wfn.org | Meeting on mission in Latin America provokes spirited debate

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jsolheim@dfms.org

2001-13

Meeting on mission in Latin America provokes spirited debate

by James Solheim

(ENS) An attempt to outline the mission of the church in Latin America as it faces a new 
millenium has provoked spirited debate at a mission consultation held in conjunction with 
an assembly of the Latin America Council of Churches (CLAI) in the Colombian port city of 
Barranquilla.

"Theology on the Road," a lengthy document prepared by CLAI's theology commission, was 
debated for three days and finally withdrawn in the face of strong criticism charging that 
it was "exclusive and racist" and out of touch with people at the grassroots.

"It was written by white Latin Americans, people with no awareness of indigenous people or 
people of African origin," said Norman Bent, a Moravian pastor from Nicaragua. "They 
consider their white power structure to represent the Evangelical movement in Latin 
America."

"The document shows their distance from people at the grassroots-and it's a big distance," 
added Margarita de la Torre, an indigenous woman who teaches at an Evangelical seminary in 
Ecuador. Beatriz Ferrari, a Methodist leader from Uruguay, said that it "displayed little 
sensitivity to women, indigenous, blacks and youth." The treatment of homosexuality also 
drew complaints.

"The original was written as if Latin America had just one culture," Ferrari said. "The 
writers chose the dominant culture as if that's all there is," and the document also 
represents "a very masculine concept of mission."

CLAI has 150 member churches in 21 countries of Latin America and the Spanish-speaking 
Caribbean.

A space for encounter

A six-page critique prepared by indigenous and black participants complained that the 
mission document followed a missiology that "denigrates indigenous peoples and blacks, 
conceiving of them as an object of mission, refusing to recognize mission as a space for 
encountering the other, where a relationship of reciprocity is established between equals, 
where all who participate in the relationship are mutually evangelized."

CLAI membership includes a mix of Evangelical and mainstream Protestant churches that has 
also produced some tension. Bent, for example, said that "the historical churches are 
worried that CLAI is losing its prophetic vision in exchange for gaining new member 
churches, members without any prophetic vision. As we enter the 21st century, CLAI seems 
intent on losing its vision, on becoming just one more of many organizations." He also 
doubts whether Pentecostals genuinely want to participate in ecumenical activities.

Participants recognize that the growth of Pentecostalism provides the greatest challenge to 
the ecumenical movement in Latin America but they couldn't agree on how to respond, "how to 
open up our movement to a wider participation of Pentecostal churches," said Prof. Walter 
Altman, outgoing president of CLAI, a Lutheran theologian from Brazil.

"CLAI has long been characterized by a wide variety of styles and theological traditions, 
but we've shared unity in the midst of that diversity," he said. "Some people worry that 
our diversity could be lost if Pentecostals became dominant within CLAI. Yet I believe that 
if Pentecostals aren't interested in unity or participating in our tradition of prophetic 
witness, then they aren't going to be interested in joining with us in CLAI."

Relating to Pentecostals

Israel Batista, a Cuban Methodist pastor who advocates closer ties with Pentecostals, said 
that they "have a richness that we can benefit from. If CLAI isn't a space where we can 
enter into this kind of dialogue and work with each other, then we're never going to 
prosper."

Some participants worried openly that more openness to Pentecostals might make ecumenical 
dialogue more difficult with the Roman Catholics, who are not members of CLAI.

"If CLAI gave in to the old antipathy between Catholics and Pentecostals it would be taking 
the wrong path," warned Federico Pagura, a former Methodist bishop in Argentina. "We must 
reject any pressure to align ourselves with any type of sectarianism, which is something 
that exists both within Catholicism as well as within Pentecostalism."

Others noted that some Pentecostals are expressing a more ecumenical attitude than in the 
past.

"Pentecostal faith offers a lot to the historic churches," argued Prof. Carlos Tamex of the 
Presbyterian Seminary in Mexico. He said that related to Pentecostals is not just an issue 
for CLAI, "it's a global issue."

"Bit by bit the historic churches have been parking themselves in a liturgical, doctrinal 
and disciplinary structure that has prevented us from fully living out the Gospel," he 
added. "Pentecostal faith helps get us closer to the spirituality of the people, the poor. 
We need to embrace it, carefully and with analysis, but nonetheless embrace this other 
dimension of the Gospel that has been absent in our churches." He does not believe that 
CLAI's traditional support for human rights and liberation are threatening by a closer 
relationship. "The Pentecostal experience is well grounded in Christian values of justice 
and solidarity."

--James Solheim is director of the Office of News and Information of the Episcopal Church. 
This article is based on reports by Paul Jeffrey for Ecumenical News International.