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The 2015 Presbyterian Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 247
Rev. Thomas Goetz
Long-term mission volunteer in Japan since 1989
Serving at Hokusei Gakuen University
Write to Thomas Goetz
Thomas is occasionally in the USA and available to speak as his schedule permits. Email him to extend an invitation to visit your congregation or organization.
About Tom Goetz' ministry
Tom Goetz is a long-term volunteer serving as professor of English in the Faculty of Social Welfare at Hokusei Gakuen University in Sapporo, Japan. He is also English language coordinator at Hokkaido Christian Center. Hokusei Gakuen University is a four-year liberal arts school founded more than 100 years ago by Presbyterian missionary Sarah Smith.
Country context
Japan is the world’s third largest producer of goods and services in the world and the fourth largest importer and exporter. Japan has a large industrial capacity and is home to some of the largest and most technologically advanced producers of motor vehicles, electronics, machine tools, steel and nonferrous metals, ships, chemical substances, textiles, and processed foods. Japanese workers enjoy a high standard of living. More than 127 million people live in Japan, making it the 10th most populous country in the world. Most people in Japan consider themselves adherents of Shintoism, Buddhism or both. Fewer than 1 percent are Christian.
About Tom Goetz
When Tom came under appointment as a mission associate of the PC(USA) in 1989, he was not a stranger to the East. From 1984 to 1986 he had worked for the Board of Education of the city of Sapporo as a teacher of English. After a year back in the United States working for a summer as the director of a Christian ministry in the U.S. National Parks and as a field education assistant at West Presbyterian Church in Wilmington, Delaware, Tom returned to Asia. For a short time he taught English at the Faculty of Theology at Payap University in Chiang Mai, Thailand. He then returned to the United States for a brief term as field education assistant for the Japanese Christian Church in Philadelphia.
Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Tom holds a B.A. in psychology from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon. He received his Master of Divinity with a specialization in missions and ecumenics from Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, New Jersey. Tom was ordained to the ministry of the Word and Sacrament in 1989 and is a minister member of the Presbytery of Milwaukee.
Tom and his wife, Hideko, have a son, Asher Hiro, and a daughter, Heidi Ann.
Birthdays:
Tom - March 21
Hideko - October 23
Asher Hiro - March 23
Heidi Ann - December 26
