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Collection 324 Records of Primer Congreso Latinoamericano de Evangelizacion (CLADE)

 Collection
Identifier: CN 324

Scope and Contents

Correspondence, reports, minutes, press releases, planning and financial records, and manuscripts of Congress presentations (primarily in Spanish). Files in this collection were those of Clyde Taylor, executive secretary of the Evangelical Foreign Mission Association at the time of the Congress. Items document early planning and securing subsidy funding from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, travel arrangements, and daily reports from the Congress. Texts of Congress messages by various Latin American or North American evangelicals are compiled in the collection; topics covered in their addresses relate to evangelism and the Latin American reglious and social context. A series of papers from the 2nd Congress on Evangelical Communication in 1962 and the 2nd Latin American Consultation About Evangelism cover the topics of Christian literature and journalism, the use of radio and television, cooperation among evangelicals in the use of media, reports from Literatura Evangelica para America Latina (LEAL) and Difusiones InterAmericana (DIA). Among the correspondents are Billy Graham, George Wilson, T.W. Wilson, Efrain Santiago, Miguel A. Suazo and C. Peter Wagner. Among those speakers whose presentations are included are Rafael Baltodano, Jose Camacho, Arnoldo Canclini, Antonio Elias, Samuel Escobar, Vergil Gerber, Juan Isais, Clarence Jones, Carlos Lastra, Ruben Lores, Miquel Morales, Emilio Nunez, Rene Padilla, Paul Pretiz, W. Dayton Roberts, R. Kenneth Strachan, Abe Van Der Puy, and Fernando Vangioni.

Dates

  • Created: 1951-1975
  • Other: Majority of material found in 1968-1970

Conditions Governing Access

The collection is open for research, and there are no access restrictions on the material.

Biographical or Historical Information

The Primer Congreso Latinoamericano de Evangelizacion (abbreviated to CLADE), which in English is translated as the "First Latin American Congress on Evangelization," was held in 1969, from November 21-30, in Bogota, Colombia. Other Latin American congresses had been previously held, such as the first (Cali, Colombia, September 13-18, 1959) and second (Huampani, Peru, December 17-26, 1962) congresses on evangelical communication The CLADE meeting was part of an international series of meetings sponsored by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, which began with the World Congress of Evangelism in Berlin in 1966, and included such meetings as the US Congress on Evangelism (1968), the Asia-South Pacific Congress on Evangelism (1968), the European Congress on Evangelism (1971), the South African Congress on Evangelism (1973), and others. The period of regional meetings was climaxed by the International Congress on World Evangelization (ICOWE) in Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1974.

Billy Graham worked to stimulate evangelistic planning by encouraging and backing continental congresses. In response to requests from Latin American delegates to the Berlin Congress in 1966, Billy Graham asked Taylor and Santiago to organize CLADE. In early 1968, Clyde Taylor and representatives of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association (BGEA), particularly Billy Graham and George Wilson, approved the idea of a Latin American congress and BGEA funding for that meeting. With a general commitment from the BGEA, more detailed planning for the Congress followed, including a continent-wide tour by Clyde Taylor and Efrain Santiago to determine the level of support among evangelical leaders for such a congress. The BGEA, in fact, supplied funding and personnel for the meeting; it underwrote three-quarters of the cost of the Congress and seconded Efrain Santiago to be the Congress's full-time general coordinator.

Personnel for the Congress included: Carlos J. Lastra, co-chairman; Clyde Taylor, co-chairman, Efrain Santiago, General Coordinator; Miguel Suazo, Assistant Coordinator; and C. Peter Wagner, Secretary of Publicity.

Eight hundred thirty delegates from Latin American countries and the United States participated in the 10-day Congress, whose theme was "Action in Christ for a Continent in Crisis." The meeting consisted of the presentation of twelve position papers, which formed the basis for deliberations by study groups. The Congress concluded with the voted affirmation of "The Evangelical Declaration of Bogota," which had been drafted prior to and revised during the Congress. Carlos Lastra proposed a thirty-year plan for the evangelization of Latin America; the first phase of the plan was implemented as delegates tentatively scheduled subsequent regional congresses, followed by CLADE II in 1976; (the meeting was actually held in Lima, Peru from 10/31 to 11/9 in 1979). To administrate follow-up of the Congress prior to the naming of a continental Executive Committee, the assembly named Lastra, Taylor, Santiago and Suazo as members of an interim coordinating committee.

*****

Clyde Willis Taylor was born in Fort Smith, Arkansas, on November 7, 1904, to Robert S. and Mabel Wassman Taylor. He received a diploma from the Nyack (New York) Missionary Training Institute in 1924, a Th.B. from Gordon College in 193l, and an M.A. in Romance Languages and Education from Boston University in 1942. He was awarded honorary degrees by Western Baptist Theological Seminary (D.D., 1948) and Houghton College (LL.D., 1960). He also received awards from Gordon College in 1958 and Wheaton College in 1960.

Taylor served as a missionary in Peru with the Christian and Missionary Alliance among the Inca and Campa Indians between 1925 and 1927. In 1927 he returned to the United States to continue his education. He was ordained to the ministry in the Baptist Church in 1930. Following his graduation from Gordon College in 193l, he went to Colombia to continue missionary work; there he founded the Bethel Bible Institute in 1934. He returned to the United States in 194l, when he began pastoring Central Baptist Church in Quincy, Massachusetts, and teaching at Gordon College of Theology and Missions until 1944.

From 1944 to 1963 he served as the Secretary of Public Affairs for the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE). In 1963 he became the NAE General Director. Beginning in 1945 and concurrent with these duties, Taylor served as EFMA's Executive Secretary until 1974. He contributed to the founding of World Relief Corporation and National Religious Broadcasters. He was also the general secretary of World Evangelical Fellowship (WEF). He served on the boards of numerous colleges and mission agencies, as well as on other organizations, such Youth for Christ International and the American Bible Society. Taylor, whose files for CLADE comprise this collection, was the Congress co-chairman along with Carlos J. Lastra. He had been a member of the Executive Committee of the World Congress of Evangelism in Berlin in 1966.

Taylor authored Ecumenical Strategy in Foreign Missions (1960), A Glimpse of World Missions (1960), and Evangelicals Examine Ecumenicity (1963). He co-edited Protestant Missions in Latin America: A Statistical Survey (1961).

Taylor married Ruth Jean Marstaller on June 7, 1930. The Taylors had four children: Orletta Jean, Clyde Donald, Darlene Elizabeth, and Carolyn Ruth. Taylor died June 3, 1988.

*****

Efrain Santiago played a central role in the planning and administration of CLADE. Born in 1930, he received a Bachelor of Theology degree from Puerto Rico Theological Seminary, pastored a Wesleyan Methodist congregation in San Juan, Puerto Rico, taught church history at the Wesleyan Bible Institute, served as president of the Billy Graham Puerto Rico Crusade in 1967, and acted as the Latin American Coordinator and Evangelist for the BGEA's Latin American division. In 1969, he was named to the Puerto Rican governor's cabinet as Secretary of Social Services.

Extent

0.9 Cubic Feet (5 Boxes (DC), Oversize Material, Photographs )

Language of Materials

English

Spanish; Castilian

Arrangement of Material

This collection consists of correspondence, reports, minutes, press releases, planning and financial records, manuscripts of congress presentations, etc., documenting the Congress planning, the invitation of delegates, coordination of travel arrangements, presentations at the meeting, public relations and press coverage of the meeting. The files in the collection were those of Clyde Taylor, executive secretary of the Evangelical Foreign Mission Association at the time of the Congress. NOTE: The researcher should be aware that a significant portion of the correspondence, minutes, press releases and reports in this collection are written in Spanish. In some cases, documents may have English counterparts; within the correspondence, an English reply may be attached to a incoming Spanish letter.

Correspondence with Efrain Santiago relates to early planning, particularly securing subsidy funding from the BGEA (see correspondence with Billy Graham and George Wilson in Folders 2-1 and 2-2), and arranging his preliminary tour with Clyde Taylor of Latin American countries with Taylor in mid-1968. Principal correspondents in the collection include the principal CLADE administrators (listed in the Historical Background section of this guide), BGEA representatives (Billy Graham, George Wilson and T.W. Wilson), and Vergil Gerber. Coordinating travel arrangements was a major function of the administrative staff, particularly since subsidy funding was limited. Much of the correspondence relates to the details and complications of travel arrangement for the delegates.

Full texts of most of the addresses presented to the Congress are available. The program book contains most of these in Spanish as follows (presenter):

Bible studies (Ruben Lores and Mario Mulki)

"Evangelical Communication to a Continent in Crisis" (Paul Finkenbinder)

"The Expansion of the New Testament Church" (Arnoldo Canclini)

"Essential Factors to Produce Growth in Latin American Churches" (Edward Murphy)

"Social Responsibility of the Church" (Samuel Escobar)

"The Position of the Church Toward Aggiornamento [Modernization in the Roman Catholic Church]" (Emilio Nunez)

"Mobilization of the Church" (Melvin Hodges)

"The Consolidation" (Rafael Baltodano)

Country reports on Dutch Antilles, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Uruguay and Venezuela.

Several other addresses, some of which appear to have been a part of the unpublished compedium of position papers, are located in Folder 4-4, including (in Spanish):

"The Doctrinal Basis for Evangelization" (Jose Camacho)

"The Holy Spirit in Evangelization" (Miguel Morales)

"The Second Coming of Christ and the Urgency for Evangelism" (Antonia Elfas)

"A Plan for Latin America" (Carlos Lastra), and its English translation, "Long Range Plan To Evangelize Latin America"). This is the outline of Lastra's thirty-year plan, which served as the basis for scheduling followup regional congresses

English version of Emilio Nunez's paper on modernization (see above)

"Plan of Evangelization Through Evangelical Schools and Literacy Work"

The correspondence in Folder 4-1 documents C. Peter Wagner's work as Publicity Secretary. In addition to sending out press releases in preparation for the Congress (see Folder 4-2), Taylor and Wagner also coordinated the post-Congress publication of a book on the Congress by Latin America Mission's publishing division, Editorial Caribe; a prospectus of the book and a memo of agreement are included in Folder 4-1. The press release file (Folder 4-2) consists predominantly of Spanish releases; a number of these have an English counterpart. The releases provide daily reports from the Congress, but also precede the Congress beginning in June 1969. The file also includes the Congress's concluding statement, "The Evangelical Declaration of Bogota."

An extensive series of papers from the 1962 Second Congress on Evangelical Communication is also available in Folders 1-2 and 1-3. These papers address subjects such as Christian literature and journalism, the use of radio and television, cooperation among evangelicals in the use of media, reports from LEAL and DIA. The file also include papers from the simultaneously held Latin American Consultation on Evangelism.

Notes on arrangement. The materials in this collection were received, some in titled folders, but in no particular arrangement. The archivist provided titles for untitled folders; unfoldered material was integrated into existing folders. Duplicates or extraneous material were discarded.

Accruals and Additions

The materials in this collection were received by the Billy Graham Center Archives in March, 1981 from Clyde Taylor.

Accession 81-26

March 19, 1991

Paul A. Ericksen

C. Easley

Title
Collection 324 Records of Primer Congreso Latinoamericano de Evangelizacion (CLADE)
Author
Paul Ericksen
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Roman Script

Repository Details

Part of the Evangelism & Missions Archives Repository

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