08159
February 29, 2008

General secretary and six staff quit Latin American church council

by Manuel Quintero
Ecumenical News International

GENEVA — The Latin American Council of Churches says its general secretary and six other staff members have resigned from the church body that groups about 140 mainly Protestant churches in the region.

“We share with you our sadness for the resignation of general secretary Israel Batista together with other regional and program secretaries,” the council’s board of directors said in a letter issued after a Feb. 20-24 meeting in Panama at which the staff tendered their resignations.

The board added that the council’s director of communications, the Rev. Nilton Giese, of the Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil, had been appointed acting general secretary.

The announcement appeared to take observers of church affairs in Latin America by surprise, and the board of directors made no mention of any reasons for the resignations.

As well as general secretary Batista, three regional secretaries, two program coordinators and the council’s chief administrative officer tended their resignations to the governing body of the council, known by its Spanish acronym CLAI.

“We deeply value their commitment and the work carried out by these brothers and sisters,” the board of directors said in its letter made available to Ecumenical News International in Geneva.

CLAI elected Batista, a Methodist from Cuba, as its general secretary in 1998 and he took office on Jan. 1, 1999. He had previously worked in Geneva for the World Council of Churches.