Greetings Ministry

Essentially helloRU.org is a greetings ministry encouraging individuals and communities to take greeting seriously. We would therefore appreciate faith followers and their faith communities to get onboard with what we are doing.

We believe that all faith followers and their faith communities should take greeting seriously as it is fundamental to the Great Commandments (we can hadly exercise love by ignoring one another).

Breaking into established communities is never easy for newcomers and faith communities should always be striving to make it easy for newcomers to become integrated.

We believe that it is wise for faith communities to encourage members to wear name badges and to also offer newcomers the option of wearing name badges so that everyone can more easily identify themselves. This does not need to be an expensive exercise as affordble name holders are readily available (or even blank name stickers to introduce newcomers). 

If faith communities would like to get behind the howRU.org ministry they are most welcome to print our web address howRU.org on their name labels. The simplest and most affordable way of achieving this is to invest in a self-inking stamp customised to print our friendly web address howRU.org (see great name badges).

Tips for setting up a greeting ministry in your faith community:

• Make the decision that greeting is important and worthy to encourage...

• It is easier if people take responsibility for their own name badge (returning each week wearing their name badge). However, to remind people that your faith community encourages name badge wearing it is imprtant to have prominent signage near the entrance door saying something like: We encourage name badge wearing to express more empathy for one another (name badge holders are available from welcomers for a small cost.).

• Purchase a batch of affordable clip-on/ pin-on name holders containing blank name cards (this is more sustainable than using temporary name stickers). The name holders can be left in a box just inside your church with a small sign indicating the unit cost to aquire. See great name badges to see how we suggest you customise each blank name holder (by using a self-inking stamp to print howRU.org on a small part of each blank name card). 

• Let people personalise their own name badge. It is much easier to encourage people to return each time wearing their name badge (avoids the messy task of distributing, collecting and storing of personalised name holders).

• To cater for newcomers (and people forgeting to wear their personalised name badges) it is worth having onhand a supply of blank stick-on address labels (on either sheets or reels). A small part of each sticker can always be customised using a self-inking howRU.org stamp (as mentioned at great address badges).

• If there is resistance to name badge wearing within yourfaith community, perhaps start by say making the first gathering of each month a "Name Badge Day."