Brian & Bophal-Yos Maher - CAMBODIA
CONTACT
BRIAN MAHER
EMAIL: brianmaher57@gmail.com
PHONE: 855-077-677-203
USA ADDRESS: 17759 13th Ave NW
Shoreline, WA 98177
Shoreline, WA 98177
CAMBODIA ADDRESS: House 427, Street 89 BT, Boeung Tumpun, Meanchey, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
BOPHAL
EMAIL: bophal.yos@gmail.com
PHONE: 855-012-923-181
WEBSITE: www.coporphanage.com/
BLOG: dovekhmer.blogspot.com
BLOG: geckocry.blogspot.com/
FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/coporphanage/
ABOUT
Brian is married to Bophal, and they had two adopted Cambodian children, Mr. Johnnathan and Miss Yorean. They recently lost their 18-year old daughter, Yorean and are still in the grieving process. Brian's background is both in forestry/arboriculture and leadership development. He has an MA in Intercultural Studies from Fuller Seminary and has been serving in Cambodia since 1994, when he first worked with the Evangelical Fellowship of Cambodia, and World Vision Cambodia, and most recently Mission Dove Cambodia, training emerging church leaders and doing men's work. He is the author of Cry of the Gecko, a book about the history of the Evangelical Mission in Cambodia. Brian is from Connecticut but calls Seattle his home away from Cambodia. Bophal, a war-orphan , was trained by World Concern and worked for World Vision Cambodia as a Trainer of Trainers of Sunday School teachers and Children's clubs until starting her own center for children at risk in 2001. She is active in the training of emerging leaders through Mission DOVE and is starting a Literacy and English school in a very remote area near their Pepper (corns) farm in northern Cambodia.
Brian is involved in translating AA’s Big Book and 12 Steps Book, counsels young people, does men’s work, recovery work, and mentoring of leaders in their forties. He works with young people by creating safe communities where he and his Cambodian colleague help young people address intergenerational trauma and mental health issues. He and his Cambodian colleague have been leading a small home church for many years now. With other Cambodian colleagues, Brian does a radio show on addiction and teaches a course to pastors on contextual theology.
His ministry is mainly discipleship through the creation of community groups that depend on dialogue, reflection, telling your story, mission and adventure retreats. All of it, in some way or another, addresses trauma and emotional pain, how to manage it and heal from it. Richard Rohr said, “True spirituality always boils down to how we deal with the pain.” The Cambodian national church does not address emotional pain experienced by many of Cambodia’s teens and young adults. Their philosophy is, “Give it over to God and move on.”
Cambodia is a "Sibling Society." The average emotional age of the Cambodian people, due to war and genocide, is around 13 years of age, not much different from Global North countries. Cambodian young people have too few tools to address their wounds and pain, and for evaluating what globalization drops on their doorstep through social media. They tend to accept, carte blanche, any form of global popular culture that is trending at the moment without discernment, while churches tell them that the Sunday morning sermon is all they need for life and godliness. Good parenting is rare, and is mainly reactive in terms of anger expressed through emotional and physical abuse, and neglect on the other hand. Shame, blame, comparisons, and unwanted advice in long monologues are what young people get everywhere they go. Hence, young people become resentful and seek to avoid adults in positions of power. Just being a safe, caring, non-judgmental listening adult can open many doors to helping them. In addition, the Cambodian Sibling Society, is also an "Elder-less society." Parents and adults have been so traumatized that they can barely keep their own fraying lives together. A Sibling Society with no emotionally mature fathers or elders leads to a society of addiction. Drugs, alcohol, sex and gambling addictions are endemic, and many young people lose their way following the crowd. There are few adult males, fathers, or church elders around who model spiritual wisdom, maturity, moderation and compassion, but when there is one available, it makes all the difference in the world in the lives of young people.
Most senior church leadership suffers from some level of mental illness themselves, associated with the trauma of the genocide. They are still, in many ways, stuck in survival mode, doing what they can to ensure their financial security and survival. Although many senior church leaders have been exposed to contemporary Christian leadership theory, their default setting is one of emulating political leaders in terms of autocratic leadership with little accountability, long sermons (speeches), and immunity from consequences. Few churches have the apparatus for members to dismiss a pastor for misconduct and few see duplicity as an Elephant in the room as it has been normalized.
Brian and his Cambodian colleagues recognize that the main gaping hole in the soul of Cambodia is the intergenerational trauma/emotional health of a large portion of the population. Trauma from genocide does not just resolve itself over time. It needs grassroots organizations in cooperation with the government to intentionally work together to break the cycle, and this is not happening on the structural side. The sectoral side is growing and is helpful but has a big job ahead of them without much encouragement from the government. We help in the process by creating safe, grassroots community groups (Alanon, Men's group, Communities of Practice, organic church groups) as places where young people can feel safe and freely dialogue, helping them move toward improvement in their emotional health and to begin the journey of becoming a mature role model for others, a good parent and spouse, mentor, leader, and elder in both the church and society. The Cambodian church believes that preaching and teaching from the Bible, will, by default, without help from other disciplines, cover a multitude of character defects, wounds and addictions, and therefore they have no impetus to create effective strategies to identify and target specific areas in which to assist young people in transformation, healing, and personal development.
In the past, we focused on creating a pool of emerging leaders who can serve as informants and prophets for their churches, helping their churches become relevant to the needs of society. But church leaders felt threatened, and were insulted that young adults thought they could contribute ideas to the life and ministry of their churches. Young people gave up, and just blended back into the old, traditional church practice. So, we took a longer view and began discipling, through addressing mental health issues, non-believers, seekers, or Christians who were comfortable with trying new forms of spiritual formation. We trusted that God would place them, Christian or not, where he wants them, in his timing, to do what he wants them to do, whatever that looks like in the future.
It’s not about victory, it’s not about numbers, it’s about bearing witness to the Kingdom of God on earth, and we do that by pouring out lives for those who are ready to make changes.
Brian is married to Bophal, and they had two adopted Cambodian children, Mr. Johnnathan and Miss Yorean. They recently lost their 18-year old daughter, Yorean and are still in the grieving process. Brian's background is both in forestry/arboriculture and leadership development. He has an MA in Intercultural Studies from Fuller Seminary and has been serving in Cambodia since 1994, when he first worked with the Evangelical Fellowship of Cambodia, and World Vision Cambodia, and most recently Mission Dove Cambodia, training emerging church leaders and doing men's work. He is the author of Cry of the Gecko, a book about the history of the Evangelical Mission in Cambodia. Brian is from Connecticut but calls Seattle his home away from Cambodia. Bophal, a war-orphan , was trained by World Concern and worked for World Vision Cambodia as a Trainer of Trainers of Sunday School teachers and Children's clubs until starting her own center for children at risk in 2001. She is active in the training of emerging leaders through Mission DOVE and is starting a Literacy and English school in a very remote area near their Pepper (corns) farm in northern Cambodia.
Brian is involved in translating AA’s Big Book and 12 Steps Book, counsels young people, does men’s work, recovery work, and mentoring of leaders in their forties. He works with young people by creating safe communities where he and his Cambodian colleague help young people address intergenerational trauma and mental health issues. He and his Cambodian colleague have been leading a small home church for many years now. With other Cambodian colleagues, Brian does a radio show on addiction and teaches a course to pastors on contextual theology.
His ministry is mainly discipleship through the creation of community groups that depend on dialogue, reflection, telling your story, mission and adventure retreats. All of it, in some way or another, addresses trauma and emotional pain, how to manage it and heal from it. Richard Rohr said, “True spirituality always boils down to how we deal with the pain.” The Cambodian national church does not address emotional pain experienced by many of Cambodia’s teens and young adults. Their philosophy is, “Give it over to God and move on.”
Cambodia is a "Sibling Society." The average emotional age of the Cambodian people, due to war and genocide, is around 13 years of age, not much different from Global North countries. Cambodian young people have too few tools to address their wounds and pain, and for evaluating what globalization drops on their doorstep through social media. They tend to accept, carte blanche, any form of global popular culture that is trending at the moment without discernment, while churches tell them that the Sunday morning sermon is all they need for life and godliness. Good parenting is rare, and is mainly reactive in terms of anger expressed through emotional and physical abuse, and neglect on the other hand. Shame, blame, comparisons, and unwanted advice in long monologues are what young people get everywhere they go. Hence, young people become resentful and seek to avoid adults in positions of power. Just being a safe, caring, non-judgmental listening adult can open many doors to helping them. In addition, the Cambodian Sibling Society, is also an "Elder-less society." Parents and adults have been so traumatized that they can barely keep their own fraying lives together. A Sibling Society with no emotionally mature fathers or elders leads to a society of addiction. Drugs, alcohol, sex and gambling addictions are endemic, and many young people lose their way following the crowd. There are few adult males, fathers, or church elders around who model spiritual wisdom, maturity, moderation and compassion, but when there is one available, it makes all the difference in the world in the lives of young people.
Most senior church leadership suffers from some level of mental illness themselves, associated with the trauma of the genocide. They are still, in many ways, stuck in survival mode, doing what they can to ensure their financial security and survival. Although many senior church leaders have been exposed to contemporary Christian leadership theory, their default setting is one of emulating political leaders in terms of autocratic leadership with little accountability, long sermons (speeches), and immunity from consequences. Few churches have the apparatus for members to dismiss a pastor for misconduct and few see duplicity as an Elephant in the room as it has been normalized.
Brian and his Cambodian colleagues recognize that the main gaping hole in the soul of Cambodia is the intergenerational trauma/emotional health of a large portion of the population. Trauma from genocide does not just resolve itself over time. It needs grassroots organizations in cooperation with the government to intentionally work together to break the cycle, and this is not happening on the structural side. The sectoral side is growing and is helpful but has a big job ahead of them without much encouragement from the government. We help in the process by creating safe, grassroots community groups (Alanon, Men's group, Communities of Practice, organic church groups) as places where young people can feel safe and freely dialogue, helping them move toward improvement in their emotional health and to begin the journey of becoming a mature role model for others, a good parent and spouse, mentor, leader, and elder in both the church and society. The Cambodian church believes that preaching and teaching from the Bible, will, by default, without help from other disciplines, cover a multitude of character defects, wounds and addictions, and therefore they have no impetus to create effective strategies to identify and target specific areas in which to assist young people in transformation, healing, and personal development.
In the past, we focused on creating a pool of emerging leaders who can serve as informants and prophets for their churches, helping their churches become relevant to the needs of society. But church leaders felt threatened, and were insulted that young adults thought they could contribute ideas to the life and ministry of their churches. Young people gave up, and just blended back into the old, traditional church practice. So, we took a longer view and began discipling, through addressing mental health issues, non-believers, seekers, or Christians who were comfortable with trying new forms of spiritual formation. We trusted that God would place them, Christian or not, where he wants them, in his timing, to do what he wants them to do, whatever that looks like in the future.
It’s not about victory, it’s not about numbers, it’s about bearing witness to the Kingdom of God on earth, and we do that by pouring out lives for those who are ready to make changes.
Discipleship for Emerging Leaders in Context
The Ministries of DOVE: ONYX program, Alongsiders, Drop in Center, Men's work and Addiction Recovery
DOVE's ministry addresses discipleship, leadership, capacity building and the healing of the emotional pain experienced by many of our emerging church people and not-yet-believing young people. Cambodia is a "Sibling Society." The average emotional age of the Cambodian people, due war and genocide, is around 14 year years of age, not much different from developed countries. Cambodian young people have been given no tools to filter what globalization drops on their doorstep, and tend to accept, carte blanche, any trends the see on the Internet or social media, while churches simply condemn anything not Christian, as worldly. Parenting is rarely proactive, and mainly reactive in terms of anger, emotional and physical violence. In addition to being a "Sibling Society," Cambodia is also an "elder-less society." Parents and adults have been so traumatized that instead of guiding this generation of youth, they are depending on this generation of young people to interpret the rapidly changing cultural landscape for them. It is a role reversal that puts a huge burden on the young people, and they become resentful and rebellious. A Sibling Society with no elders leaders to a society of addiction and we see this constantly in Cambodia. Drug and alcohol addiction is endemic, and many young people lose their way just following the crowd. There are very few elder Cambodian role models who model spiritual wisdom, moderation and compassion as most senior church leadership suffer from some level of mental illness associated with the trauma of the genocide. They are still, in many ways stuck in survival mode, doing what they can to ensure their financial security and survival. Although many senior church leaders are familiar with contemporary Christian leadership theory, their default setting is one of emulating national and political leaders in terms of being an autocratic leader with little accountability, long sermons (speeches), immunity, and cover up of gross sin. Few churches have policy that allows members to dismiss a pastor for misconduct or other reasons.
DOVE recognizes that one particular hole in the soul of Cambodia is the secondary trauma/emotional health of young people in a society where healthy and positive adult role models rarely exist. DOVE ministries are providing forums where young people can experience transformation in their emotional health and begin the journey of becoming a healthy role model, mentor, leader, and elder in both the Church and society. Most churches think that preaching and teaching the Bible will by de facto, heal and address a multitude of sins, and therefore they have no impetus to create effective strategy that can help identify and target specific areas in young people that need transformation, healing, and development. DOVE, through the ONYX program, Alongsiders (big brother big sister program), Drop in Center, (Language Lab & Leadership Club) has been building up a pool of emerging leaders who can serve as informants and prophets for the Church. These are the next generation of church leaders and our intention is that they begin to model healthy, humble and mature leadership to both Church and society.
ONYX Program
The ONYX Program is an "in-service," yearlong training program for emerging church leaders across denominational lines which utilizes peer mentoring, field work, and participatory classroom work. Although ONYX does impart knowledge and skills, it focuses more on changing attitudes and habits. We assist in the transformation and healing of emerging leaders by providing safe and constructive learning communities. DOVE developed new curriculum in 2013, based on Jane Vella's adult learning methodologies. We redesigned all of our lesson material accordingly. Some topics covered are: Personal Spiritual Formation, Focused Leaders Timeline, Leadership, Social Justice/Environment Men's/Women's block, 5 Love Languages, Missional church, and Khmer Church History. The topics are covered in 4-5 week blocks followed by fieldwork that relates to the block. Homework includes interviews, research papers, reflection papers, and a final research project. Students are required to meet in their peer-mentoring group every week. Monitoring and evaluation of the impact on the students is built into the design of each lesson. During class, homework, field trips, exposure trips, and retreats, facilitators can observe how the students process and apply their learning.
The ONYX program has both a beginning year and end year retreat. The opening year retreat is a challenging adventure camp to push students out of their comfort zone so they bond and can walk together for the following year. The ending year retreat helps students solidify what they have learned. We are have begun year 4 with a great start.
Through DOVE, we do men's work with the goals of learning about ourselves and healing from emotional pain, as well as recovery work through the 12 Step program.
The Ministries of DOVE: ONYX program, Alongsiders, Drop in Center, Men's work and Addiction Recovery
DOVE's ministry addresses discipleship, leadership, capacity building and the healing of the emotional pain experienced by many of our emerging church people and not-yet-believing young people. Cambodia is a "Sibling Society." The average emotional age of the Cambodian people, due war and genocide, is around 14 year years of age, not much different from developed countries. Cambodian young people have been given no tools to filter what globalization drops on their doorstep, and tend to accept, carte blanche, any trends the see on the Internet or social media, while churches simply condemn anything not Christian, as worldly. Parenting is rarely proactive, and mainly reactive in terms of anger, emotional and physical violence. In addition to being a "Sibling Society," Cambodia is also an "elder-less society." Parents and adults have been so traumatized that instead of guiding this generation of youth, they are depending on this generation of young people to interpret the rapidly changing cultural landscape for them. It is a role reversal that puts a huge burden on the young people, and they become resentful and rebellious. A Sibling Society with no elders leaders to a society of addiction and we see this constantly in Cambodia. Drug and alcohol addiction is endemic, and many young people lose their way just following the crowd. There are very few elder Cambodian role models who model spiritual wisdom, moderation and compassion as most senior church leadership suffer from some level of mental illness associated with the trauma of the genocide. They are still, in many ways stuck in survival mode, doing what they can to ensure their financial security and survival. Although many senior church leaders are familiar with contemporary Christian leadership theory, their default setting is one of emulating national and political leaders in terms of being an autocratic leader with little accountability, long sermons (speeches), immunity, and cover up of gross sin. Few churches have policy that allows members to dismiss a pastor for misconduct or other reasons.
DOVE recognizes that one particular hole in the soul of Cambodia is the secondary trauma/emotional health of young people in a society where healthy and positive adult role models rarely exist. DOVE ministries are providing forums where young people can experience transformation in their emotional health and begin the journey of becoming a healthy role model, mentor, leader, and elder in both the Church and society. Most churches think that preaching and teaching the Bible will by de facto, heal and address a multitude of sins, and therefore they have no impetus to create effective strategy that can help identify and target specific areas in young people that need transformation, healing, and development. DOVE, through the ONYX program, Alongsiders (big brother big sister program), Drop in Center, (Language Lab & Leadership Club) has been building up a pool of emerging leaders who can serve as informants and prophets for the Church. These are the next generation of church leaders and our intention is that they begin to model healthy, humble and mature leadership to both Church and society.
ONYX Program
The ONYX Program is an "in-service," yearlong training program for emerging church leaders across denominational lines which utilizes peer mentoring, field work, and participatory classroom work. Although ONYX does impart knowledge and skills, it focuses more on changing attitudes and habits. We assist in the transformation and healing of emerging leaders by providing safe and constructive learning communities. DOVE developed new curriculum in 2013, based on Jane Vella's adult learning methodologies. We redesigned all of our lesson material accordingly. Some topics covered are: Personal Spiritual Formation, Focused Leaders Timeline, Leadership, Social Justice/Environment Men's/Women's block, 5 Love Languages, Missional church, and Khmer Church History. The topics are covered in 4-5 week blocks followed by fieldwork that relates to the block. Homework includes interviews, research papers, reflection papers, and a final research project. Students are required to meet in their peer-mentoring group every week. Monitoring and evaluation of the impact on the students is built into the design of each lesson. During class, homework, field trips, exposure trips, and retreats, facilitators can observe how the students process and apply their learning.
The ONYX program has both a beginning year and end year retreat. The opening year retreat is a challenging adventure camp to push students out of their comfort zone so they bond and can walk together for the following year. The ending year retreat helps students solidify what they have learned. We are have begun year 4 with a great start.
Through DOVE, we do men's work with the goals of learning about ourselves and healing from emotional pain, as well as recovery work through the 12 Step program.