Origins of Church Interpreting & Future Development

One particular area that the questionnaire was unable to cover was the origin of church interpreting, or the primary driver that necessitated the role in the immigrant church. The semi-structured allowed the researcher to prompt members of church leadership or those who served in pastoral roles to elaborate on the histories of interpreting at their respective churches (both ethnic Chinese churches in the USA and bilingual churches in Taiwan). The researcher hoped that looking into what created the need for interpreting in the church in the first place would shed more light on the role or roles church interpreters are supposed to fill.

Pastoral Accounts of Origins of Church Interpreting

Respondents R1, R4 and R9 are all pastors currently serving in one of three ethnic Chinese immigrant churches in the United States (i.e. churches NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1). All three churches were founded between the late 1970s and early 1980s by Chinese-speaking immigrants mainly

from Hong Kong and Taiwan. NJCA and NJ-2 are considered “sister churches” which spun off from a larger church in New Jersey and operate independently, though they do maintain loose connections with one another and often conduct joint meetings and conferences with their memberships. CA-1 is located on the west coast, so its membership has had very limited contact with members of NJCA and NJ-2. However, through the various Christian conferences held throughout the year and around the country, all of which are interpreter-mediated, pastoral staff from all three churches have met and interacted on a semi-regular basis. Below is a summary of their accounts of the origins of interpreting in their respective churches.

Interpreting at NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1 initially appeared to address communication gaps between differing language groups in their memberships. Interpreting at NJCA and NJ-2 started as a way to integrate the first wave of coming-of-age English-speaking second-generation members who would have otherwise been excluded from church activities due to their insufficient Chinese language abilities. The beginnings of interpreting at 1 differ from NJCA and NJ-2 in that CA-1 was originally part of a larger congregation (hereinafter referred to as CA-0) which catered predominantly to Cantonese and Mandarin-speaking congregants. The pastor of CA-1 (i.e.

respondent R9) mentioned that before CA-1 spun off into its own congregation, CA-0 originally started providing interpreting to mitigate linguistic gaps between two Chinese dialects rather than Chinese and English. But when the English-speaking population grew to considerable size, CA-1 spun off from CA-0 and became its own congregation. CA-1 currently offers interpreted-mediated services between Chinese and English and, like NJCA and NJ-2, has a sub-ministry catering to its English-speaking second-generation. Members of CA-1 and CA-0 maintain close connections with each other even more so than NJCA and NJ-1.

In summary, the ostensible role of the church interpreter in its nascent years at NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1 was simply to make Chinese sermons accessible to their younger English-speaking members. This same reasons were cited for the role of church interpreting by both Carlson (2008) and Yang (1999), who both saw interpreting as a natural solution to the language gap problem. All three churches have since created supplementary church programs to cater to the needs of English-speaking members, so to varying extents, English-English-speaking ministries at NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1 now have certain levels of autonomy. According to Carlson (2008), this is when immigrant churches should begin shifting away from relying on interpreter-mediated services and move towards developing a semi-autonomous English-speaking congregation. Carlson believes that the role of the interpreter only satisfies a linguistic need, and forced interpreter-mediated sessions between Chinese-speaking and English-speaking members will ultimately drive away American-born second generation English-speaking members who are frustrated at being kept in an immigrant culture of which they have never been able to fully acclimate.

Thus, as mentioned in Chapter 1, this is why Carlson (2008) believes that interpreting in immigrant churches is at best a temporary measure that is ineffective at retaining English-speaking members. However, cases like NJCA and other ethnic Chinese immigrant churches in this study have been able to maintain a certain level of membership comprising both Chinese-speakers and English-speakers for nearly three decades despite continuing with interpreter-mediated services.

This suggests that interpreting in immigrant churches may be more than just a temporary solution, or that for certain churches, the need for interpreting in the church may have shifted or will be shifting from bridging internal groups (i.e. first generation Chinese-speakers and second-generation English-speaking ABC’s). The next section will go through each pastor’s take on the purpose of interpreting in ethnic Chinese immigrant churchesį

Pastoral Perspectives of the Purpose of Interpreting in Immigrant Churches

As pastors serving at ethnic Chinese immigrant churches, respondents R1, R4 and R9 were asked to expound on the reasons for the use of interpreting in their respective churches. Their responses generally portrayed a gradual shift in the role of interpreters in immigrant churches from being a reactive role to fill an internal need (i.e. American-born second generation) to becoming a proactive one where interpreting is seen as a tool to reach out beyond the ethnic Chinese community to the local community.

Immigrant churches begin as cultural hubs for members of the same ethnic group. Echoing Ley (2008), churches like NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1 provide immigrants a rich environment to accumulate “social capital”. While in a foreign land, immigrants can find a sense of belonging and community in immigrant churches. However, the dispensation of social capital to immigrants was never the main priority of the immigrant church. Instead of aiming to become a cultural center for immigrants and their progeny, respondents R1, R4 and R9 all mentioned that their visions for their churches is to be able to introduce the Christian faith (e.g. the gospel) to anyone, regardless of language, ethnicity or culture. Take NJCA for instance. When prompted about the original vision of the founders of NJCA, R1 gave this account:

We were trying to reach out to all people of all different languages in that locale. We had a vision to be inclusive in the very beginning, so we didn’t have Chinese as a prefix to the name of our assembly, so we’re just using the place we meet as part of our name. So we didn’t put the ethnic name in front of our church name. The reason is that we want to reach out to all people who speak different languages. So that’s how we started this assembly (Respondent R1).

Pastors at NJ-2 and CA-1 have expressed similar sentiments. However, despite this vision to expand outside the ethnic Chinese cricle, all three immigrant churches have retained de facto homogeneity since their founding 30 or so years ago. All three pastors (i.e. respondents R1, R4 and R9) mentioned that the influx of Chinese-speaking immigrants throughout the decades served as one of the primary drivers for this perpetual cultural and linguistic majority in ethnic Chinese immigrant churches. In other words, as long as there are Chinese-speaking immigrants coming into the United States, ethnic Chinese immigrant churches like NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1 will continue to operate as de facto cultural enclaves and social hubs for immigrants.

These cultural enclaves and social hubs are perpetuated by the cosmopolitan makeup of immigrant church memberships, and is what enforces transnational ties between immigrant churches in the United States and those in Chinese-speaking regions (Yang, 2002). For example, Yang mentions that some immigrant churches are located near universities, and have large portions of their memberships comprising graduate students from Chinese-speaking regions (e.g. Taiwan, China, Hong Kong) in addition to members who are permanent residents, naturalized or American-born. Some of these members may move back to Asia where they will continue to meet in local churches while keeping in touch with the churches they attended abroad. Thus, these transnational ties serve to maintain the church’s immigrant and cultural hub identity, slowing down or otherwise preventing immigrant churches from assimilating with the local American community.

As a result, the cultural milieu and values of ethnic Chinese immigrant churches would continue to be dictated by the immigrant majority. This explains why sermons at NJCA, NJ-2 and CA-1 are still given predominantly in Chinese and interpreted into English despite all three churches having sizeable English-speaking memberships. The demand for the English language in ethnic Chinese immigrant churches just does not warrant any definitive changes in the church’s

language policy from being Chinese-dominant to English-dominant. However, this may be gradually shifting. When asked about the future of church NJ-2, R4 spoke of the desire to give more opportunities for English usage to develop:

In our church, we are actually thinking of increasing English usage. We might have reverse translation more, translating from English to Chinese. Even now, we are starting to do that, but we still have more Chinese to English translation than Chinese to English.

We want to see if we can increase the frequency of English to Chinese translation gradually (R4).

The desire to move towards to more English usage, even during interpreting, may be more than just an attempt to cater to the American-born English-speaking second generation. As mentioned before by respondent R1, the vision of some ethnic immigrant churches is to eventually open their community to those outside of the ethnic community to those in the local community.

The difficulty in accomplishing this lies in the inherent conflicts between cultural values and norms between the church’s existing ethnic community and those outside of it. An immigrant church’s cultural values and norms are naturally resistant to potential changes brought in by members who come from outside the ethnic group. Respondent R4 elaborates:

We are first generation Chinese immigrants. All of the immigrant churches that were founded by people from European countries like Sweden, Germany and what not have all used their native languages. But right now, you don’t see them doing that anymore.

It seems that that’s unattainable. Secondly, it’s the desire to serve a greater community.

We are still an ethnic church; we still serve Chinese. Even though we say we are open to everybody else, everyone has to be attuned to our Chinese way of thinking in order to partake (R4).

R4’s comments here and right before echo what Ley (2008) found in his survey of Chinese, Korean and German immigrant churches in Canada, that immigrant churches that fail to accommodate the needs of their second generation, be it cultural or linguistic, will lose their future.

In his survey, one Korean church recounted how they were able to purchase a church building that was once owned by a German immigrant church community because that younger members of that German church left due to the church’s rigidity, which most likely refers to the church’s cultural and language policies. Ley further elaborated on the success of some Chinese immigrant churches in Canada that have transitioned from being just ethnic to multiethnic via establishing parallel English-language ministries, thus limiting or even eliminating the need for interpreters.

In the interviews, pastors from all three churches expressed a genuine desire to see their churches’ membership become more inclusive and diverse with fellow believers from other ethnic groups. However, Ley (2008), Yang (1999) and Carlson (2008) have all mentioned the immense challenge and difficulty for ethnic immigrant churches to transition. If the power of “transnational ties” (Yang, 2002) are considered, immigrant churches may take even longer to transition into multiethnic churches, which would extend the necessity of church interpreting.

The churches that R1, R4 and R9 currently pastor all have developing parallel English-only programs with a minority of non-Chinese members, though the interpreter-mediated service format and the need for church interpreters have remained relatively intact. R9 further elaborated that the presence of interpreting in the immigrant church is not only just to meet an internal need

but is related to a wider ideal:

We still need to have the English translation. That has something to do with what we believe. We think we are a testimony for Jesus Christ, not because we are Chinese. It’s because we have the life of Christ. We should include all Christians if they want to come to meet with us. We should welcome them and they should have access to our meeting.

We are in the US we need to always have English as part of our service (R9).

Pastoral Accounts of Origins of Interpreting at Bilingual Churches in Taiwan

As mentioned in the interview participant profile section (4.4.2.1), respondents T1 and T4 both serve as pastors in bilingual ministries which are nested under a larger Chinese or even Taiwanese-speaking local “mother church”. T1 serves as the pastor for the English and bilingual congregation denoted as church TPE-1 while T4 serves as the pastor for the English and bilingual congregation denoted as church KH-1. Despite the focus of this study being placed on church interpreting at ethnic Chinese immigrant churches in the United States, the researcher sought to get a better understanding of the church interpreting situation at bilingual churches in Taiwan in hopes of finding parallels between the two types of churches.

The immediate overlap between ethnic Chinese immigrant churches in the United State and Chinese-English bilingual churches in Taiwan is that both types of churches cater to memberships that comprise Chinese-speaker and English-speakers, many of which are not bilingual and thus warrant interpreter-assistance to participate in church functions. However, the main differences lie in the origins and purpose of interpreting.

As mentioned in the previous section, interpreting in ethnic Chinese immigrant churches arose out of an obligation to meet an internal need to make church functions and programs accessible to the second-generation English-speakers. Thirty or so years after their founding, the ethnic Chinese immigrant churches in this study may now be trying to find new purpose for interpreting as a tool for reaching out to not only their internal English-speaking members but also potential English-speaking or non-Chinese-speaking members from outside the ethnic community.

Bilingual churches may or may not have developed to address the same issues. To investigate this issue, questions posed to respondents T1 and T4 from churches TPE-1 and KH-1, respectively, addressed the origins and purposes of interpreting at each of their churches.

When prompted on the origins of the bilingual church TPE-1, its pastor (i.e. respondent T1) divulged that the current bilingual church originally started off as an English-only group that branched off from the main Chinese-speaking church. When asked why an English-only group was even needed, T1 had this to say:

It’s to provide a spiritual home for English-speakers in Chinese. There are English speakers who find it really hard to go into a Chinese church. Some Chinese church provide in-ear translation so you can just go and listen to the sermon. But just the whole culture and context and everything is different, so it’s still hard to just put them in an all-Chinese environment. Another big reason why they started it was because [the main church] had a senior pastor who had a vision to do cross-culture missions. And by cross-culture missions, I meant Taiwanese people going overseas to do missions, but not just Chinese-speakers.

They had a mind to reach the locals and non-Chinese-speakers (T1).

Similar to immigrant churches in the United States, the English-only ministry at church TPE-1 started off as an open cultural enclave (Ley, 2008) for foreigners living in Taipei. But unlike the more insular and exclusive cultural enclave of immigrant churches in the US, the bilingual churches TPE-1 and KH-1 were quick to embrace members across ethnicity, nationality and even language with the help of interpreting via bilingual services. The decision to add Chinese-English bilingual services to the English-only ministry was an attempt to create a meeting place for both Chinese-speaking locals and non-Chinese-speaking foreigners. This was in line with T1’s original dream and aspiration:

When I first came, I wanted to do a Chinese ministry, so when I talked to the church, I thought that I’d [pastor the English ministry] for a few years. But that fire to do Chinese ministry was always there, so I pushed for the church that I wanted. Can I do something to reach out to the locals? A lot of these English-speaking members, their friends, classmates, coworkers and family members are all Chinese speakers, when they want to invite them to church, they can’t really invite them because it’s an all-English environment. After talking with the church, we decided to start a bilingual service where we can still do it English and provide a Chinese translation (T1).

Respondent T4, the pastor of the bilingual church KH-1 in Kaohsiung CIty, provided a succinct explanation for the reason KH-1 was formed and why interpreting became a necessity:

It became a necessity because our church is thinking about internationals and expats in the city, as the city becomes more international. And that seems to be the trend for more

urban areas. This is how we started as a church. When I came back from the States, we started English and Chinese bilingual service. And top of that, we want to serve the people who are able to come and need English interpretation (T4).

T1 and T4’s responses depict a church community that is founded for the reason of reaching out and connecting to the greater community outside the church. This differs from immigrant churches which start off as closed cultural hubs for immigrants (Ley, 2008) which do not concern themselves with reaching out to other ethnic groups in the wider community until decades into their development. In addition, T1 and T4’s bilingual churches are both affiliated with larger Taiwanese “mother” church. However, unlike immigrant churches’ English programs, these bilingual churches do not seem to be attempts by church leadership to help the larger Taiwanese mother church transition (Carlson, 2008; Ley, 2008) into a multiethnic church. Thus, the origins of interpreting in bilingual churches in Taiwan seem to be more related to outreach rather than the immigrant church interpreter’s role of bridging internal gaps between generations, cultures, and languages.