![\"Rev](\"https:\/\/jss.ca\/blog\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2014\/02\/Rev-Yoshida-300x266.jpg\")
\nRev. Edward Yoshida is the Pastor of Wesley Chapel Japanese Church. He was one of the founding members of the Japanese Family Services (predecessor of Japanese Social Services) and he\u2019s been the longest-standing member and donor of both organizations in the last 25 years. We asked him to write about the birth of JFS and what he thinks of the current role of JSS in our community.<\/p>\n
By Edward S. Yoshida, Retired Minister\/J.S.S. member
\nThe author, Yoshida, was a Family Counselor\/Probation Officer for the government of Ontario when the first call came from Setsuko Thurlow, M.S.W.\u00a0 This was some months before Japanese Family Services was organized in 1980.\u00a0 In his capacity as Family Counsellor at the Family Court on 311 Jarvis St, he was usually assigned to Nikkei cases that required some interpretation. These included complaints of domestic violence, desertion and financial irresponsibilities, third party intrusion into the marriage, depression-related shoplifting, in-laws interference plus others.\u00a0 Setsuko herself was occasionally called by other social agencies, schools, courts & even hospitals to offer bilingual services despite her full-time commitment to the Metro Dept. of Social Services.
\nBefore the birth of J.F.S. these cases were brought to the attention of local church ministers and Buddhist priest. (Yoshida was one of them, wearing a dual hat) The Nikkei clients hesitated to seek their help because they feared the leakage of confidentiality.\u00a0 So when Setsuko gave the invitation, others involved with providing unofficial social services came to the early organizational meetings either at her home or the JCCC.\u00a0 She struck a similar chord in the minds of others.
\nAnother impetus for Yoshida\u2019s participation in this new organization came from the Bible.\u00a0 Jesus did not only teach and preach, but he fed, clothed, healed and helped those who were depressed and oppressed.\u00a0 Yoshida felt that serving these people was part of his ministerial call.\u00a0 What better place than the J.F.S. to serve the community can be found, he thought!
\nSome 20 years after its birth, the J.F.S. changed significantly in its outreach to the community.\u00a0 Its services grew, changed and morphed into other areas of community need.
\nNewcomers English Class was begun.\u00a0 Seminars and lectures on health, prevention of diseases, problem of dementia, community safety, translation of Ontario\u2019s available pamphlets on these issue and other kinds of referrals made the name, Family Services, too exclusive.\u00a0 Thus the name changed to J.S.S., Japanese Social Services in year 2000.
\nToday, J.S.S. has one full-time and one part-time counsellor.\u00a0 The two handle cases running into the hundreds and many man-hours over a one-year period. They also have one full time office administrator who handles office duties and coordinates various programs that JSS carries. They are further assisted by an army of volunteers who attend the J.S.S. office located inside the JCCC.\u00a0 And of course all members of the governing Board are volunteers.
\nIf J.S.S. should exit from the community, where can these Nikkei clients go for social services when their first language is not English?\u00a0 Even the government of Japan has begun to see its need.\u00a0 What J.S.S. needs today is a regular, consistent core of supporters and volunteers who will provide both funds and time to this relatively unknown organization.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rev. Edward Yoshida is the Pastor of Wesley Chapel Japanese Church. He was one of the founding members of the Japanese Family Services (predecessor of Japanese Social Services) and he\u2019s been the longest-standing member and donor of both organizations in the last 25 years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[259],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-jss-newsletter-vol-2-no-1-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10637\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jss.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}