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Welds Taking Up New Ministry in Argentina
BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA (March 9, 2003) - Brian and Kerith Weld, consecrated for
service in world mission at the 2001 Annual Meeting of the Evangelical
Covenant Church (ECC) are headed to Argentina for a new ministry in Buenos
Aires.
After spending much of 2002 in Costa Rica for language studies, the Welds
left the United States February 27 en route to ministry sites in a Buenos
Aires neighborhood and a suburban area. Brian is the son of Wayne and Mary
Anne Weld, who are short-term missionaries in Ecuador. Wayne was professor
of World Mission at North Park Theological Seminary in Chicago for more
than two decades and the Welds were the first Covenant missionaries to
Colombia.
The Welds are scheduled to partner with Missionary Christian Movement
(Movimiento Cristiano Misionero), which has had a presence in Argentina for
more than four decades. Pacific Southwest Conference administrator Walter
Contreras' mother, Margaret, has headed up that ministry recently. Margaret
(a native Canadian) and her late husband, Celsio (an Argentine evangelist),
helped begin a community-based church plant and hundreds of churches have
sprung up as a result. The Welds hope to build on the group's efforts in
holistic ministry in some of the poorer areas of Buenos Aires.
"This group is obviously good at evangelism and church planting," said
Brian Weld, a graduate of Wheaton College who served at the Department of
World Mission before he and his wife were consecrated. "What they would
like help in is in reaching those entrenched in poverty in their society.
The Covenant has always believed in holistic ministry - ministering to the
body and soul - and we want to develop something sustainable to those
areas, so they don't need to exist by handouts, from us or anyone else."
For now, the Welds believe that much of their early ministry will involve
observing the sociological dimensions that affect future ministry in Buenos
Aires, a city of 12 million that includes 40 percent of Argentina's
population. Possible ministry ventures might include helping start small
businesses, operating a community bank or teaching business skills.
The Welds perceive their ministry primarily based around research and
development in Latin America and Argentina seems an ideal focal point.
Brian and Kerith have experience in Latin America as Brian served as a
Covenant short-term missionary in Colombia and met Kerith while she served
in that country with the Australian Plymouth Brethren Church. They hope
that the new partnership and the possibility of partnerships with the
Covenant's Latin America counterpart, CIPE, can build the Kingdom in
significant ways.
"Our role is as relationship builders and linkers (to other local
entities)," said Weld. "We see this as a three-to-five-year project.
There's no guarantee that we may go beyond that period, but this is what we
feel called to now. And we're excited to see how God can use the Covenant
in Argentina - through us and whomever else goes there."
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