Francisco Cañas

It’s incredible but we are just around the corner for the celebration of our Third National Consultation for Hispanic/Latino Ministry at Duke University in Durham, N.C. In precisely fourteen days, we are planning to gather as a United Methodist people to think, talk and wrestle with what the Creator is expecting of us in the face of the realities of the XXI century. Perhaps, as builders of His kingdom, we must move out of the comfort of a parroquial mentality and begin to construct the bridges that will allow us to inextricably connect with those who are asking: Where is the real church of Christ?  At this point, we hope that you have already begun to focus your thoughts, prayers and plans on how we can be relevant to society today.

As we continue preparing ourselves for this holy moment, please, remember that our main proposal is that we, as a communal body, face the compromising reality that for so many years, we have been irresponsible in not preparing ourselves to pass the leadership to the new generations. At this consultation, we want to honor and recognize the existing talents and gifts among our youth and young adult people. Consulting, listening and utilizing many of their own understandings, perspectives and vision about the needs and opportunities of our communities could be the key for the UMC to become truly a church for all.  It’s vital that we exercise the spiritual discretion to lay aside all entrenched historic opinions, and that we embrace the emerging future as the only context in which God’s spirit can re-form us as Christ’s body for the new moment.

Let us remember our baptism and His call as we walk patiently into the sacred space of this consultation. Remembering our baptism will allow us to more easily peel away the many labels imposed on us by society and many other institutions, making it almost impossible for many of us to remember that we are members of the same community; we are one body. And by remembering His divine call to each of us, as the people who serve and not to be served, we will be reaffirming our commitment to those who have been excluded from the opportunity to sit, eat and drink at the communal table. Please, be sure that you will be sitting and partaking at the table of this consultation!

Anxious to see you in fourteen days.

I’m glad and grateful that the National Plan for Hispanic/Latino Ministry has taken the initiative to organize this third consultation on Hispanic/Latino Ministry. However, I come to this consultation with a healthy and constructive dose of suspicion. If the past is the best predictor of future behavior, then events of this sort typically don’t result in anything substantial. However, I believe that some good things can happen if several elements align themselves as coincidence or, better yet, if we use our intentionality to help make them happen.

Since I ‘m a firm believer that true debate can’t take place unless we first deal with tough questions and address critical issues with total openness and well-grounded insights, I’d like to use this opportunity to spice up our conversation by means of a series of interconnected rhetorical questions.

How can we talk about developing strong leaders and implementing relevant ministries when…

1.- we don’t really know who we are, where we came from or where we are; we have no real message to share, much less to model; we don’t know where we’re going; and, worst of all, no one is following us? What, then, are we going to talk about?

2.- we still hold onto a dualistic, arrogant, selfish religious ideology that preaches that the church is God’s chosen instrument, called and sent to save the world? In fact, the church has never been or done that. It can’t even save itself; and, as a result, it needs instead to be redeemed by the world.

3.- we only have a very narrow-minded understanding of what it means to be the church; (literally, ”assembly”) and, at the end of the day, we’re not really open to other forms of being in community and acting as community?

4.- we’re still in love with and worship a God who seems more like an idolatrous, alienating abstraction, an ethereal illusion removed from this world of suffering, hope, and possibility?

5.- in the eyes of the world, we have nothing to offer, since we can’t offer what we don’t have?

6.- our notion of leadership is always a replica some business model, focused on external skills and techniques to be implemented; and ignoring context, circumstance, and the idea that the exercise of power is always an extension of our own emotional and psychological issues, whether good or bad?

7.- the older generation (with its insecurity, need to control and be validated, and its constant appeal to its own experience as the real source of wisdom and the priesthood of all believers) doesn’t let the younger generation take over, unless it does so on the older generation’s terms and repeats its older forms of ministry that are alienating?

8.- the younger generation complains and criticizes the church’s current leadership for not thinking of them, instead of being more proactive and not letting the older generation patronize them? And, when the new generations are given the chance to play a significant role, why do they always choose to reproduce the same irrelevant models of the past?

9.- we’re happy and grateful to be treated as “that church of the basement;” and no one has the guts to denounce this because, at the end of the day, we’re not here to protect our people and defend their dignity, but to keep our jobs?

10.- the Hispanic community’s models for theological education and curriculum continue to be self-imposed, shameful translations or replicas of non-Hispanic/Latino models and curricula?

11.- we continue to be obsessed with demographic “studies” that turn the realities of our churches and communities into simplistic utilitarian objectifications, preceded and followed by very superficial thought-processes?

12.- many of our leaders confuse the vocation (calling) to service with a career; and then, because of what they’ve become and what they’ve been trained to do, are really in the wrong place and should be doing something else with their lives?

 

As we engage the issues that questions like these raise, I hope we can learn more about the condition of our church and its leaders (and whether there really is hope or not), only based on the comments that these kinds of questions and the consultation itself can generate. 

As we look ahead towards the future of our Latino/Hispanic UMC congregations, we must carry in our hearts the struggles and dreams of not only our parents whom we dearly love but also of our migrant forebears. Many of us were brought to the U.S as children by immigrant parents. Hence, our sense of belonging has dwelt between the Old World and the New World. Personally, I feel as American as the blonde-haired, blue-eyed Anglo-Saxon who was born and raised in a southern city like Albany, Georgia, and as Salvadorian as my uncle who has lived all his life in Usulutan, El Salvador. These claims, though, could easily be proven wrong if you were to see my own perplexity when Salvadorians use certain regional colloquialism in conversations, or if you heard my constant questioning regarding American Football to my native co-workers. Nonetheless, it’s this shared experience of living “in between” which has become the narrative for many first and second generation immigrants.

The Third Consultation on Latino/Hispanic Ministry is a great step to promote awareness of other developing ministries that attempt to embrace our rising numbers English-speaking Latinos. The consultation in itself will be a great opportunity to see our vast and diverse ways of being Latinos, either as foreign born or U.S born. As we engage in a risky dialogue about our connections with ourselves, the church, our culture and our world, I hope that we can also reach practical ways in which we can use our “in-between” narrative to become bridge-builders and conscious mediators. Becoming conscious of our limitations, as we reap the whirlwind of our own multicultural and multiethnic backgrounds and histories will not be an easy task. Yet, we cannot make the mistake of thinking that we will solve all the issues pertaining to our Latino communities in so little time. There just isn’t one simple solution to our unsuccessful system of doing ministry with our fast changing Latino population. Instead, the consultation, as a divine dialogue, has great potential to produce many strategies in which we can all reaffirm our commitment to support and accompany the changes in the coming years, as America also grows into its new self.

At a larger level, I hope our consultation can focus on more attainable goals that surpass sudden epiphanies or personal realizations. These goals must be based on a gradual development of not only UMC institutions but also other partnerships that serve our Latino/Hispanic communities. It is my wish that at the end of our consultation we can look at each other and see ourselves in those who resemble us the least. I hope to learn from people who are pioneering different ministry models, so that my way of thinking and doing can be also challenged. Finally, I pray that through all this innovative process of “caminando juntos,” we can realize that, yes, we can work together to reach perfect union, because our God is with us each step of the way inviting us – for His yoke is easy and His burden is light.

A Latina pastor reflects on her experience in ministry

By Alma Tinoco Ruiz

The ethnic diversity that exists in the United States today is similar to the diversity that existed in Jerusalem in the earliest days of the church. Acts 2 narrates how God, through the power of the Holy Spirit, enabled Jesus’ disciples to share the good news with people from every nation under heaven:

When the day of Pentecost has come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability. Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. (Acts 2:1–6)

At the very founding of the church, God made it clear that the gospel must be shared with people from every nation under heaven, and, ever since, the church has been multiethnic, multicultural, and multilingual. People from other nations did not have to learn the language of the disciples to be able to receive the good news, but the power of the Holy Spirit made it possible for the people to hear the good news in their own languages. If we believe that God is the same yesterday and today and forever, then we must believe that the same Holy Spirit that was at work through the first disciples of Jesus Christ is the same Spirit that is at work in us today, equipping us to share the Word of God with all people.

We are blessed to live in a country where we do not have to go to all nations to make disciples of all nations. People from many different nations come to this country. The harvest is plentiful here. The question before us is how to take advantage of this great opportunity. I have been serving in the United Methodist Church in the North Carolina Conference for 10 years, nine years as a lay missioner and one year as a local pastor. I also served for six years in the Hispanic/Latino committee of the UMC.

Overall, my experience serving in United Methodist churches has been positive and encouraging. But my experience as a Hispanic pastor in the United Methodist Church as a denomination has not always been encouraging. For instance, I have encountered people who think that sharing the Word of God with people who do not speak English is an option, one of many missions we can choose, rather than God’s non-negotiable commandment. Thus, they do not see it as a priority. Hispanic/Latino ministries are viewed as a mission that only receives from the denomination rather than as a full contributing partner. One reason we are treated as a charity case rather than as equals is because the denomination believes it is giving more money than what Hispanic/Latino ministries are able to give back. Sadly, the United Methodist Church often does not value the contributions that Hispanic/Latino people, and people from other ethnic groups, can bring to the denomination. If we are not valuing the people living in our communities and do not see it as a priority to share the Word of God with them, how can we say that we are a faithful church? After all, as Acts 2 shows, God intended the church to be multiethnic, multicultural, and multilingual, so to be an inclusive local church is to be faithful to God’s plan. Thus, we must share the Word of God with people from different ethnic groups not because they need us, but because we need them.

Ultimately, we—both Hispanics and non-Hispanics, especially those in leadership positions—need to better understand the cultural concerns, challenges, and gifts of the different ethnic groups represented in the United States. How can we respect, acknowledge, and value our differences when we cannot even identify them? The diversity that exists today in the United States will not go away but only increase. And it is nothing new for the church of God, which from its very beginning included many languages and ethnicities. In order to be faithful to our calling to share the gospel, therefore, we must educate ourselves about the diverse communities in which we are serving and be prepared to welcome them in the church. We must demonstrate that we are a people who love, who embrace diversity, and who value all people.