Radio Colombe becomes TWR Partner

Radio Colombe, an FM Christian radio station near Lyon in France, became Trans World Radio Europe’s 30th partner in November.

Directed by Jacques Aquila, Radio Colombe broadcasts on 107FM and covers the largest area of any Protestant radio station in France.

Founded in 1982, Radio Colombe recently helped pioneer a Protestant FM radio network within France. “We hope to cover every area of France,” notes Aquila. He adds that the network hopes to expand their audience to a younger demographic by airing mostly music with short, three-minute spots.

Many of Radio Colombe’s programs contain music along with a 30-minute Bible program, aimed at adults ages 45 to 60.

Since Aquila became director of Radio Colombe in 2004, the station has doubled its transmitting power and improved the quality of its programs. Radio Colombe hopes all Protestant FM stations in France will cooperate within this network.

Radio Colombe’s Website

Triple Award for Revelation TV

On Thursday 10th November six members of the Revelation TV team excitedly made their way up to Stoke On Trent to receive awards from the Christian Broadcast Council for their contribution to Christian Broadcasting.

In front of representatives from all walks of Christian Media including producers, terrestrial TV Channels, Satellite and Cable channels, Christian radio, Christian music artists , poets, etc....., Howard Condor received the gold award for Best Christian Satellite/Cable programme, for ‘London Terror Attacks 7/7/05'. This was a programme produced by Howard and Tom Russel,with interviews on the streets of London on that horrific day and live coverage of the events, from the London studios of Revelation TV.

Abigale and Antonia were were then called up to receive the bronze award, under the same category, for an interview with a victim of domestic violence. The victim’s face and voice had to be disguised to protect her identity.

Later in the evening Howard and Sam received the bronze award for ‘The Best of British Gospel’, a Revelation TV music programme featuring artists who recorded on their very own ‘Top of The Pops’ style stage.

Revelation TV operates with a team of only eleven and on limited budget but delivers more live programming than any other Christian television channel in the UK.

GBM Radio

GBM Radio is a ministry of Grace Baptist Mission which produces Bible based evangelistic and teaching material aired through the main christian broadcasters around the world.

Programming languages are English and French, with 3 programmes in current production:

• Sound Words (basic Bible teaching)
• Serving Today (aimed pastors and teachers, mainly in developping countries)
• Espérance aujourd'hui ('Hope for today' - in French, basic Bible teaching)

Traditionally Christian radio broadcasts have mainly used short-wave in order to reach wide areas with their message. However, the majority of programmes are now aired over FM local stations since this has become more popular and reasonably cheap.

As a result of the more local FM broadcasts, part of the GBM Radio ministry now is to train nationals to make use of the opportunities offered to them locally.

More information

Audio Ministry in Mozambique

Talking Bibles International is reaching an illiterate people group, the Xitshwa, in Mozambique with the gospel through partnership with Cross Connection Outreach, Youth with a Mission (YWAM) and local pastors.

Luke Rider with Cross Connection Outreach is the distribution and production partner for the New Testament for the approximately 1.7 million people who speak the language.

Rider says the literacy rate in Mozambique makes audio Scriptures essential. “The literacy rate in Mozambique is astounding. Basically, nobody reads their mother language,” Rider said.

“The local pastors, they know where we need to take them. Talking Bibles are working with the process. YWAM has provided us with technicians to record and the Bible society is encouraging it. We have about 500 Bibles in the country right now with about 400 in circulation. And, those Bibles are actually in areas where people have never heard the Word of God before.”

Also in Mozambique, eight hours of daily Christian Portuguese programs airs on an FM station in Maputo, the result of a cooperative effort involving HCJB World Radio, Trans World Radio and Radio Africa Network.

Christian Radio in Constanta

More than 345,000 people living in Constanta, Romania, a strategic port city on the Black Sea, can now hear Christian radio broadcasts in their native tongue through a joint effort of HCJB World Radio, the Romanian Missionary Society (RMS) and local believers.

The station is part of the Radio Voice of the Gospel (RVG), a nationwide network of eight Christian FM stations. HCJB World Radio and RMS helped with equipment and funding for construction and materials that were purchased locally.

Station Manager Bogdan Vlagea and his young 20-something staff began broadcasting at 2 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 6, after a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by station managers from most of the other seven network stations along with local pastors and supporters. HCJB World Radio Romanian Director Steve Hunter also attended. The initial broadcasts were followed by a three-hour dedication service at the Second Baptist Church where the studios are located.

Hunter says the station will easily cover the entire city’s population as well as “many more listeners within a radius of 30 to 40 miles from the city center.” Constanta is the largest seaport on the Black Sea with commercial vessels arriving from around the world to serve Eastern Europe.

RVG had included Constanta in its original strategy to blanket Romania's main population centers with Christian radio programming. However, the initial application for this license was denied. About three years ago when authorities reopened bidding for licenses in Constanta, RVG reapplied and was granted the license for the eighth station in the network.

To lay a foundation for the station, a local advisory committee was formed to develop local support. The chairman is Daniel Fodorean, a young Baptist pastor who works in the Constanta area. He has planted 69 churches throughout eastern Romania in the last 10 years. It was through Fodorean’s initiative that space for the radio studios was offered in the Second Baptist Church’s educational building.

Plans are also under way to place RVG programs on Europe’s digital direct-broadcast satellite radio system. Unlike XM or Sirius satellite radio in the U.S., the new service will not require listeners to pay a subscription fee. Many Europeans already have the inexpensive satellite receivers that will pick up the broadcasts.

During Hunter’s recent visit to Romania, German engineer Matthias Barthel provided a satellite training session for RVG station managers. This training, held two days prior to the dedication of the Constanta station, set a basic groundwork for a new satellite ministry with plans to begin operations in early 2006. The licensing agreement with the Romanian government requires satellite broadcasting to begin before the start of 2007.

Satellite broadcasts will reach all of Romania as well as Romanian speakers in other parts of Europe. “For the first time since its inception, RVG will have, by means of the satellite, the technical facility to carry simultaneous programming on all eight stations—something that has not been possible until now,” Hunter explained. “The highest quality programs from each of the stations will then be carried on the network. In addition, individual stations will still broadcast local programs, weather and news.”

HCJB World Radio and the Romanian Missionary Society assisted Romanian Christians in establishing RVG soon after the fall of communism in 1989. HCJB World Radio has provided all of the network radio stations with equipment, training in broadcast arts and technical help.

RMS assisted with personnel and funding for construction and furnishings. Moody Radio also provided numerous seminars in Romania as well as training for key Romanian personnel at WMBI, Moody’s Chicago station.

(HCJB World Radio)

Funding needed for Haiti

As violence continues in Haiti, Christians know that the only answer to this is a heart change. According to Men for Missions, the laymen's voice of OMS International, Christian radio can help.

Men for Mission's Wayne King says Christian radio station, 4VEH isn't only proclaiming the Gospel to those who haven't heard, but it's discipling believers, too. "In a country like Haiti, which is known for its mountains and the terrain. It's difficult for people to get to church. So, radio is something that they can do. So, 4VEH provides that tool of discipleship."

King says 4VEH is needed for another good reason. "Many of the pastors of the churches in Haiti have received minimal education. And so, they need to be trained in an ongoing way, just like the new convert needs to be trained."

However, funding is a great need right now. "With all of the events of Katrina and the catastrophe that we faced, there is a tremendous strain on charitable giving that people are able to do." 4VEH is facing a $45,000 deficit this month, says King.

That doesn't even take into account the goal to place 250,000 radios throughout Haiti so even more people can hear the Gospel.

King says a long term financial commitment is what's needed. He says that will do a lot, "to seeing a country changed from a country of voodoo, ignorance, to a country where the Gospel of Jesus Christ is in the forefront."

Honouring Memory of Radio Pioneer

Former HCJB World Radio missionary Rev. Rodrigo Zapata was remembered as a scholar, pastor and friend by those at a memorial service at the church where he had pastored in his native Ecuador Tuesday, Nov. 22.

A small group gathered in the Iñaquito Evangelical Church in Quito to remember Zapata, his ministry and his marriage to Mercedes, his wife of 43 years. He died Sept. 15 in California at the age of 67.

Born on Oct. 12, 1937, Zapata earned an engineering degree in Guayaquil, Ecuador. He studied the Bible after meeting an Ecuadorian carpenter who challenged him to do so, and in the early 1960s prayed with an HCJB World Radio chaplain to receive Jesus Christ as Savior.



Zapata and his wife began attending the Iñaquito Evangelical Church, across from the mission’s main compound in Quito, and soon he began pastoring there. He later received a theology degree at Seminario Bíblico in San José, Costa Rica. Pastoring in Zapote, Costa Rica, he became known as “Zapata de Zapote.”

At HCJB World Radio in Quito, where he served as a missionary from 1980 until 1993, Zapata was the first dean of the mission’s Christian Center of Communications. He also helped with a biblical literacy radio program and wrote and produced radio programs with Mercedes. He began his work with HCJB World Radio as an employee in the Radio Circle, a ministry in which the mission built simple fix-tuned radios for Ecuadorians who couldn’t afford commercial receivers.

Zapata faced tough scrutiny in Ecuador for his views on liberation theology. His concepts, though not popular with fellow missionaries and many Ecuadorian pastors, were published in such books as Human Rights Are Biblical and Theology of Liberation: Its Roots, Development and Challenges.

He led such groups as the Inter-American Broadcasters based in Costa Rica and the Ecuadorian Evangelical Fraternity. Estuardo López, who now heads the latter group, remembered Zapata’s self-sacrifice to disciple younger Christians, including himself.

Later in the U.S., Zapata taught at the Hispanic Bible School of Chicago. Then in California, toward the end of his career, he and Mercedes were both named pastors with the Church of the Brethren. District Director Bryan Boyer helped evaluate Zapata who was “so thorough in his answers that the committee recommended full ordination be granted to the Church of the Brethren—something that is not often offered to persons from other denominations.”

Zapata is survived by his wife, Mercedes, three children, Richard, Hito and Rocío, and eight grandchildren.

DAB Listening Increases

The hours for radio listening via digital radio receivers (DAB) has overtaken the combined listening hours via digital television (DTV) and the Internet for the first time.

Total listening hours via digital radio receivers (DAB) has grown by 165% according to RAJAR's latest 'Listening via Platforms' survey results undertaken during August and September this year.

Listening hours via the Internet has increased by 84%, DTV has risen by 42% and DAB overtakes with 39% more listening hours than both combined. DAB also records a 95% increase in reach compared to the Internet with 30% and DTV with a 28% increase.

Managing Director of RAJAR, Sally de la Bedoyere said:
"The findings of the latest RAJAR Listening via Platform Survey make encouraging reading for the digital radio industry in the UK...While listening via digital, DTV and Internet receivers has been gradually increasing over the past year, listening via DAB has grown by a staggering 165%."

In addition, the number of listeners who claim to own a DAB receiver or listen to the radio via DTV or the Internet has increased by 25% compared to the same survey taken a year ago.

Ian Dickens, chief executive of DRDB said:
"RAJAR's Platform Survey findings very much match the DRDB's own research which shows sales of DAB digital radios more than doubling year-on-year. Consumers are delighting in the new, unique content available on DAB stations, both commercial and BBC, and this is translating into rapidly growing listening figures."

RAJAR announced the survey results on the 21st November 2005 and it was the second 'Listening via Platform' survey to be undertaken by RAJAR since 2004.

At present there is no Christian radio presence on the UK DAB networks, partly because of the restrictive UK licencing system which existed when the main networks were opened.

History Makers - from 95Five

Brisbane Australia's 95Five www.96five.com is preparing to launch their new "History Makers" programme early in 2006 and wishes to identify any stations which would be interested in taking the programme. So far, worldwide, 19 stations have indicated interested in taking the show.

A new website, www.historymakersradio.com is under construction. Stations which carry the new programme will be listed, with their station logo, time and day it will go to air and a link to the station website.

Each show will be downloadable from an FTP site.

A weekly promo for the show and a media kit will also be provided so you can promote the show on your website, and newsletter etc.

Anyone interested, please contact Matthew Prater at 95Five at the following contact details:-

Matthew Prater, Business Development Manager, www.96five.com

e-mail matt@96five.com

Phone: 07 3217 5999 Fax: 07 3217 5888

Mobile: 0402 477 746 matthew@96five.com

2/20 McDougall Street, Milton Queensland 4064

POSTAL: PO Box 965, Milton Queensland 4064

First Kulina Language Broadcasts

The newest language on HCJB World Radio’s shortwave station in Ecuador airs for just five minutes a day, making it the “shortest language program we’ve ever done,” said Station Manager Doug Weber. “But I think it’s an important program because it’s basically a Bible-reading program.”

It’s also the first Kulina radio programming -- secular or Christian -- according to HCJB World Radio’s partner ministry in the area. The new programs began airing as part of the Portuguese-language release (or programming block) on Sunday, Oct. 30.

Kulina is one of four living dialects of the Arawá language family. Producers at HCJB World Radio’s World Office in Curitiba in southern Brazil collaborate with a Kulina speaker working in the Brazilian and Peruvian Amazon region. From Curitiba, the programs are sent via the Internet to Eunice Carvajal in Ecuador who coordinates program releases.

The Joshua Project, a missions research ministry, lists 1,200 Kulina (also known as Colina or Madija) speakers in Peru and Brazil. Carvajal puts that figure higher, saying the broadcasts could reach as many as 4,000 people. Since many Kulina speakers already tune in to Radio Station HCJB’s Portuguese programs, it was a natural fit to add their native language.

Normally at least one person in each village has a shortwave radio, along with a public address system for communal listening, said Ingrid Winter who directs the mission’s Portuguese Language Service from Curitiba.

University anthropologist Domingos Bueno da Silva noted that Lutheran and Wycliffe missionaries have worked among the Kulina. Evangelicals make up less than 20 percent of Kulina speakers with 70 percent claiming to be Christian, according to Joshua Project. The remainder adhere to ethnic religions. Operation World calls Brazil the “largest spiritist country in the world” with a majority of Brazilians involved in spiritism while still claiming to be Christian. Da Silva added that many of the Kulina believe sickness is “basically caused by dori or witchcraft.”

Shortwave radio penetrates areas otherwise inaccessible by radio, especially Christian radio. “Many of our listeners send us letters telling us that they live two or three days’ walk from a town where they can attend church (which they do infrequently), stock up on food, or mail letters,” Carvajal said.

Weber said he isn’t looking for many letters from Kulina listeners, but he hopes to hear results of the broadcasts via the Curitiba staff’s contact with the Kulina-speaking program producer.

“You have to remember that a lot of people listening in that region are never going to write a letter [to the station],” said HCJB World Radio’s Curt Cole. He preceded Weber as station manager and oversaw the station’s mid-2003 transition that refocused Quito broadcasts on Latin America. Cole now serves as the mission’s vice president of international ministries. He said of the Portuguese-language block, “I think it’s a very strong release—one of our strongest.”

Both before and after the 2003 ministry transition, lesser-known languages have been added. Daily Low German broadcasts have been airing since early 2002 for Mennonite settlers in Central and South America. Languages such as Woarani (started in 1999), Cofán (started in March 2005) and now Kulina have joined the lineup of indigenous languages, including Quichua and Quechua which have aired for decades.

More indigenous programming is planned. “We have some others actually that are in process too, that we would like to add,” Weber said. HCJB World Radio’s presence on shortwave radio continues across Latin America from Quito and in the Asia Pacific region from Kununurra, Australia.

The Kulina broadcasts come on the heels of HCJB World Radio-Australia’s addition of seven languages to its broadcast schedule. In late August programs in Bangla, Bhojpuri, Tamil, Telegu, Marwari, Marathi and Santhali were added for Asian audiences.

(HCJB World Radio)

USA Arabic TV Channel

The founder of the first Arabic Christian television channel in the U.S. says he is getting many calls from curious Muslims.

The channel Alkarma -- which means “vineyard” in Arabic -- premiered last month.

The founder, Samuel Estefanos, says there are about 35 Arabic-language channels available to viewers in the USA, but none were Christian until his went on the air.

Estafanos says he gets about 10 to 15 calls a day from Arabic speakers who say they are Muslim and need to know more about Christ. He says he has families call him and say they have met Jesus through the programming of Alkarma.

Estefanos, an Egyptian-born businessman, has produced some of his own Arabic programming for the channel in different dialects of Arabic, including Syrian, Iraqi, and Egyptian. He also uses some English programs.

Estefanos says his goal for Alkarma is two-fold: to provide solid biblical teaching, and to provide family-friendly programming.

Alkarma TV website