Title: Ecumenical consultation celebrates shared hope
Date: December 12, 1997
Disciples News Service
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
Contact: news@cm.disciples.org
97b-66
INDIANAPOLIS (DNS) -- In many ways, the groups couldn't be more different. Nevertheless, an evangelical devotion to the gospel is what unites Hispanic Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and United Church of Christ members with partners from Pentecostal churches in Latin America and the Caribbean.
These groups -- the Disciples of Christ/United Church of Christ and their Pentecostal partners -- recently shared their common commitments in a consultation sponsored by the Common Global Ministries of the Disciples and UCC. The 40 participants convened under the theme, "Sharing of Hope: An Ecumenism of the Spirit."
The group also included observers from the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Puerto Rico and the Assembly of God in Lesotho, Southern Africa. The nearly 40-year pilgrimage "has been indeed an experience of life in the Spirit'" that nurtures each party involved, said the participants in a common statement of agreement.
The statement also celebrated the participants' ability to "cross frontiers" to meet and accept each other's diversity and understand their differences. "We affirm our common needs to tear down the many barriers that affect us today," the conferees added. These barriers include economic injustice, misunderstanding and prejudice against Pentecostalism and exclusion.
"We commit ourselves to be forgers of hope, with a clear awareness of the multiple challenges to be faced as we enter the 21st century with a reaffirmation of our pledge of service to the churches in the North and the South," the statement concluded.
The Disciples of Christ offers their overseas partners "sharing and relationships" that ultimately help both churches to "learn from one another," said the Rev. Rhodes Gonzalez, a pastor affiliated with the Council of Churches of Cuba.
"The spirit calls us to unity," she said, cautioning against dialogue between structures. She called instead for relationships between people. "We must recognize and share with one another."
Retired Disciples' Division of Overseas Ministries President William J. Nottingham challenged the participants to "communicate with people of our own churches." Middle class North American church members need to understand the link between spirituality and the "situation of poverty," he said.
In addition, "we must be critical of our histories," said Nottingham. He noted that the oppressive conditions present among countries represented at the gathering are the cause of the relationship with Disciples and UCCs.
In Latin America, Pentecostal churches often comprise the poorest members of a community, said the Rev. Gamaliel Lugo, bishop and president, Evangelical Pentecostal Union in Venezuela. In Pentecostalism, they find a brand of "Christianity in which the poor classes in Latin America can fit."
This means that while more individual participation is encouraged in worship, church members have more than heaven on their minds, said Lugo. The Pentecostal Church of Latin America "finds itself training people to resist exploitation. Hunger, exploitation and death in Latin America challenge the social ethic of Pentecostals. We must protest injustice in the established order."
Pentecostal spirituality also affirms human life and social peace, he said. For them "spirituality and social justice go together." This means the church must be engaged in a "committed spirituality" or social ethic which asks, "How do we act?"
Two other concerns shared by the South American church leader include the need for better theological training for pastors and immediate attention to the impact of external debt upon developing nations. World debt, according to Lugo, is the "largest problem in Latin America." And because of the resultant poverty, hunger and other problems, "opportunities have been postponed" for women, children and young people, he said.
U.S. church people need to become aware of these and other issues and emerge from the localism in their faith communities, said the Rev. Dan Romero. The issue of external debt is one the World Council of Churches needs to take up, according to the general secretary for mission program for Common Global Ministries.
Venezuela paid $420 million in interest alone on its external debt in 1996, Romero said. Other countries are enduring a similar plight. All of this points to the failure of democracy to help poor persons in Latin America and North America.
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