How do I make a donation to Ottawa CityChurch Network?

1. Click the "Donate" button above. 2. Fill out all the information. Make sure that "Ottawa CityChurch Network is selected in the "Designation" menu:

Can I receive a charitable receipt for my donations?

Donations made through the site are managed through the Evangelical Free Church of Canada. You will receive a donations receipt at the beginning of each year for your tax purposes.

How are funds distributed among the churches?

CityChurch funds are distributed according to the following principles:
1) Unlike most churches, we do not own property, pay rent, or provide salaries to our pastors or missionaries. We meet in private homes and our pastors and misisonaries are either bivocational or raise funds independently of the network. (1 Corinthians 9:13-18; 1 Thessalonians 2:5-12; 2 Thessalonians 3:6-10) 2) Our churches conduct themselves according to a simple household structure in a semi-autonomous fashion. This means that most of the body life, including generousity, is conducted in a household fashion (directly and immediately) within each church. Everyone who can is to contribute to the Lord's Supper (our commonal meal), and minor church expenses are expected to be simply absorbed by those of means in each house church. These minor expenses are done directly and without the involvement of the Ottawa CityChurch Network funds. Believers in each church are to be instructed to do what they can to contribute directly to the needs in front of them and to the Lord's Supper (2 Thessalonians 3:6-12; James 2:15-16).

Churches associated with OCN are not to collect their own regular offerings or funds, but are to direct all offerings and gifts toward the OCN. Churches may take a special collection for church specific activities (such as catering a meal, giving gifts to a member, etc.) but these collections are to be reimbursed directly and spent immediately and no charitable receipt shall be issued for such collections. 3. CityChurch funds are to be distributed:

• to reimburse material costs of discipleship resources incurred by the OCN and its churches (10% of budget)
• to reimburse costs associated with networkwide outreach or gathering (10% of budget)
• to extend benevolent charity to those facing financial hardship in a manner that alleivates hardship without fostering a relationship of dependence (40% of budget)
• to support a foreign missions through CRA certified charitable organizations (40% of budget)

Who manages the funds donated to OCN?

Donations to OCN are managed by our missionary team plus our network directors (Dan Byrne, Missionary; Neil Bassingswaitght, EFCC National Misison Director, Ron Koleba, EFCC Central District Superintendant). Requests for funds must be unamimously approved by our directors.

Donation and expense reports will be distributed to house church pastors and missionaries each month to share with any interested members.

How can I make a benevolence request?

Please speak to your house church leader regarding any benevolence request you would wish to make and they will bring the request to OCN.

What principles govern your charitable works?

We will seek to deliver relief and charity to individuals according to the time-tested and biblical principles for effective compassion as articulated by Marvin Olaski. You can read about them in more detail here and here.

1. Affliation: We ask, "Who is bound to help in this case" so that we do not supercede familiy ties, friends, or neighbours, etc. This is illustrated in 1 Timothy 5 when Paul requires that family members take care of their own widowed mothers, before the church is to care for them.
2. Bonding: Human beings are created in God's image for relationship. When applicants for help a century ago were truly alone, volunteers worked one-to-one to become, in essence, new family members. This is what we aspire to be in the household of God - a new family for those who are in need of one.
3. Categorization: Charities a century ago realized that two persons in exactly the same material circumstances, but with different values, need different treatment: one might benefit most from some material help and a pat on the back, the other might need spiritual challenge and a push. We cannot treat every case the same. We must distinguish between the truly needy, the down-on-their-luck, the idle, and the addict.
4. Discernment: Categorization requires discernment to see and to know the state of the need and the proper course of relief and support.
5. Employment: Those who are healthy and able to work must be encouraged and supported to work, even to volunteer, so as to not be idle, and to gain the stability and confidence that comes from contributing ones labour.
6. Freedom: We will work to promote the dignity of each individual and encourage them to take ownership of their own betterment.
7. God: “True philanthropy must take into account spiritual as well as physical needs,” poverty-fighters a century ago noted, and both Christians and Jews did. Bible-believing Christians worshipped a God who came to earth and showed in life and death the literal meaning of compassion—suffering with. Jewish teaching stressed the pursuit of righteousness through the doing of good deeds. Groups such as the Industrial Christian Alliance noted that they used “religious methods”—reminding the poor that God made them and had high expectations for them—to “restore the fallen and helpless to self-respect and self-support.”