most youth workers think they should get a job or raise missionary support. The problem with missionary support is that it’s often hard for urban folks to raise cash from a relatively impoverished urban community. If you are raising missionary support, you are most likely bivocational, too.

Here’s what we do at Harambee Christian Family Center:

Donations – Solicit and receive individual donations. Give people a chance to participate in your ministry by supporting the work.

Foundation Grants – Seek out and apply for grants.

Tuition and Fees – Operate a private Christian school, preschool and summer day camp. Collect fees from parents and youth for these programs. There are even times when we collect fees for camping trips and turn a net profit.

Rent – At Harambee, we own six properties outright and collect at least $4,000 a month in rent. It may seem outside your focus on urban youth, but it’s not. Wouldn’t $4,000 a month well sustain your ministry? Even a couple hundred dollars a month would supplement the ministry budget.

Church Support – Though it might take a while to get placed on a church missions budget, once you do, a whole relationship full of diverse resources opens up. Invest in these relationships.

Consulting – Go out and speak on topics about which you have experience. Start small. Maybe the group you address can only pay $20—or provide a chicken dinner. After a while—if you genuinely have game and God is illuminating your ministry—you will be able to match your much-needed expertise with the resources you need for continued ministry.

Using the above methods, Harambee raised more than $800,000 last year. Granted, I’m not alone. We have 16 staff, plus board members, who are busily raising funds. You won’t get to this capacity overnight, but it is doable. If you are thinking about being there for urban youth over the long haul, these are things you seriously should consider.

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Protest and Invest

Christians need to change the way we teach and preach economic justice. Most of us have been to the one-hour workshops where the leader spends the entire hour pointing out injustice, highlighting the negative side of democratic capitalism, cautioning against the misuse of America’s superpower status, explaining various ways to protest injustice, and overall emphasizing that the glass is half empty. There is great truth to this perspective, but let’s give it half our time. And then let’s give the other half to affirming the ideas that can lift people out of poverty — ideas that include free enterprise, long-term investment, societal conditions that encourage prosperity for all, and certain aspects of globalization. Let’s protest and invest. Let’s give equal time to each aspect of economic justice — half to the protest, then half to investment strategies that focus on what is possible rather than on whom the enemy is.

The problem is that few urban ministers or justice fighters are equipped to teach the second half of the workshop. We’ve got our protest speech down pat, but we have little data to offer when it comes to teaching how to lift people out of poverty. The typical justice fighter in urban America is often a person of relative or serious privilege who is captivated by a vision of justice. This is wonderful, but too often the focus remains on them and their experience, and they fail to understand — or accept — some basic truths.

Let me cite David Batstone’s defense of an instance of child labor, from a June 2003 issue of SojoMail, as an example. Batstone shows how, in the light of day, the concept of and need for “just child labor” emerges out of on-the-ground necessity. In his article, he writes about how a highly respected center for street kids in Lima, Peru, actually puts kids to work. Most American progressives would immediately decry the injustice of child labor, but Batstone wrote the following:

“The director of [the center] argues that work does more than put money in kids’ pockets — it gives them a discipline otherwise absent in their lives. Placing them in a school — even if that were a viable option — is untenable, says the director. There are no breadwinners at home…”

Batstone makes the case that this particular circumstance of child labor is a blessing. However, if progressives believe that child labor is always bad, they might be moved to protest against the center’s practices. Batstone’s conclusion is something every justice fighter in America should memorize and apply: “Political progressives need to be careful not to turn their own privilege into a road block for those who are not so lucky.”

Are there times when we unwittingly do likewise? When our particular view of justice gets in the way of accomplishing the justice that the poor actually need?

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE

As a college student I took part in a small group Bible study. One night I shared that I was no longer interested in returning to my poor East Los Angeles neighborhood immediately after graduation (my long-professed goal). I had grown up with little in the way of resources, and I was feeling the need to make some money and establish myself first.

One woman in the group cautioned me about the temptations of money. I took her words seriously and questioned the wisdom of my thinking. Later, however, I learned that this woman was sitting on a large inheritance. She was struggling to make sure her financial concerns did not override her obedience to the gospel. She had grown up with investment thinking, and she was striving to learn protest thinking. In her zeal she looked at me but saw herself — and advised me accordingly. But I did not need the same speech she needed. I needed a speech tailored to my life’s experiences.

I was a person who knew a lot about justice, about God’s heart for the poor, about the need to sacrifice and commit all. My family had been poor, I understood what it was to be poor, and I understood how the poor are often locked out of our systems of prosperity. I didn’t need a reminder or admonishment about the protest. I needed to learn more about investment, about the things that would help me break the cycle of poverty in my own family, about how I could establish a financial base through which I might bless others.

Thank God that I did not follow this woman’s advice. If I had, I would have continued to close my eyes to the investment side of life. Instead, I continued forward with my hunch about ways that I needed to grow personally. Today, as I steward resources beyond what I ever imagined, I am grateful that I have 15 years of experience in studying and practicing investment principles.

I pray that this woman now understands how to look beyond her own issues to the true plight of other people, and then to practice justice in both spheres. But this caution goes for me as well. Once very poor, I am now, years later, a member of the middle class in the wealthiest nation the world has ever known. I have youth in my community who talk about getting rich and making money. I’m afraid they will lose their spiritual bearings if they overemphasize or glamorize money, if they believe that money can do for them what only God can do. It’s been easy for me to speak to these young men in the same way the young woman in college spoke to me, and I’ve heard their reaction on more than one occasion: “You can say that, but you’ve got money.”

What I believe I need to do instead is to match my words of biblical caution about wealth (protest) with teachings of the principles that will help them rise out of poverty (invest).

This balance of protesting and investing is critical, because the average teen in my community does not believe his life circumstances can change. For example, there are jobs available — tough and low-paying jobs that, when done well, can be springboards to better jobs — but many teens do not believe they can ever rise out of poverty by working hard, saving their money, keeping away from all sorts of trifling behaviors, and investing wisely.

I spend a lot of time trying to convince them to take the long, persevering road. My list of speeches sounds oh-so-square. Don’t spend your money. Start with an old, cheap car. Work two jobs, even three. Get some college. Start a business on the side. This is how people all over America, regardless of ethnicity, get ahead. But it’s a hard sell because these principles go against human comfort, and they are especially hard to embed in a young heart. So, extra time and attention are needed to convince poor urban youth that this is the way to go.

What I do not need to put extra time and energy into is teaching them about the existence of injustice. They already believe they have to fight for themselves against what they view as a cold, prejudiced system. They know that greedy capitalists often get away with massive, multi-million-dollar crimes, while many poor people are sent to prison for years for relatively minor offenses. This and other anecdotes about economic injustice are easy to come by on the streets of the city, and city youths’ hunger for them is great. Some kids have already participated in protests against police and educational administrations, lobbied city councils, marched in demonstrations against war, walked out, sat in, and held the line in union-led strikes.

But from the vantage point of my home, next to a corner store in a black and Latino neighborhood, what I see is a generation carrying picket signs in their hearts but running no businesses, owning no property, creating no wealth, tempted to commit crimes, and doomed to wallow in poverty. The very kids who should be disciplining themselves, saving money, working long hours, practicing how to write a business plan, and learning how to win investor confidence, are instead walking around complaining. They talk about what can’t happen and who is against them, preoccupy themselves with endless conspiracy theories, and otherwise squander their God-given time, talent, and opportunities.

Urban youth today know the protest side. They need to be taught — and practice — the investment side.

Let’s think about it another way: We go into the city and teach a poor kid how to fight for justice, but not how to invest for the future. A better-off kid gets trained to invest, then comes into the city and learns about injustice and how to fight it. The better-off kid is well-rounded because she knows both investment and protest and thus is able to take care of herself and her community as she seeks what is right. But no one stands up to teach the poor kid about investment, so that kid grows into an adult who does not know how to effectively take care of herself or her community. Is that just?

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This article by Rodolpho Carrasco originally appeared in the Summer 2004 issue of PRISM Magazine.

Some takeaways from CCDA 2011

(photo, right: view from the stage at CCDA 2011)

It’s been a month-plus since the 2011 Christian Community Development Association annual conference. I had a great time there, as did my wife and children. My wife taught a workshop entitled “Theology of Rest” that was well-received. I was a sidekick in Jane Vander Ploeg’s workshop in the Business as Ministry track. I also shared the main stage on opening night with Mary Nelson and focused on the need for CCDA to affirm to its members that business is an outstanding Christian calling.

A month out from the event I think back to these takeaways:

1. It was great to have a Business as Ministry track. This is the first year that CCDA hosted such a track. There has always been an Economic Development track. But the business emphasis has been spotty in the past. Here’s to more “business as ministry to end urban poverty” in the future.

2. The networking was great, as always. There are too many names to mention, but I appreciated the casual way one can run into key contacts. In this way I ran into Scott Truex, Brian Jenkins, and Al Tizon, just to name a few. If you don’t consider yourself a networker, I encourage you to go to a CCDA conference and JUST STAND IN A MAIN THOROUGHFARE. The people will come to you, or within feet of you. Trust me on this.

3. It was great to follow the conference on Twitter via the official event hashtag, #ccda2011. I couldn’t be there for the Arthur Brooks – Jim Wallis morning plenary, but got a taste of it from the tweets. It’s oh so fascinating to observe what people “hear” in any given session. Richard Twiss sure got a lot of interesting tweets, just to name one “twitterable” speaker.

Finally, I’m grateful for the CCDA team providing a child care option every year. I was able to bring my entire family including four children. The three youngest were in child care nearly every session it was offered. (The oldest, 11-year-old Samuel, roamed with us adults a few times.)

Finally, finally… I’m grateful to God that my son could watch his father speak in front of 3,000 people. He was in the audience as I spoke, and he watched me on the two giant video screens with everyone else. Later in life he will have the confidence to address large groups of people, and he probably won’t remember where he gained that confidence. In that way he is privileged. I just pray that someday he recognizes his privilege and uses it as a tool to do the things God “prepared in advance” for him to do. (Eph. 2:10)

How to remain a multiethnic church

Michael Emerson at New Culture Monthly:

1. An instituational commitment to racial equity, clearly stated…congregations go beyond stating they will be multiracial by also stating their commitment to equity.

2. Leaders who are personally deeply committed to racial equity…without this personal commitment, multiracial congregations will fall short.

3. A common purpose that supercedes racial equity…their statements do not say, “Be multiracial” or “Obtain racial equity,” but rather they say they will be multiracial communities to live our their faith.

4. Structures to ensure racial equity…a key goal of these structures is to ensure that outsiders come to be and feel like insiders, that they belong and have a voice.

5. Internal forums, education, and groups…there must be a space where issues can be talked about, people can learn about race issues, and misuses of power can be discussed.

6. Be a DJ…adjustments are normal, made often, and with a larger purpose in mind.

7. Recognize that people are at different places, and help them move forward one step at a time.

via New Culture Monthly Newsletter

Business as Mission in Les Miserables

Jean Valjean is the focus of the literary classic Les Miserables, wherein his story of redemption takes place against the backdrop of early 19th century France. I first encountered his story when my sister took me to see the play in Los Angeles when I was a child. What is not often discussed about Les Miserables is how it portrays Valjean as a model practitioner of business as mission. Consider the following excerpt taken from Book Fifth – The Descent:

From time immemorial, M. sur M. had had for its special industry the imitation of English jet and the black glass trinkets of Germany. This industry had always vegetated, on account of the high price of the raw material, which reacted on the manufacture. At the moment when Fantine returned to M. sur M., an unheard-of transformation had taken place in the production of “black goods.” Towards the close of 1815 a man, a stranger, had established himself in the town, and had been inspired with the idea of substituting, in this manufacture, gum-lac for resin, and, for bracelets in particular, slides of sheet-iron simply laid together, for slides of soldered sheet-iron.

This very small change had effected a revolution.

This very small change had, in fact, prodigiously reduced the cost of the raw material, which had rendered it possible in the first place, to raise the price of manufacture, a benefit to the country; in the second place, to improve the workmanship, an advantage to the consumer; in the third place, to sell at a lower price, while trebling the profit, which was a benefit to the manufacturer.

Thus three results ensued from one idea.

In less than three years the inventor of this process had become rich, which is good, and had made every one about him rich, which is better. He was a stranger in the Department. Of his origin, nothing was known; of the beginning of his career, very little. It was rumored that he had come to town with very little money, a few hundred francs at the most.

It was from this slender capital, enlisted in the service of an ingenious idea, developed by method and thought, that he had drawn his own fortune, and the fortune of the whole countryside.

On his arrival at M. sur M. he had only the garments, the appearance, and the language of a workingman.

It appears that on the very day when he made his obscure entry into the little town of M. sur M., just at nightfall, on a December evening, knapsack on back and thorn club in hand, a large fire had broken out in the town-hall. This man had rushed into the flames and saved, at the risk of his own life, two children who belonged to the captain of the gendarmerie; this is why they had forgotten to ask him for his passport. Afterwards they had learned his name. He was called Father Madeleine.

CHAPTER II–MADELEINE

He was a man about fifty years of age, who had a preoccupied air, and who was good. That was all that could be said about him.

Thanks to the rapid progress of the industry which he had so admirably re-constructed, M. sur M. had become a rather important centre of trade. Spain, which consumes a good deal of black jet, made enormous purchases there each year. M. sur M. almost rivalled London and Berlin in this branch of commerce. Father Madeleine’s profits were such, that at the end of the second year he was able to erect a large factory, in which there were two vast workrooms, one for the men, and the other for women. Any one who was hungry could present himself there, and was sure of finding employment and bread. Father Madeleine required of the men good will, of the women pure morals, and of all, probity. He had separated the work-rooms in order to separate the sexes, and so that the women and girls might remain discreet. On this point he was inflexible. It was the only thing in which he was in a manner intolerant. He was all the more firmly set on this severity, since M. sur M., being a garrison town, opportunities for corruption abounded. However, his coming had been a boon, and his presence was a godsend. Before Father Madeleine’s arrival, everything had languished in the country; now everything lived with a healthy life of toil. A strong circulation warmed everything and penetrated everywhere. Slack seasons and wretchedness were unknown. There was no pocket so obscure that it had not a little money in it; no dwelling so lowly that there was not some little joy within it.

Father Madeleine gave employment to every one. He exacted but one thing: Be an honest man. Be an honest woman.

As we have said, in the midst of this activity of which he was the cause and the pivot, Father Madeleine made his fortune; but a singular thing in a simple man of business, it did not seem as though that were his chief care. He appeared to be thinking much of others, and little of himself.

I’ll figure out ways to incorporate this material into my future lectures on business as mission. It’s a great excerpt. Valjean (Madeleine) is an inventor; employer; holds high standards of integrity; and shows great concern for others; to name just a few exemplary qualities that align him with business as mission principles.

Latino Heritage Bible

I was working on some old files tonight and came across the Latino Heritage Bible. It’s from 2002. Man, this takes me back. I contributed a few articles for this Bible (they appear sprinkled throughout the Scripture) and recommended a few other Latino Christian writers for this English-language project. I’m glad this is available at Amazon. There were a few years there when this Bible was actually in limbo. The original publisher, Livingstone Corporation, either dropped the project, merged, went out of business – something. I toyed with the idea of buying all the printed versions for cents on the dollar but could never reach anyone. Anyway… I think I’ll order a few more of these.

The Color of Love: In a neighborhood where racial barriers are a fact of life, Rudy and Kafi Carrasco show others there is hope for unity

This article appeared in 1997 in Marriage Partnership magazine. My wife and I had been married three years at the time. Now the article is online at Kyria (link here).

BY ANDRES TAPIA

When Kafi and Rudy Carrasco fill out forms, they often have to answer with “none of the above.” They can handle questions about age and education. Rudy’s a 29-year-old social worker and a graduate of Stanford. Kafi (pronounced KAH-fee) is a 24-year-old second-grade school teacher with a master’s degree. Beyond that, they don’t fit the standard categories.

Kafi and Rudy live in a Southern California community where Latino and black tensions are rising as the growing Latino population threatens to displace black families and workers. The Carrascos’ cross-cultural marriage makes a strong public statement of black/brown harmony in a neighborhood where that message is sorely needed.

Last year, Rudy became associate director of the Harambee Christian Family Center, where the community’s children and youth are developed for leadership through discipleship and education. Kafi is also investing her life in young people. At the Cleveland Elementary School, which is made up mostly of African-American and Latino students, she affirms both cultures in her classroom.

Neighbors and friends often are curious about the Carrascos’ marriage. “The first thing we tell them is that we are intercultural, not interracial,” explains Kafi. Rudy goes on, “Which usually leads to a discussion about the concept of race and how Latinos are an interracial population to begin with. Latinos and African-Americans have many cultural similarities, such as a view of life that is much more communal than it is individualistic. When people see the common bonds rather than the differences, it goes a long way toward getting beyond the ethnic barriers.”

But sometimes those barriers are easier to see than the common bonds. “There’s a Mexican family on our block who told their kids they couldn’t speak with Rudy because he is ‘too American,’” recalls Kafi. “When we asked the kids what they meant, they explained it was because ‘Rudy is married to a black woman.’”

But that doesn’t keep the couple from reaching out to other black and Mexican families, with Kafi speaking to them in Spanish and Rudy participating in Afrocultural events.

“I see my marriage as a model,” Kafi says. “Not as a prescription, but as a sign that cross-cultural relationships are possible.”

Even their home life reflects the Carrascos’ commitment to community. In an effort to redeem urban blight into urban sanctuary, they recently remodeled what was formerly a crack house in an inner-city Pasadena neighborhood. Kafi and Rudy share the home—and their vision for racial and economic reconciliation—with their friends and Harambee coworkers Derek Perkins and Karyn Farrar-Perkins.

“When people see middle-class, college-educated families moving into the neighborhood, it has an incredibly positive effect on how people view their ‘hood,” says Rudy. Adds Kafi, “It helps create an expectation among our neighbors that it is not impossible to create a safer, more nurturing environment for the children.”

And they say having two couples share the same house brings added benefits. “When you share cooking, cleaning and childcare among four adults,” Rudy says, “it makes day-to-day living much easier. It leaves energy to respond to the needs around us.”

A Meeting of Minds
Rudy and Kafi began their relationship as they have continued it—by sharing dreams of urban renewal and racial reconciliation. Five years ago, Rudy was working as managing editor of Urban Family magazine at the Harambee Center, when Kafi—still a college student—came by to find out about the center’s work. Rudy gave her an article he had written about institutionalized injustice, and the next time she visited Harambee the two discussed the article for so long that Rudy asked Kafi to “keep talking over dinner.” She calls that conversation their first date.

Now that they’ve been married three years, the Carrascos still talk over dinner. And lunch. And breakfast. Friends say they talk about every intellectual, cultural and spiritual issue imaginable—which shows how similar they are. But the contrast between them is also intense.

Rudy grew up in east L.A. without a father in the home. His standard of living improved when his older sister, Yolanda, took him and his siblings in after their mother died. Yolanda was a Christian, so she took her family to church. That little neighborhood church became their extended family.

On the opposite coast in black- and Latino-heavy Brooklyn, Kafi grew up the second of nine children in a strong, middle-class African-American family. As a result of her parents’ fervent push for black pride, and the close friendship of several Latina schoolmates, Kafi gained a strong sense of both personal identity and cultural respect. When she became a Christian in college, her burden for reaching urban youth gained added purpose.

When Rudy and Kafi became engaged, friends and family members wondered if they’d be able to withstand the racism they would face. Would their cultural differences be a source of conflict?

“I never considered not marrying Kafi because she was African-American,” says Rudy. “I always had a real connection with the black community. I joined the Gospel choir at Stanford, read a lot of civil rights history in high school and had been immersed in the black community two years before Kafi came here.” Their families approved Rudy’s and Kafi’s decision to marry. Still, both families made sure the couple understood and could withstand the social pressures that interracial couples face.

“I didn’t think twice about marrying a Latino man, though I’d always imagined I would marry a black man,” says Kafi. “I knew I’d have to give up some thoughts I’d had about how to raise kids. I’d envisioned raising my children black and proud. Now I’ll have to balance both cultures. When we have kids, they’ll be raised Christian first.”

Rudy, too, meditates on what life will be like for their kids. Early in their engagement, he woke up one morning and realized, “My kids are going to be considered black. What if my kid came home one day and said someone called him a ‘nigger’? How would I respond? I can deal with racism as a Latino, but suddenly the African-American experience in this country was becoming profoundly personal.”

Kafi and Rudy regularly speak to church and college groups about their intercultural relationship. At school meetings whenever racial issues come up, they speak up in the name of cultural harmony. Before black groups, Kafi encourages African-Americans to learn Spanish and identify with Latino history. At the same time, Rudy urges Latinos to learn African-American history and fight their biases against blacks.

“Not long ago I was hanging out with a group of Latinos when they started bad-mouthing blacks,” Rudy says. “There was no way I wasn’t going to speak up. And they couldn’t believe it. Few are used to hearing someone from one ethnic group defending another.”

But this is precisely why the Carrascos’ message is so powerful and why people listen. “We are ambassadors,” says Kafi. “Our lives are open books.

“I think people see us as having credibility in the other’s culture,” she adds. “I have an authentic concern for my Mexican students because my husband’s Mexican. It also gives me credibility when I say the world is not color blind, that culture does matter. We want to show Christians that we can be uniquely ourselves and still be committed to Christ.”

My 9/11: “Turn on the TV. Any channel. ANY CHANNEL.”

At 6 a.m. on September 11, 2001, I was home recovering from surgery. I was asleep when my brother Andrew called. “Dude, are you watching TV?! Turn on the TV. Any channel. ANY CHANNEL.” Then he got off the phone. It was odd. As I reached for the remote I wondered, “What kind of situation would be covered by any and every channel?” I turned to one of the local network stations and watched a tape replay of a plane crashing into a large building.

And so it began.

I learned later that a relative had seen the second plane crash from her office at Salomon Smith Barney in lower Manhattan. She was among the thousands who walked home across the Brooklyn Bridge that day after the twin towers collapsed.

A friend in DC told me she was driving near the Pentagon when the plane crashed there.

A few days later I wrote “Religion Matters” for Re:generation Quarterly. I reflected on the media’s unwillingness to probe Islamic faith and belief in light of these attacks. A portion of the article is here (the rest is behind the Christianity Today paywall).

I remember being angry that the U.S. English language media refused to show footage of people falling from the World Trade Center heights to their deaths. (Some Spanish-language outlets were showing such footage.) I didn’t mean to be macabre. But the full horror of the attack is symbolized by these 9/11 victims, and I felt – and continue to feel – that they must not be hidden. Here is the Wikipedia entry on The Falling Man.

Back by popular demand: The 3-page Business-as-Mission startup plan w/ bonus Usain Bolt clip

Some months back I made a blogpost about a business as mission start-up plan. If you missed it the first time around, here it is.

Meanwhile, here is the new 4×100 world record by the Jamaican team at this year’s World Championships (final leg anchored by the man with one of the great names in sporting history, Usain BOLT).

How are BAM and Bolt connected? Just by my mind. Enjoy both.

“Rescuing people out of trafficking and prostitution is insufficient unless there is a job with dignity at the other end”

Mats Tunehag writes on the need for “BAM in a Box”:

I recently met a fellow BAMer who has a background in franchising in the US. Now based in the Middle East, he told me about a recent gathering in that Region that consisted mostly of aspiring BAMers. They were enthusiastic, but had little or no prospect of succeeding.

Are we missing something in BAM because we are assuming everybody can start from scratch? Are we missing an opportunity to tap into this pool of committed people because we don’t have a ‘BAM in a Box’ to offer? Could these people become good BAMers if there were franchising options? Many people are medium-level entrepreneurs, medium risk takers and good managers. These are good qualifications for franchise operators.

BAM in a Box is also worth exploring and pursuing as we deal with human trafficking. Regions with high unemployment are high risk areas for human trafficking and unemployment makes people vulnerable to traffickers’ cunning schemes.

Rescuing people out of trafficking and prostitution is insufficient unless there is a job with dignity at the other end. Thus BAM in a Box can be one answer to scalable job creation measures both in prevention of human trafficking and restoration of its victims.

The spiritual, social, demographic and economic challenges of the Arab world and Asia are enormous and growing. How can we begin to meet the many needs there?

BAM in a Box could potentially engage more people in applying BAM. That would mean more opportunities to serve people and nations by providing employment and good services and products, and so on.

Global conversations are underway on business as mission and franchising. We need to move further. Are you an entrepreneur who can help develop BAM in a Box?

via BAM in a Box: Accelerating the Impact of Business as Mission | Mats Tunehag.