EDMOND—The Philadelphia Church of God foreign language translations department has shifted into a higher gear during 2016, creating four new websites, translating 28 Key of David television programs, and producing piles of translated books, booklets and articles. As the year comes to an end, translators and editors have their sights set on even bigger goals.
“The focus of the department over the past year has changed, and progress has been excellent,” foreign language translations manager Edwin Trebels said. The department’s 56 translators and editors turn the pcg’s English-language literature and other media into Spanish, German, French, Italian, Dutch, Norwegian, Finnish and Portuguese. The department has also worked on translations in Hebrew and Afrikaans. In September, flt temporarily suspended printing some translations of the Philadelphia Trumpet newsmagazine and focused on translating theTrumpet.com, Key of David programs, online video and social media, in addition to ongoing literature translation. So far this year, versions of theTrumpet.com in German, Dutch, French and Spanish have gone live online. An Italian edition, laTromba.org, is planned to launch in the coming months.
Key of David presenter Gerald Flurry said that flt department head Brad Macdonald asked him to look at the German, French and Dutch websites and to offer feedback. “I thought it was fantastic,” Mr. Flurry said. “You can see it opening up God’s Word to these people. I saw myself speaking German and French, which is pretty neat, since I don’t know those languages.”
From its launch in February through the first full week of December, the German website logged 12,031 page views and 114 video views. Visitors downloaded literature 1,266 times and placed 48 orders. The affiliated YouTube channel logged 15,250 views. Since its launch in November, the French website attracted 803 page views and 114 video views, plus 125 downloads and 24 orders; its YouTube channel logged 246 views. The Dutch website, which also launched in November, logged 1,136 page views, five video views, 67 downloads and 13 orders; its YouTube channel recorded 65 views. The Spanish website collected 346 page views, 67 video views, 12 downloads and 7 orders since it went live in November; its YouTube channel has 151 views. Trebels said that the larger numbers probably include artificial page views (by search programs), but that he is encouraged by the figures for regular visitors and for literature downloads and orders.
The new websites have garnered a small-yet-loyal following. As of December 9, the German site, diePosaune.de, had attracted 66 visitors who return to the site every day; the French site, laTrompette.fr, 50; the Dutch site, theTrumpet.nl, 51; and the Spanish site, laTrompeta.es, 24. Visitors to the sites can now access more than 250 combined books and booklets, more than 60 lessons of the Herbert W. Armstrong College Bible Correspondence Course, and a trove of archived videos and articles. The French site has existed for less than two months but already has a stockpile of four years’ worth of articles.
“It’s amazing to me that people all over the world have access to this,” Mr. Flurry said. “There is no higher mountain than what we have on the Internet. If people hunger for the truth, they will be able to fulfill that hunger in every way.”
Meanwhile, translators, editors and layout assistants continue to produce books, booklets, articles and correspondence coursework in earnest. In February, they completed Lesson 8 and Test 4 of the correspondence course in Finnish; French versions of Who or What Is the Prophetic Beast, “The Fraud of Evolution” reprint article and Lessons 19 and 20 of the correspondence course; and a German version of the Nahum booklet. In March, they produced an updated version of Malachi’s Message and a How to Be an Overcomer audio book in Spanish, Lesson 21 of the correspondence course in French, Just What Do You Mean Conversion? in Portuguese, and correspondence course Tests 2 and 3 in Finnish. For the first quarter of 2016, the department mailed 1,975 pieces of foreign literature, including 1,664 in Spanish.
In April, the Spanish, French and Italian versions of the Trumpet newsmagazine each increased in circulation by 3 percent. The department also produced Daniel Unsealed at Last! and an updated version of Which Day Is the Christian Sabbath? in French, and Ezekiel: The End-Time Prophet in Norwegian. In May, The King of the South and The Proof of the Bible booklets became available in German, and “The Times of the Gentiles” reprint article became available in French.
In September, German versions of The Seven Laws of Success and America Under Attack, as well as Lesson 24 of the correspondence course in French, were completed. The department suspended printing German, French and Italian versions of the Trumpet magazine and devoted more of its power to online efforts; it also hired a professional translating company to produce one German-language article per week for diePosaune.de. In November, French translators completed America Under Attack, Lesson 22 of the correspondence course and updates to Jerusalem in Prophecy and He Was Right. The department also completed The Truth About Christmas in Norwegian.
The department received an extra boost in July when Trebels transferred to the pcg regional office in England, where department head Brad Macdonald is also based. The time Trebels had been spending at headquarters as an Imperial Academy instructor and as head usher and marketer for the Armstrong International Cultural Foundation is now focused almost entirely on managing translations. Trebels said that the move to the Edstone office has increased his translation department output since he now lives in the same time zone as many of the translators and much of the department’s potential audience; he can work more closely with co-workers and volunteers in the region; and he can fine-tune region-specific content on theTrumpet.com sites. Above all, Trebels said that living closer to so many non-English-speaking nations has helped remind him of the deep need for the work of the translations department.
“Our big goal is to reach the largest audience possible,” Trebels said. With websites and much of the literature library in place, the department aims to increase: the number of literature and reprint article downloads from the foreign-language Trumpet websites, webpage views, regular site visitors, literature orders, newsletter sign-ups, video views on the websites and on YouTube, YouTube channel subscribers, likes and shares on Facebook, and followers and retweets on Twitter.
Trebels said that he is now exploring an effective digital marketing strategy for bringing the pcg’s message to exponentially more people. “If you want to put it in farming terms,” he said, “it does seem like there is a lot of ‘low-hanging fruit’ ready for harvesting in these foreign-language nations.”