Hello Mavis! I'm not a librarian, but I work for Christian Reformed World Missions, and we are working on developing a network of library volunteers to work with theological libraries all over the world. As I have learned, librarians come in many varieties, so the opportunities we have may or may not mesh with your experience, but if you'd like to read more, you can visit http://www.crcna.org/pages/crwm_libraries.cfm.

I am in charge of our church library at First Hamilton CRC in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Our library was initially founded by two women and has grown in size to a collection comprised of 2000+ books, DVD's, CD's and Videos. Our facility is heavily used by the children and youth of our congregation. I have recruited several tween volunteers, who function as library assistants/pages on Sunday mornings. Having peer assistance while using our library has proven to be very popular with our 'patrons' and has improved our circulation.

Hello! I am involved in our church library at Ebenezer CRC, Trenton, Ontario. Our library is well used also - kids love the growing DVD collection. Items not being returned is often an issue with our open door self serve library.

Hi Yvonne, We have found missing items, or items not being returned, an issue for us as well. We keep our library locked up during the week and always have it attended during the open period before and after our morning service.

Hi, I'm Trena Boonstra at Crossroads CRC in San Marcos, CA. I started a book sharing book case and eventually actually made it into a lending library. We have a beautiful combination BookStore/Library cart in the foyer and a small library room in a nearby building. It is all self serve. I have in the last years been cataloging all our books and adding pockets/cards. But my catalog is entirely on a computer which is not in the library so not accessible right now to patrons. Most of our books, audio books, etc are donated. I need to enlist someone else to help. I am also wondering what automation programs others are using. Right now I have a library program put together by an individual in a neighboring church. Not sure yet how flexible it is in adding patrons and a scanner--so far asking for $$ for that doesn't seem appropriate. I also need to find time to review and promote individual titles

Hi, I'm Marlene Boven at Cadillac CRC in Cadillac, Michigan. We, too, have a collection of around 2500 books plus audio books and DVD's. I am so happy to have other Christian librarians to talk to! We are recently automated but have some final tweeks to do before we go online. Discussions that would interest me are book reviews and library promotion ideas. Also, what are your thoughts about investing more money in audio CD's with the usage of MP3 players etc.?

Hi Marlene, I don't have a lot of ideas about promotion of the library, although I will say that if you get the children visiting the library each Sunday, their parents inevitably come in to browse while waiting for their children to make their selections. The parents than become patrons. At least, that's how it's worked at our library. For the young children, our DVD collection is their favourite. We have a large early reader section wtih chapter books that they are interested in. Once I have them hooked , they keep coming back!! We also have recruited some young people to act as library pages which has worked really well in encouraging our youth to use our library. Regards, Gina Taylor Lunshof

Hi Trena! Just a tip regarding reviews/recommendations: Use volunteers (who are avid readers but don't want to be on "another" committee) to write the reviews for your library.

Christian Reformed World Missions is looking for librarians or library technicians to help strengthening Christian libraries internationally. This is to support the development of libraries in evangelical Christian educational institutions in developing countries through the Strengthening Christian Libraries Internationally (SCLI) project.

If you are interested or know of someone you can find out more info here:

http://www.crcna.org/pages/servicelink_librarian.cfm

 

 

 

 

I am looking for a book(s) dealing with homosexuality from a CRC viewpoint for our church's library.

Hi, I am Sue Vander Heide at Maranatha CRC in Holland, Michigan.  I just found out about this site and think it is a great idea to be able to share ideas with other librarians.  We have had a library for a number of years, I have been in charge the last few.  I too am interested in ideas for how to promote the library.  Our library is currently used most by the little ones -books, videos/DVD, women reading fiction and those checking out DVDs.  Also, has anyone found any of the Church Library organizations to be helpful?  Thanks

I just put a comment/suggestion into the site to get a forum of our own entitled Church Library Ministry or some such. You may vote to get the idea into a Network forum and make comments as why you would like it to be. 

Lets see if we can get our own Forum to share our ideas and information. 

You can get there by clicking on Feedback, the orange button on your right. 

Jo Vandermey

Hi Jo,

I wonder if we can rename this forum from Church Library to Church Library Ministry.

I feel the church library in  our CRC churches are untapped learning resources and outreach ministries .I would love to see the CRC take the stand that our libraries are ministries. They need to be talked about in the CRC and with some librarian training they could be awesome places of ministry. Just this week..... we signed out some books and DVDs to our Friendship Ministry people. Also, I purchased some good book glue and I am repairing  Bibles that are dearly loved and are falling apart.

There are many ways to use the library as a Ministry!! Do any other librarians have ideas about how God could use us?

If you are a librarian, please reply to this.Let's get some discussion going!

Does anyone else have ongoing ministries in their churches that we could loan books to? Jail ministry, perhaps, or Kids Hope.

I placed a question in some of the headings at the top of the network page headers. 

It asks about them using the library and how the library is viewed. 

It has garnered a response from the pastor of the pastor title and will use my question as a possible guest post. 

We can only promote the library as a ministry by promoting it our selves and supporting others. 

As with any ministry and a volenteer ministry usually because you like to read yourself you can get burned out. 

Someone asked if it was benifitial to belong to an association and I feel it is. The CLAO - church library association of Ontario - provides for $15 a year - membership. This gives a discount on Library supplies from Broadart, 4 times a year newsletter, website, yahoo group, facebook group (the facebook host is great!) and puts on two conferences a year. They also sell material to use to educate yourself and promote your library. 

What is the National Church Association like in the US? 

Jo Vandermey

Providence CRC

Beamsville, Ontario

Hi jo, That is my mom's name(she's 94yrs young). I have been following your posts and I have a suggestion on the topic.

What about placing overstuffed chairs in the cfhurch library like the coffee shops. Add soft music to ceate a inviting ambiance.

Thanks

Ken

Hi Jo,

I am a member of the National Church Library Association. Membership is $55 a year. The link to them is.... 

 

http://www.churchlibraries.org/ and Im usually find something I can use i 

They have an email newsletter, "Branches", that I find helpful. It has book reviews and articles; I usually find something usefull in each issue. They have group member discounts for library supplies etc. They also have links to helpful online resources

I wish the price was lower. I also wish they had meeetings closer to Michigan. 

Do any of you librarians out there have a favorite website you would like to share? Where do you get Christian book reviews and/or library ideas?

I subscribe (for free) to Faithful Reader as a website to read their reviews. 

You can find it at faithfulreader.com 

I have to look up my other resources. 

I'm not a part of the CRC but I am the middle word, Reformed, ha ha.  Anyway, we have a small library that we put out on a table weekly.  People donate books and I have a sign up list when the books are checked out or are checked back in, the honor system really, but it works. :)  Any ideas on how to get free, good, Gospel-saturated, God-glorifying and Christ-centered books for free for a new church, only about 4-5 yrs old?