Scholarly and Streetwise

The pastor from an Assembly of God church in Bell came to combat crime. The youth minister from Genesis Foursquare Church in Highland Park came to study the economics of unemployment. A pastor from Messiah Foursquare Church in Oxnard came to expand his ministry’s homeless program. But Edgar Chacon, associate pastor of Fairview Heights Baptist Church in Inglewood, came to weave a dream.

“Let me tell you about my dream,” he said with a beckoning gaze. “I dream of starting a ministry for young drug addicts, for single mothers, for the unemployed. A church for people who have no place else to go. That is the dream.”

Yet, without proper academic and theological training, that dream would have little hope of ever coming to life.

As more Latino evangelicals assume leadership roles in their churches, the need to develop better-educated pastors is becoming more apparent, according to experts and religious scholars.

For many ministers, lack of education, financial resources and English literacy pose obstacles to attaining an advanced theological degree. In addition, pastoral training at most accredited theological schools, which often focuses on classic biblical interpretation and church history, can have little relevance to gritty issues such as AIDS and teen pregnancy that Latino pastors face outside their doors daily.

In response, the Haggard Graduate School of Theology at Azusa Pacific University took action. With funding from the Pew Charitable Trusts, the school began a new master of arts program in pastoral studies designed for Latino clergy and lay ministers who work in urban areas and may not have traditional college degrees.

The bilingual program aims to broaden participants’ theological and practical knowledge in two languages. The first year is taught in Spanish, the second year is bilingual and by the third year classes are in English.

Jesse Miranda, associate dean of the Haggard School, and Enrique Zone, professor of theology, noticed the need for higher education among the hundreds of pastors in independent and storefront churches throughout the Los Angeles area. They designed the program in 1994 and last year graduated their first group of students. In a required course called “Christian Ministry and Socio-Urban Problems,” Zone asks students to probe problems in their neighborhood and prepare reports on how they are being addressed.

He said the field research, which includes taking an AIDS test and visiting abortion clinics, motivates pastors to become more active in their ministry.

“We have to teach them to get away from the evangelical ghetto and enter the world,” said Zone, who is also pastor of Beverly Boulevard Foursquare Church in Montebello. “What is the church doing besides singing hymns on Sunday morning? Many of them are discovering that their churches are meaningless to everyone but themselves.”

Theological programs designed for Latinos are by no means new. Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena became one of the first schools in the nation in 1974 to implement such course work. After the formation of the Assn. for Hispanic Theological Education in 1991, more seminaries and theology schools, such as Gordon-Conwell in Massachusetts and McCormick in Chicago, added courses to their catalogs aimed at Latino ministers or concentrating on Latino communities.

But Isaac Canales, assistant professor at Fuller, said Azusa’s program is unprecedented in its emphasis on social issues.

“They’re taking the urban stuff from the street and getting deep into it,” he said. “Unfortunately, we’re still woefully behind as an ethnic group in theological higher education.”

Of 65,416 students enrolled in master’s degree programs at accredited universities belonging to the Assn. of Theological Schools, only 1,921 are Latino. Faculty rosters paint an even more disproportionate picture. According to the 1997-98 Fact Book on Theological Education, there are 2,979 professors in theological schools across the nation, a mere 74 of them Latino.

The students in Azusa’s master’s program present a dynamic mix of men and women from various Latin American nations, as well as different denominations. Pastors and lay ministers come from Foursquare, Baptist, Salvation Army, Assemblies of God, Catholic and Methodist churches. Most are immigrants with several years’ experience in the ministry. Others, like 30-year-old Alejandro Herrera of Genesis Foursquare Church, are just starting out.

Many have been educated at Bible institutes, Zone said. But, since those schools are not accredited, few have engaged in theory or research, and their career opportunities have been limited.

“What we find is that these pastors know their Bible, but they have not been theologically formed,” Zone said. “They come to understand that social action is not a contradiction of the Gospel.”

Vicente Martin Garcia, 41, pastor of Iglesia del Senor in Bell, said Zone’s course has already changed his approach to the ministry. After riding along on patrol with police for a class assignment, he decided to arrange a church dinner with law enforcement and city officials to thank them for their work and to form an alliance.

“We lock ourselves in the church and only look at the problems within our own congregation,” Garcia said. “This class is teaching us to move beyond that. It’s opening up my mind and helping me see the big picture.”

As senior pastor of Messiah Foursquare Church in Oxnard, Edgar Mohorko, 38, already heads an active ministry feeding the homeless in parks and running a rehabilitation center. For him, higher education serves as a springboard to tackling larger problems and training others to join him in the faith.

“We’re learning how to examine our community and think about how can we bring long-term peace to the city,” he said.

Carmen Rivera, co-pastor of Ministerio Vida Nueva in Glendora, said the main reason she entered the program was to better understand the different Latino groups in her church.

Tensions among Latinos have sometimes made unity difficult, pastors say. Indeed, they have struggled to find common ground among themselves.

Latino religious leaders are also starting to realize that services in English are essential to reach younger members.

At Fairview Heights Baptist, Chacon serves as bridge between Latinos and African Americans by translating during business meetings. Having been in his post a little over a year, Chacon is only now starting to build up Latino membership and is using principles learned at Azusa Pacific to become a more effective leader. His dream is to replicate a ministry he built in his native Costa Rica for drug addicts and single mothers.

“It won’t be easy. But I know with desire, with passion and with faith, all is possible in the eyes of God,” he said.