Source: International Mission Board, April 20, 2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Daniel Bates couldn\u2019t believe his eyes. But there it was, tucked between a pastel row of caf\u00e9s and cobblestone alleys in downtown Ljubljana, Slovenia\u2014a\u00a0friendly local game store. He pulled [his wife] Heather through the door and into a world alive with colorful miniature role-play scenes and towers of board game boxes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It had been hard for the family to make close local friends when [their church] first sent them to Slovenia through the IMB. Their Slovenian language skills were still a work in progress, so most interactions with parents at the kids\u2019 school or with neighbors stayed polite and surface-level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But in this game shop, the connection through board games was immediate. The owner invited Daniel to join a weekly game night in another town. The distance wasn\u2019t an issue. Slovenia, after all, is roughly the size of New Jersey, and the gaming group drew people from every direction. They used a Discord channel to keep in touch during the week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe use different social platforms\u2014Reddit, WhatsApp, Messenger, Discord\u2014as part of our digital engagement strategy for ministry. This is where people gather, so we want to be there too,\u201d Daniel said. \u201cWe\u2019ve found most will never talk to you in person, but they will chat on the computer with you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBut taking these relationships from digital to physical is hard,\u201d he continued. \u201cThat\u2019s what made this gaming group so different. It\u2019s hybrid. They meet physically and use their Discord channel to keep in touch during the week.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Read the full story<\/a>. Always good to see people leveraging their interests to connect with those who enjoy the same things. Evidently Daniel loves board games (and Slovenians).\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Source: International Mission Board, April 20, 2026 Daniel Bates couldn\u2019t believe his eyes. But there it was, tucked between a pastel row of caf\u00e9s and cobblestone alleys in downtown Ljubljana, Slovenia\u2014a\u00a0friendly local game store. He pulled [his wife] Heather through the door and into a world alive with colorful miniature role-play scenes and towers of … Continue reading Slovenia: Gaming Culture Leads to Gospel Connection<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-briefs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14648"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14648\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14650,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14648\/revisions\/14650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}