Until ten years ago, Kaua’i churches met the religious needs of the island, mostly through Sunday services. Now the delivery of the message of God has been stepped up at a new wave of Protestant churches. Up to 12 new
Until ten years ago, Kaua’i churches met the religious needs of the island, mostly through Sunday services.
Now the delivery of the message of God has been stepped up at a new wave of Protestant churches.
Up to 12 new churches have settled in Lihu’e, Koloa, Kapa’a, ‘Ele’ele and the North Shore over the past ten years, espousing different religious interpretations that church leaders claim are appealing to more and more residents.
It has been an arduous journey for some churches to gain recognition. Aloha Church served the community out of temporary quarters for 50 years before officially moving into a permanent church site in Lihu’e in February.
In an innovative move to build church membership and better serve old and young members, the new churches are planning to build church facilities with multi-purpose centers, music studios and skating rinks.
Other churches want to continue providing home Bible school study as a way to boost church membership.
These new churches will augment the ways established churches meet the religious needs of the island and help strengthen ties among communities.
Yet, the emergence of these churches poses a challenge to existing churches to remain viable to their congregation and communities.
Unlike the established churches, most of the new churches, because of limited funding, don’t operate from permanent church structures.
Instead, they meet in school buildings, under tents and in rented spaces at existing churches until they can afford to buy land for a church and build.
Yet, the new churches are poised to significantly increase the size of their congregations, due to innovative methods of spreading the word of God, thereby gaining greater religious influence over the island.
If older churches are to survive, they have to “make adjustments to remain viable to their congregations,” said Keith Nitta, a senior planner with the Kaua’i Planning Department, which reviews permit applications from churches.
“The new churches are trying to do a better job of being part of their congregations and their communities,” Nitta said. “I think they are trying to be more far-reaching than the church itself.”
With the resident population of Kaua’i now between 56,000 to 58,000 and poised for growth, more “new-style” churches are likely to become established on the island in the future, Nitta predicted.
Here are some of the new churches:
The First Assembly of God King’s Cathedral has plans for a church and facilities on 14 acres mauka of Kuhio Highway in Hanama’ulu town.
At a public hearing last Thursday, First Assembly and a handful of supporters asked the Kaua’i County Council to delete a zoning condition that would allow the church to develop a multi-purpose building and other structures.
Also planned are a school, a sanctuary, recreational facility and park for youths. There was no opposition voiced against the project.
The facilities are to be used for dances, basketball, volleyball games and religious events, said church pastor Phil Marocco.
When the Council rezoned the property from agricultural to industrial use in 1989, lawmakers stipulated to Amfac, the landowner at the time, that the property would revert back to agricultural use if sold.
The condition was inserted in the zoning ordinance because of public concerns the land would be sold and used as a resort project, according to Kaua’i attorney Michael Belles, who is representing the church in the matter.
The land remained in sugar cane cultivation until Amfac ceased growing sugar on the property in March 2000, Belles said. Since then, the land has remained fallow.
The church has bought the land and is now attempting to delete that condition.
At the public hearing, Allen Yap, a leader of the First Assembly of God King’s Cathedral Church on Maui, a sister Assembly of God church to the Kaua’i church, urged the Council to act favorably on the proposed zoning amendment. To do so would benefit all of Kaua’i, he said.
The Kaua’i branch of the church currently operates out of facilities at the ‘Ele’ele Shopping Center and at the former shopping center near Whaler’s at Kaua’i Lagoons.
The church wants the proposed facility in Hanama’ulu to accommodate growth of the congregation, which now numbers between 200 and 250 members who come from all parts of the island, Marocco said.
The church also wants to buy another piece of land in ‘Ele’ele some day for another church, he said.
First Assembly, which was founded on Maui, has churches in Japan, the Philippines, Tahiti, Moloka’i, Lana’i and the Big Island, California and Alaska. Plans also call for a church on O’ahu in the future, Marocco said.
The Maui church boasts a 65,000-square-foot church facility on 14 acres in Kahului – the largest church structure in Hawai’i.
Kauai Christian Fellowship Church is building a church facility with a 4,000-square-foot youth center, a skating rink and music studio on six acres along the makai side of the Koloa Bypass road.
From the road, the partially completed hollow-tile block structure resembles a fortress.
The church bought the land from Grove Farm Company three years ago and is developing the whole project for about $800,000, about $1.2 million less than the projected cost, said pastor Rick Bundschuh.
Costs were cut significantly due to the donation of materials and volunteer help, Bundschuh said.
“We have guys who have donated incredible amounts of materials. It is absolutely phenomenal,” he said.
The project came about mainly because of massive fundraisers and because the congregation “dug deep” into its pockets to pay for the project, Bundschuh said.
The work started 1 1/2 years and is scheduled to be completed by early summer, he said.
Ten years ago, the church opened it doors in an office at the Rainbow Plaza in Kalaheo. The congregation started with 70 members and, today, has 300 adults and youths, excluding children.
The growth of the congregation and a growing awareness that “we wanted our own place,” compelled the church to find a permanent facility, Bundschuh said.
Bundschuh, a pastor for 30 years and a nationally-known expert on ministry to youth, said when he came to Kaua’i from California in 1986, he couldn’t “tell you of new churches I knew of.”
New churches surfaced on Kaua’i over the past ten years to meet the demands of a “growing population, a population that came from the Mainland who looked to churches similar to ours and others which have a contemporary swing to them,” Bundschuh said.
In this new century, established churches may not be as effective in serving the community if they don’t “rejuvenate themselves and bring in new members,” he said.
Bundschuh said his church is different from many churches because it has more programs for youths than for adult, because “the youth are the future.”
The North Shore Christian Church holds services in donated classrooms at the Kilauea Christian Academy and under a tent on the school’s grounds.
The church first opened for services in April 2001 at the school with a congregation of 120 members, boasting 200 members a year later, according to Kahu (pastor) Steven Thompson.
Faced with a growing congregation and the desire by members to hold services in a permanent church building, the church is now looking to buy land somewhere on the North Shore.
In a year to two, the church hopes to buy between five and ten acres in the area, and would not consider looking elsewhere on the island because most of the congregation is from the North Shore, Thompson said.
Finding the land at the right price could be daunting, he said.
“The biggest obstacle is the cost of the land and the building of the church,” he said. “On the North Shore, an acre of land is $200,000. It seems forbidding, but it is a reality.”
The church currently conducts home Bible studies and will continue to do so after moving into a permanent church building, Thompson said.
Aloha Church in Lihu’e is located across from the Burger King restaurant along Kuhio Highway.
A grand opening ceremony was held on the church grounds on Feb. 16. It was attended by leaders from the Assemblies of God’s headquarters in Springfield, Mo., the denomination of which Aloha Church is an affiliate. Hawai’i church leaders and 16 pastors from other churches on Kaua’i and O’ahu also attended.
Completion of the metal frame structured church facility, which is capable of withstanding hurricane force winds, took 2 1/2 years, said Grace Galiza, the wife of pastor Villamor Galiza.
In 1997, the church bought the 2 1/2-acre church site from Lihue Plantation for $550,000. The church is located next to a former plantation manager’s house known at Koa Malu, which is used for Sunday school classes, a nursery and food pantry.
For the land purchase, Aloha Church raised funds locally and received donations from other churches connected with the Assemblies of God.
It cost only $700,000 to build the church because building costs were significantly cut back due to locally-donated services, a continuing stream of volunteers from other Assembly of God churches on the Mainland and materials and donations from affiliated churches, Galiza said.
The Assembly of God denomination has a policy of only lending money, but not awarding funds, for the construction of churches, Galiza said.
Aloha Church was first established in 1950, offering services in a home at the old Rice Camp behind the Lihue Fire Station.
Following Hurricane ‘Iniki, the church conducted services at the Hilton Hotel, now the Radisson Hotel, at the cafeteria of Wilcox Elementary School, the Veterans Center on Kapule Highway and in a tent at the current church site before the church was built, Galiza said.
Church services at the Aloha Church are given a Hollywood flair through the use of multi-media productions that allows the church to “express your faith to God through dance, songs and dramas,” Galiza said.
“It is a more creative way of getting out the word of God,” she said. “Instead of traditional preaching.”
Other new churches include the Calvary Chapel Kaua’i church, which meets in the Kauai Village Shopping Center in Waipouli. The church is buying land for a church facility in Kapa’a. The Lihue Missionary Church, which once held services at Island School, is now conducting them at the old Sharon Sue Building on Rice Street in Lihu’e. And the Breath of Life church is meeting in and renovating the metal frame building next to the Lihue Bowling Center.
Staff Writer Lester Chang can be reached at mailto:lchang@pulitzer.net or 245-3681 (ext. 225).
