Page 348 - tesis
P. 348

resources invested in the construction of their church buildings or evangelistic projects cannot be compared with the resources invested in the social needs. This tendency is more marked among the lower middle and working classes. They give less attention to social assistance. Most of pastors emphasize that the investment in evangelism is justified because it brings spiritual and social change to the lives of people. Also, some leaders say that what people need is to be empowered by the Spirit of God and with values to develop as leaders.\u000AOn the other hand, projects such as Fundaci\u00F3n Manos de Amor (FMA) and Casa Bernab\u00E9 (CB) go beyond social assistance. They promote a more integral vision of the person and community development, and count on resources, infrastructure, organization, and work teams. Support from CB is significant in a context where street children are condemned to abandonment, hunger, sexual abuse, drug addiction, persecution, and death. Its offering of substitute families in the context of a community provides the opportunity of restoring dignity and hope to children with no future. As indicated in chapter three, this project is mainly funded by believers in the United States, and supported by foreign missionaries. The question remains: Why is the participation of local church lay people low? And why do the Verbo churches invest so little in the project?\u000ADevelopment of the FMA from the ecclesiastical base shows an advance in social matters within the Neo-Pentecostal world. It integrates the spiritual component with sociological and economic elements to promote development of communities in the rural areas. According to the founders of FMA, \u2018true spiritual revival produces a social effect, a transformation\u0027 (Caballeros 1998: 22). The goal of FMA is spread out around the country the concept of \u2018communities of transformation\u2019 [related with the case of Almolonga, called \u201Cthe miracle city\u201D, were the religious revival brought economic prosperity, family integration, and social development].\u000ATwo things must be pointed out: first, as long as the Almolonga project is presented as an example of development within the structure of spiritual warfare, it does not give\u000A 335\u000A


































































































   346   347   348   349   350