BELLEVILLE Ontario Canada - According to ChristianWeek (Canada), some visitors to Desert Stream Christian Fellowship church are using a point-of-sale terminal provided by CIBC to make their contributions to the church.
Pastor Kevin Dowling said the CIBC terminal has been in the church's foyer for 15 months, as part of a strategy to encourage the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada congregation in their "tithing habits."
"One of the areas we really look at as a ministry in the church is giving," Dowling told ChristianWeek. "It's an act of worship."
He added that many of the 250-member congregation would either forget to bring their checkbooks, or did not have cash on hand. "We're always looking at different ways of making people's participation as accessible and easy as possible," he said.
Parishioners can purchase items from special events or give their tithes directly to the church bank account, but cannot do other transactions at the machine.
