A History of American Baptist Missions in Haiti

While revising an article this morning on the late Julio Laporte for the Journal of the Bahamas Historical Society, I came across an old copy of the following article in my files which gives a nice concise summary of the major developments in American Baptist missions work in Haiti. Unfortunately, I didn't note the source of this article when I first filed it. I believe it was published in the Nov-Dec 2004 edition of American Baptists In Mission but, if not, it was most certainly written as a publicity piece (by my former IM colleague Eleanore Lundy) for some other purpose.

Before posting the article, I'd like to note two important points that were omitted from the section on the Haitian diaspora, subtitled "Mission with and to Haitians beyond Haiti."

1. American Baptist Home Missionary Society (ABHMS) missionaries in Cuba led a vibrant outreach to Haitian cane cutters in Cuba throughout the 20th century up until the takeover by Fidel Castro in 1959. Today, many of those Haitian Baptist Churches in Cuba have been absorbed into the Spanish-speaking Cuban Baptist Convention that American Baptists still work with out of Santiago, Cuba. Also, many of the Haitians who came to Christ through ABHMS in Cuba, later returned to South Haiti and started a Baptist Association there which remains completely independent of ABC's historic work with the Haitian Baptist Convention in Northern Haiti.

2. In the States, American Baptist Churches have a thriving Haitian Caucus (now with 40+ churches) that is reaching out to Haitian immigrants to the U.S. Many of the pastors and leaders in the Caucus are graduates of the Baptist Seminary in Limbe. The late Julio Laporte, for example, is the recently retired director of Haitian Ministries for National Ministries. Laporte graduated from the Baptist Seminary in Limbe back in 1958 before migrating to Nassau, Bahamas, where he pastored Emmaus Baptist Church (where Estela and I currently work). Later, Laporte was active as a pastor in a Haitian congregation in New Jersey before being called to serve as the denominational liaison to the ABC Haitian Caucus for National Ministries.

Also, for those who are interested in reading more on Haitian Baptist history, the late ABC missionary Ivah Heneise has written a wonderful book on the Haitian Baptists, titled Pioneers of Light. It is possible that some copies are still available from the Haiti Hope Fund. For more information, e-mail info@haitihopefund.org or call 904-284-4165.

In the meantime, enjoy the article:

Mission in the Footsteps of Peter and Paul
Serving Christ and the People of Haiti for 180 Years
by Eleanor Lundy

During 2004 alone, One Great Hour of Sharing has provided over $15,000 in emergency funds to aid Haitian people suffering from the effects of civil unrest and natural disasters.

During the first decades of Christian mission, Peter and Paul were inspired to encourage fellow followers of Jesus in ways that are still vitally important. Peter urged believers to recognize that God’s grace has come to us in an amazing variety of forms, and we need to contribute whatever gifts we have received to the cause of Christ (1 Peter 4:10). Paul urged believers to persevere when they were tempted to grow weary, always looking in hope to the harvest that God would produce (Galatians 6:9). Between them Peter and Paul call us to do mission in many ways and to hang in there when the going gets tough. American Baptist work with and among the people of Haiti embodies both of these principles.

Natural disasters and political strife have brought Haiti into the news again recently. The situation in this tiny island nation continues to be incredibly difficult. But the Haitian Baptist Convention and American Baptists are working together to bring hope and the Good News of Jesus Christ to the people of this troubled country.

A brief plane ride from Miami, the Republic of Haiti is a world apart. Located between Cuba and the Dominican Republic, with which it shares the island of Hispaniola, Haiti was colonized first by Spain and then by France. Both countries developed huge sugar and coffee plantations and exploited the native Indian populations as laborers, later bringing African slaves to work in the fields. In 1804, with heroic effort, Haiti gained her independence. And not long afterward, Baptist missionaries began arriving in Haiti.

Laying the Groundwork
The first of these missionaries was Thomas Paul, the son of freed slaves from Exeter, New Hampshire. Paul sailed into Cape Hayti (later Cap Haitien) in 1823 with crates of Bibles and tracts, and for six months he preached, baptized, and laid the groundwork for the establishment of the First Baptist Church there. Paul’s stay in Haiti, despite its brevity, was an authentic sign of what was to come: he was followed by many Baptist missionaries from America, Jamaica and the United Kingdom. Their ministries have taken many different forms and have been supported in many different ways (including several different mission organizations formed by American Baptists). The common denominator has been a desire to see the grace of God in Jesus Christ bringing new life to the people of Haiti.

Thomas Paul was sent by the Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Society. A dozen years later, William Monroe was sent by the agency we now call International Ministries. From the 1840s to the early 1900s, many American Baptists served in Haiti under the auspices of the Baptist Free Missionary Society (which rejoined the Northern Baptist Convention in 1911). The American Baptist Home Mission Society (now National Ministries) began to send missionaries to Haiti in the 1920s. Supervision of ABC mission involvement in Haiti passed to International Ministries in 1973.

The Haitian Baptist Convention
Throughout this period, God was also raising up gifted and dedicated servants of Christ among the Haitian people. Overcoming opposition from governmental, Catholic and Voudou leaders, Haitian followers of Jesus gave courageous and sacrificial leadership to the growing Baptist work. In 1852, Jean Jacques Lillevoix became the first ordained Haitian pastor. 1964 saw the birth of a new indigenous organization within the part of the Baptist movement with which American Baptists are most deeply involved, the Haitian Baptist Convention (Convention Baptiste d’Haiti or CBH). Today the CBH has some 110 churches, hundreds of preaching stations, and over 90,000 baptized believers. In the midst of the political turmoil of recent years, God has used the Rev. Emmanuel Pierre to provide a steady hand at the helm of the CBH.

A Wide Variety of Ministries
Baptist witness to the grace of Jesus Christ in Haiti has long been embodied in a wide variety of ministries. Primary evangelism and church planting have long been done most effectively by Haitian Baptists themselves. Especially during the last sixty years, American Baptist missionaries have complemented Haitian-led evangelism with demonstrations of the Lord’s concern for improving the lives of God’s children in the areas of education, health, agriculture, women’s ministries and leadership training.

Touching Minds with the Light of Christ
From the founding of a Christian school for girls in 1942 (the Ecole [later College] Pratique du Nord) to the founding of a Christian university in 1993 (the Christian University of Northern Haiti), Haitian leaders and American Baptist missionaries have borne consistent witness to God’s desire to develop minds as well as hearts. Haitian leaders from Edith Robinson (founder of the Ecole Pratique du Nord) to Jules Casseus (founding President of the Christian University of Northern Haiti) have invited a large number of short- and long-term missionaries to serve alongside them in ministries of education.

It is worthy of special note that the Christian University of Northern Haiti (UCNH) grew out of the educational work to which missionaries Ivah and Harold Heneise were called in the late 1940s. The Heneises were sent to Haiti in 1947 to launch a school to train Haitian pastors, the Baptist Theological Seminary of Haiti. The Heneises have both gone home to be with the Lord, but their faithful work has been multiplied by missionary successors and dedicated Haitian professors. Pastors continue to be trained at UCNH, but so do hundreds of other students who are preparing to serve in agronomy, business and fine arts.

Touching Bodies with the Love of Christ
From the founding of a small rural clinic under the mango trees of the seminary in the late 1940s to the current high-tech operation of the Cap Haitien Eye Center, missionaries and Haitian leaders have worked together to demonstrate the love of God in Jesus Christ through a wide variety of health ministries. The little clinic begun by Ivah Heneise and Nevart Yeghoyan became a major medical facility, the Good Samaritan Hospital of Limbé. This transformation was guided by William and Joanna Hodges, who served as American Baptist missionaries from 1958 to 1995, providing outstanding leadership and incorporating the gifts of thousands of volunteers from all across the U.S. (The hospital continues its ministry as an independent institution today, due to a break in relationships with International Ministries in 1995.)

The Cap Haitien Eye Center was founded in 1989 by Hollis and Wanda Clark, with the support of the Haitian Baptist Convention. The Eye Center provides services ranging from eye exams and glasses to surgery for glaucoma and cataracts. It is now staffed entirely by Haitian personnel, most of whom were trained onsite by the Clarks. Many are evangelical Christians, including one of Haiti’s best ophthalmologists, Dr. Carmelle Lucien. The Center accepts all patients regardless of financial status, and continues to function in spite of political and economic chaos. Says Dr. Lucien, “There is always somebody in the waiting line!”

Missionaries Create a Legacy of Love
Bernice and Herbert Rogers served in Haiti for 28 years. Herb Rogers, who served for many years at the Good Samaritan Hospital and then at UCNH, now coordinates American Baptist volunteer work teams through International Ministries and teaches microbiology as an adjunct professor in the department of agriculture. Bernice Rogers was the founder and director of Jericho School, a missionary children’s school. She currently serves in International Ministries’ home office in Valley Forge.

For fourteen years, until their recent call to serve in D.R. Congo, Katherine and Wayne Niles served the Haitian people in medical ministry and agricultural development. Katherine worked at the Danda Clinic and facilitated outreach in villages stricken with AIDS and tuberculosis. Wayne helped farmers to design and build simple irrigation pumps, and also developed the “Kids for Kids” goat-raising project in cooperation with local Baptist churches. Still going strong, this self-perpetuating project entrusts responsible children and youth with raising the young goats, with the first offspring brought back to the church to be given to another child. Additional kids are raised and sold, with the income making it possible for many youth to pay school tuition.

In September 1998, International Ministries commissioned Mabudiga and Kihomi Nzunga for service in Haiti. The Nzungas previously taught at the Christian University of Kinshasa in their homeland of D.R. Congo. Mabudiga teaches theology at UCNH, administers a scholarship program, preaches in churches, and helps rural schools with needed supplies. Kihomi works in family counseling and women’s health issues, and supports the women’s association of the Baptist Convention of Haiti. In the autumn of 2001, the Nzungas organized a successful intergenerational soccer game that attracted 1,500 people from the surrounding community.

Mission with and to Haitians beyond Haiti
Haitians, like many of the world’s peoples, now contribute to the lives of many nations beyond Haiti. Haitian Baptists are an enthusiastic and growing part of American Baptist life in the U.S. With leaders like Lemaire Alerte and Edgard Nicolas, the Alliance of Haitian Baptist Churches is making an important contribution to ABC witness in the U.S. while maintaining a vital relationship with the work of the CBH.

International Ministries has missionaries serving other parts of the Haitian Diaspora, especially in the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic. Missionary nurse Kristy Engel ministers to Haitian workers and families in the bateys (work camps) of the sugar cane plantations of the Dominican Republic. Daniel and Estela Schweissing work with Haitian immigrants, many of them undocumented refugees, in the Bahamas. Madeline Flores-López coordinates American Baptist volunteers throughout the Caribbean, many of whom serve Haitian communities.

Getting Involved
When First Baptist Church of Lockport, New York, sent fifteen members to serve in rural Quartier Morin, Haiti, it was a life-changing experience. The volunteers worked with American Baptist missionaries and congregation members to build a preaching station. Lockport volunteer Mike Edmister says he has grown “immensely” in his spiritual life through participation in such mission trips. “Now I feel the Lord tugging at my heart to be a missionary or a children’s pastor,” Edmister said recently.

Similar experiences awaited the students, faculty, and friends of Central Baptist Seminary who went with members of First Baptist Church of Kansas City, Kansas on a “Work and Learning” trip to the Christian University of Northern Haiti in January 2004. Among the volunteers were a doctor, an emergency room nurse, and a drug enforcement officer. “We visited a church that held a 6:00 a.m. Sunday worship service, with over 1,000 in attendance and 175 that could not get into the building,” wrote the Rev. Robert Southard, pastor of First Baptist, Kansas City and coordinator for the trip. “The drug enforcement officer worked the streets with Haitian police and stayed an extra week to lead training sessions for the police.”

Peter was right: working side by side with fellow police officers, attending patients, doing construction, raising goats, doing HIV/AIDS education, training pastors, restoring sight to the blind, teaching tomorrow’s agronomists and businesspersons, encouraging the leadership of women . . . truly, the grace and gifts bestowed by our Lord are wonderfully diverse. Paul was also right: in the midst of the continuing crises that burden the country of Haiti, it is vitally important that followers of Jesus — including American Baptists and our Haitian Baptist sisters and brothers — do not grow weary in doing what is right, but continue to look to the Lord of the harvest. Pray for Haiti. And, as you pray, listen: perhaps the Lord may be calling you to become more deeply involved!

*With special thanks to Herb Rogers and Stan Slade of the IM staff for their contributions to this article.

Missionaries to Haiti Supported by American Baptists1823 to 2004
Charles and Grace Chapman
Hollis and Wanda Clark*
Ann and William Clemmer
Millicent Engel
Gene and Margaret Gentry
Suzette Goss
Deborah and Kenneth Heneise
Harold and Ivah Heneise
Evelyn Hillman
Barbara Hodges
Joanna and William Hodges
Elizabeth Howard
Nancy and Stephen James
Elizabeth and William Jones
Nancy and William Judd
C. Stanford and Mae Kelly
Electa Lake
Dorothy Lincoln
P. Reidar and Sigrid Lindland
Vera McAllister
William and Mrs. Monroe
Amy and William Moore
William Newman
Katherine and Wayne Niles
Kihomi and Mabudiga Nzunga*
Thomas Paul
J. Alfred Pearce
Edith Robinson
Bernice and Herbert Rogers
Laura Belle Romeus
Ronald and Susan Smith
Mark and Sandra Jo Thompson
Philip and Rose Uhlinger
Alice and Arthur Wood
Nevart and Zenas Yeghoyan
Nancy Yeghoyan
Helen Yost
Polly Young
...and thousands of short-term and volunteer missionaries

*Currently serving

Understanding Haitian Vodou

Thanks to Pastor Bob Cornwall over at Ponderings on a Faith Journey for pointing out this thought provoking and informative article on Haitian Vodou. Not only does it explain some important new developments taking place in the Vodou religion, it also helps to shed light on a number of widespread misconceptions as well as some of the positive contributions that Vodou has made to Haitian society. In their book Understanding Folk Religion: A Christian Response to Beliefs and Practices, missiologists Paul Hiebert, Daniel Shaw, and Tite Tiénou stress the importance of taking the time to carefully study and understand the beliefs and worldview of others before evaluating and responding--something that far too many many pastors, missionaries, and church leaders have failed to do in their dealings with Vodou in the past. This article is a positive step in the right direction and is highly recommended for all those wishing to interact with Vodouists in a more nuanced and constructive fashion.

Sightings 5/1/08

Voodoo's Quest for Respect
--Spencer Dew

Headlines early last month, announcing the enthronement of what the New York Times called "Voodoo's Pope," drew attention to one of the world's most misunderstood and frequently maligned religions. The official title of the newly-created position is "Supreme Chief" or "Supreme Master," and the figure in question, Max Beauvoir, a houngan (priest) and longtime self-styled public relations figure for the religion both in Haiti and the United States, wasted no time in issuing statements to the press addressing the unenviable position of the religion he now represents.

"My position as Supreme Chief in Voodoo was born out of controversy," he said, casting blame on "the voice of Hollywood" for enduring caricatures of the faith and its practices. Indeed, depictions of Voodooists as sinister magicians – not to mention the issue of zombies – have done much to shape popular opinion of the religion. Yet the exceedingly problematic reception of Voodoo has more complicated roots. Voodoo is met with disrespect, suspicion, and outright fear for a confluence of reasons, and these entangled issues are what Beauvoir must somehow seek to address, and, indeed, what he claims his position was created to address.

Voodoo in Haiti, since its inception, has functioned as a politicized force, first playing a crucial role in the Haitian Revolution (1791–1804), associated with armed revolve and raids by maroon bands on slave plantations. Later, in the resistance to the American occupation (1915-34), Voodoo was associated again with assault and warfare. During the dictatorships of Francois and Jean-Claude Duvalier (1907-71 and 1971-86) the religion was linked with the nefarious tonton macoutes militias, and in retribution for these abuses, after Duvalier's fall, hundreds of Voodoo practitioners were killed in what Beauvoir calls "pogroms."

Haiti was the first country founded by former slaves. In America, conceptions of Voodoo have been inseparable from conceptions of race. The religion has therefore suffered from explicitly racist portrayals, and has acted as a canvas for race hatred and race-based fear. Derived in part from African tradition and practiced primarily by black-skinned peoples, Voodoo has, for hundreds of years, been victim of sensational accusations associating its practices with cannibalism and other outlandish and canned racial stereotypes.

Voodoo's secretive nature also continues to hinder its public reception. Secrecy as a theological tenet, mysterious initiations, and a priestly economy wherein houngans and mambos are paid for their services based on claims of power to manipulate invisible forces are all regarded with suspicion by contemporary, Western, secular audiences. Likewise disturbing are two central practices – the sacrifice of animals and spirit possession. The former is bloody, the latter theatrical and sometimes violent, as dancing practitioners lapse into ritual trances and are "ridden" by loas from the Voodoo pantheon.

Such acts strike many outsiders as "Satanic," an inaccurate but nonetheless damaging label with which Voodoo is frequently plastered. Compounding the problem is Voodoo's symbolism, prominently featuring the snake, which Voodooists identify with life and God but Jews and Christians identify with evil and the devil. Then there is the tricky issue of Christian saints' names, prayer formulas, and iconography appropriated by and occurring within Voodoo rites, resonating with long-standing fear within Christianity of the parody and perversion of its rites and symbols.

Finally, Voodoo suffers from a flaw built into both scholarly and popular typologies of religion, that of hierarchical thinking about religions. Beauvoir argues that Voodoo's character derives from its location as a "popular religion." But lacking a sacred text, law codes, or traditions of written commentary, Voodoo is a marginalized tradition – marked as "primitive," as if religions evolve along a given trajectory – compared to those "world religions" that come to dominate empires.

Until now, Voodoo also lacked a formal institution of authority. The establishment of a national federation of Voodooists and their election, in turn, of Beauvoir to his current post is a radical (and not uncontroversial) move. Beauvoir's hope is not only, of course, that Voodoo will receive long-due legitimization on the world stage, but that it will also play an active role in addressing Haiti's poverty and social ills, paving the way for a self-sufficient and sustainable future. It is a tall order, but Voodoo, a religion practiced since the 18th century and only officially recognized as a religion by the Haitian government in 2003, has proven its capacity to persist.

References:

Marc Lacey, "A U.S.-Trained Entrepreneur Becomes Voodoo’s Pope", New York Times, 5 April 2008.

Spencer Dew is a PhD candidate in Religion and Literature at the University of Chicago Divinity School and a Junior Fellow in the Martin Marty Center.

In Memory of Julio Laporte: Pioneer Haitian Baptist Pastor in the Bahamas

This weekend, my wife and I received word from the American Baptist Haitian Alliance that Pastor Julio Laporte has recently passed away. While the official press release from the American Baptist News Service (see below) emphasizes Laporte's accomplishments as a Haitian Baptist pastor in the United States, those of us in the Bahamas also remember Laporte as one of the first pastors to serve Emmaus Baptist Church in Nassau, the oldest Haitian congregation in the Bahamas. Laporte's tenure at Emmaus, which lasted from 1968-1973, was the subject of an interview that my colleague Charles Chapman conducted with Laporte last summer and will be available when the forthcoming issue of the American Baptist Quarterly is released in the next few weeks.

Laporte's pastorate coincided with the first significant waves of modern Haitian migration to the Bahamas back before the overwhelming influx of migrants had made immigration the pressing social crisis that it is today. During Laporte's ministry in the Bahamas, most Haitian migrants chose to attend Roman Catholic mass at the handful of parishes where it was offered in Haitian Creole and, when Laporte left Nassau for New Jersey in 1973, there were only two or three other Haitian Protestant congregations besides Emmaus. Since then, Haitian Protestantism has made significant inroads into the Bahamian religious milieu and, today, Nassau alone is home to at least twenty-five or thirty separate Haitian Protestant congregations.

In addition to his pioneering role as a Haitian Baptist pastor in the Bahamas, Laporte’s life and ministry illustrate an important development in twentieth century global Christianity—the increase in non-Western missionaries serving in former missionary sending countries. Beginning his ministry as a pastor under the supervision of the American Baptist Home Mission Society (ABHMS) in Haiti during the 1950s, Laporte concluded his ministry as a commissioned missionary of American Baptist National Ministries (formerly ABHMS) over five decades later. As the Christian church continues to decline in North America and Western Europe, we will no doubt see an increase in two-thirds world missionaries, such as Laporte, serving in former missionary sending countries.

While my wife and I did not know Pastor Laporte well and, indeed, only had the opportunity to meet him personally on one occasion, we are thankful for the way that God has used him to minister in Haiti, the Bahamas, and the United States during a half-century of change and migration.

ABCUSA: American Baptist Home Missionary And Former National Ministries Staffer Dies

VALLEY FORGE, PA (ABNS 04/14/08) - Rev. Dr. Julio Laporte, former national coordinator for Haitian Ministries at National Ministries, American Baptist Churches USA passed away on April 10. He was 73.

A leader among American Baptist Haitian congregations, Laporte served the Haitian American Baptist community through National Ministries from 2000 to 2003. During that time he supported Haitian churches through pastoral training and networking opportunities such as annual conventions, monthly pastoral meetings and more.

National Ministries' Executive Director Dr. Aidsand F. Wright-Riggins III remembers Laporte as an "esteemed elder" among Haitian Baptists in the United States and Haiti. "He was an effective urban pastor," Wright-Riggins says, "as well as a voice of advocacy for Haitians and a bridge-builder between National Ministries and the Haitian Alliance and congregations."

Most recently Laporte served Bethel Haitian Baptist Church in East Orange, N.J., as pastor. During the 1980s and 1990s, when there was an influx of Haitian refugees in New Jersey, Laporte provided pastoral support to the resettlement effort and, in some cases, sponsored refugees in conjunction with his church.

Laporte also worked as a social worker for the Essex County Welfare Board in Newark, N.J., and as a health representative in offices of the New Jersey Health Department in Trenton and Newark. Early in his career, he pastored local churches in the Bahamas as well as Haiti.

Commissioned as an American Baptist home missionary in 2001, Laporte was ordained in American Baptist Churches USA in 1958 and held a Ph.D. in Christian education and a master's degree in theology, both from Lighthouse Christian College in Beebe, Ariz. He also held a B.D. from Theological Baptist Seminary in Limbe, Haiti.

Laporte is survived by his widow, Rev. Dr. Anne-Rose Laporte, who currently serves Bethel Baptist Haitian Church, and six children. Prayers for the family and friends will be appreciated.

Services are scheduled at Bethel Baptist Church, 320 Springdale Ave., East Orange, N.J. 07017-4532; (973) 673-1731: the viewing on April 18, 6 - 9 p.m., and the funeral on April 19, 9 a.m.

Andrew C. Jayne American Baptist Churches USA Mission Resource Development http://www.abc-usa.org/

Baptist Witness in the Bahamas

As I mentioned yesterday, one of the big projects that I've been working on intensively for the past couple of months is an upcoming issue of the American Baptist Quarterly that will focus on the history of the Bahamian Baptists. Slated for publication at the end of this year, this issue will contain a number of articles by Bahamians and Bahamianists alike that should help to illuminate our understanding of this heretofore largely ignored aspect of Baptist history. Given that Baptists make up approximately 33% of the Bahamian population, making them the largest religious group in the Bahamas, one simply cannot overlook their contributions to the Bahamas. Once released, I hope that this issue will not only be well received by the ABQ's regular readers but also by Bahamian scholars and clergy who would find this topic to be of interest.

Once we have determined how and where this issue of the ABQ will be made available in the Bahamas, I will make that information available on this blog. For those interested in obtaining a copy of this edition directly from the American Baptist Historical Society, the organization that publishes the ABQ, click here. In the meantime, here's a copy of the table of contents along with the author bios to whet your appetite.

“The Bahamas: Baptist Witness amidst Slavery, Colonialism, and Globalization”
American Baptist Quarterly 26 (W 2007)
Edited by Robert E. Johnson and Daniel M. Schweissing

1. “Introduction: Baptist Witness in the Bahamas”

By Daniel M. Schweissing

2. “The Great Awakening and Baptist Beginnings in Colonial Georgia, the Bahama Islands, and Jamaica, 1739-1833”

By Alfred L. Pugh

3. “Shadrach Kerr: Priest and Missionary”

By Jim Lawlor

4. “A History of the Baptists’ Contribution to Education in the Bahamas”

By Christopher Curry

5. “The Role of the Afro-Bahamian Pastor as a Catalyst for Majority Rule”

By R.E. Cooper, Jr.

6. “Rev. Julio Laporte: Pioneer Haitian Baptist Pastor in the Bahamas”

By Charles Chapman and Daniel M. Schweissing

7. “Decolonizing Theology: The Role of Theological Education in Bahamian Nation Building”

By Daniel M. Schweissing

8. “An Annotated Bibliography of Resources on the Bahamian Baptists”

By Daniel M. Schweissing

Authors:

Charles Chapman, a retired American Baptist pastor and missionary, has served overseas in Congo (formerly Zaire), Haiti, and the Dominican Republic. He is currently an interim pastor in the Philadelphia area.

R.E. Cooper, Jr. is the president of Atlantic College and Theological Seminary in Nassau, the senior pastor of the historic Mission Baptist Church in Grant’s Town, and the general superintendent of the Mission Baptist Consortium of Churches.

Christopher Curry, a lecturer at the College of the Bahamas in Nassau, is currently pursuing Ph.D. studies in Latin American and Caribbean history at the University of Connecticut. He is a specialist in the African diaspora of the Anglophone Caribbean.

Robert E. Johnson, editor of the American Baptist Quarterly, is an associate professor of church history and missiology at Central Baptist Theological Seminary.

Jim Lawlor, a retired educator, currently divides his time between substitute teaching and historical research and writing. He has researched for Paul Albury, Arthur Hailey and Sir Orville Turnquest on various aspects of Bahamian History. Together with his wife Anne, Jim has written The Harbour Island Story, updated The Paradise Island Story written by Anne's father, Paul Albury, and presented lectures and written numerous articles in journals and magazines on Bahamian History. Jim has recently authored a biography of the late Paul Albury.

Alfred L. Pugh is a retired American Baptist pastor. From 1970 to 1987, he was an assistant professor in the Black Studies Department at the University of Pittsburgh and an adjunct professor of church history and homiletics at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. He has recently authored Pioneer Preachers in Paradise.

Daniel M. Schweissing is an American Baptist missionary in Nassau where he serves as a theology instructor at Atlantic College and Theological Seminary and conducts leadership training workshops through the Mission Baptist Consortium of Churches. He is also the guest editor for this edition of the American Baptist Quarterly.

Overcoming Racial Prejudice

Last week the Bahamas Human Rights Network (BHRN) hosted an information table at the United Evangelistic International Crusade sponsored by Nassau's Haitian churches. Dick Coulson, a BHRN member, has given me permission to post his comments on the experience here:

In that connection, I would like to say to all that my last night's visit to the Haitian conclave at the Church of God auditorium was, for me a white Bahamian, an extraordinary experience. I saw a religious-civic gathering of nearly 1,000 Haitians living in Nassau and got to talk to a few of them - some citizens, many with resident status and some still undocumented but having found work and by no means a drag on our society. Perhaps this group was not typical of our alleged 60,000 Haitians living here (who has ever verified that number even approximately?), but any Bahamian who has a lingering prejudice against Haitians in our midst should visit an event like this to see the well-dressed, orderly, polite, obviously hard-working men with their wives and children, enthusiastically singing the Creole hymns and listening to their Creole pastors.

If BHRN is to really make an impact on these people and discover their problems, we must have our promotional material translated, into Creole not French. While some men to whom I gave our literature did read English, it was a struggle for them, and only announcements in Creole will make a real impact. They are and will remain a distinct community, but can and already do contribute to Bahamian life. Probably many of them would tell us that they really have no great problems with local authorities, but it is our task to find out.

Dick's experience is an important reminder that racial and ethnic prejudices will only be overcome when we are willing to step out of our comfort zone and meet with others on their own turf and, to the extent possible, dialogue with them in their own language.

The 11th Annual United Evangelistic Int'l Crusade

This is THE big event of the year for Haitian Protestant Churches in Nassau and it's taking place this week (May 21-27). Check it out! Services are held nightly at 7:30pm at the Church of God Auditorium on Joe Farrington Road.

Haitian Protestantism in the Bahamas

I've just learned that Bertin M. Louis, Jr., a doctoral candidate in anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis, is finishing up a dissertation on Haitian Protestant religion in Nassau.

Here's the abstract:

Title: “My Body is in Nassau but My Spirit is in Haiti”: Transnational Migration, Religious Identity and Long-Distance Nationalism Among Protestant Haitians in Nassau, Bahamas

Haitians have been migrating to the Bahamas for the past two centuries and have grown into a community that ranges from 30,000 to 60,000 people. Many Haitians in the Bahamas are undocumented and lead isolated and segregated lives subject to Bahamian discrimination and exploitation. In this environment religion serves an important role for Haitians, and Catholic and Protestant churches are the primary institutions that address their economic, social and spiritual needs. In Nassau, Haitian transmigrants attend Protestant churches more than Catholic churches indicating a religious shift away from the religions practiced by Haitians traditionally (Catholicism and Vodou).

But ethnographic research, conducted in 2005 within Nassau’s Protestant Haitian community, shows the development of a form of religious and social identification that differs from traditional forms of religious and social identification among Protestants in Haiti. Specifically, Protestant Haitians in Nassau who behave and dress in ways considered inappropriate to other Protestant Haitians cause social friction within churches and, by extension, the larger Protestant Haitian community. Within the community these offenders are labeled Pwotestan (Protestant). Community members with proper comportment and appearance demonstrate the acceptance of a new way of life, reflect inner transformation (conversion) and express true faith in God based on any difficulty encountered. They are considered to be Kretyen (Christian).

To be Kretyen reflects the character and social identity that Protestant Haitians within a transnational social field deem necessary to remedy the economic, political and social ills that plague Haiti. To be Kretyen is also important to the progeny of Protestant Haitians in the Bahamas, other Protestants from Haiti, and its diaspora who visit Nassau periodically. Practiced properly among Haitians within a transnational social field, Protestant Christianity then becomes a form of long-distance nationalism that has as its goal the total transformation of Haiti into an economically, politically and socially stable nation-state.

Prior to this effort, Haitian religion in the Bahamas has been largely neglected by academic researchers. Hopefully, the completion of this work will generate interest and open the doors to further research on the subject. In the meantime, I'll be looking forward to reading the completed dissertation once it becomes available.