Espinoza, Benjamin D.

English

APU Digital Archives (Azusa Pacific University)

283great commission research journalWord, seeking the Spirit in prayer, and learning from the field of missiology for a more careful treatment of how the church should address diversity and engage the culture for the sake of the gospel.Mulder, Mark, Aida Ramos, and Gerardo Marti. Latino Protestants in America: Growing and Diverse. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2017. 218 pp. $37.98 hardcover.Reviewed by Benjamin D. Espinoza, BA in Biblical and Theological Studies, Cedarville University; MA in Christian Education, Asbury Theological Seminary; and current PhD student in Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education, Michigan State University. Benjamin is also pursuing a certificate in Chicano and Latino Studies at MSU.By 2050, more than one-third of the population in the United States will be Latino. The April 4, 2013, issue of Time covered “The Latino Reformation,” a reference to the exponential growth of Latino Protestantism in the United States. Moreover, while Latinos tend to be Catholic, by 2030, the majority of Latinos will be Protestant. What is behind this marked shift, and what traits characterize this growing and diverse population? Aided by data from the Lilly-endowed Latino Protestant Congregations (LPC) project, Mark Mulder, Aida Ramos, and Gerardo Marti seek to present a multifaceted picture of the scope, shape, and feel of Latino Protestantism in the United States. The authors recognize the fluidity of both Latino identity and Latino religion and therefore are careful to avoid generalizations about this popu-lation. They highlight that while the Latino population has surged in the United States in recent years, Latinos have been present in this nation since its founding. In chapter 2, they describe both indigenous and migration pat-terns, beginning with white settlers in Mexican lands and the explicit racism that ensued. The authors provide a strong picture of how Mexican Protes-tantism began to take shape due to the presence of white missionaries in Texas and the Southwest. Today, Latinos occupy a diverse and growing share of Protestants in the United States. The authors describe how Latino Catholics are migrating to Protestantism for numerous reasons, such as theological preference, free-dom to worship expressively, and “as a means of gaining power, challeng-ing the status quo, or rechanneling political anxieties into religion to cope with political discord” (55). Among Latino Protestants, Pentecostalism is popular and continues to grow, as does a willingness to worship in predomi-nantly white churches. Some of the churches that Mulder and others high-light worship in significantly different ways, speak both English and Span-ish, and embrace diverse leadership structures. Moreover, the majority of Latino Protestants attend smaller congregations with bi-vocational leaders, lay volunteers, daily ministry services, and a high degree of “relational inti-macy” (85). 284 Book reviewsPolitically, Latino Protestants are more likely to identify as Republican than their Catholic counterparts, but they also endorse a larger role for gov-ernment in alleviating social and economic barriers for low-income people. For instance, Latino Protestants retain conservative positions on abortion and same-sex marriage while also endorsing progressive tax structures and immigration reform. Interestingly, a little over one-third of mainline Latino Protestants agreed that religion plays a “very important” role in influencing political positions, while nearly two-thirds of Latino evangelicals affirmed the same. This speaks to the political diversity of Latino Protestants, signi-fying that in the coming years of explosive growth, Latino Protestants will continue to be a diverse voting bloc.The authors effectively demonstrate the diverse nature of Latino Prot-estantism from religious, social, political, and ecclesial perspectives. Their assertions regarding the current state of Latino Protestantism are driven by rich findings from the LPC project and a diverse array of data collec-tion methods. From a research perspective, Mulder and others provide a strong example of how to capture the essence of an oft-misunderstood and growing population. They present their findings in an engaging and readable fashion, ensuring that the work will reach a popular audience interested in the phenomenon of Latino Protestantism.This book also functions as a prophetic call to white evangelicals to listen to the concerns of their Latino counterparts. As Mulder and others emphasize, Latino Protestantism refuses to be confined to the categories of conservative versus liberal, English only versus Spanish only, and main-line versus evangelical. The tapestry of Latino Protestantism reminds white evangelicals that there are numerous ways of being Christian in the world. Moreover, evangelicalism as a whole must reckon with the growth of Latino evangelicalism. Latino evangelicalism challenges broader evangelicalism to move beyond social and political allegiances that push people away from hearing the good news of the gospel. Latino evangelicalism celebrates its diversity while remaining focused on the good news of the gospel.As the landscape of evangelicalism shifts, those of us in the academy have a responsibility to reimagine theological education. Will we continue train-ing men and women to minister in predominantly white, upper-middle-class contexts, or will we equip them with the ability to construct cultur-ally responsible ministry practices? Latino Protestants in America implicitly makes the case that theological educators can no longer avoid the shifting demographics of evangelicalism; evangelicalism must embrace Latinos as crucial members of the movement. The authors have conducted in-depth research that demands a response to the growing population of Latino Protestants here in the United States. Latino Protestants in America will be a useful text for Christian educators, leaders, pastors, missionaries, and laypeople. 

Book Review: Latino Protestants in America: Growing and Diverse by Mark Mulder, Aida Ramos, and Gerardo Marti

Asbury Theological Seminary

https://digitalarchives.apu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1097&amp;context=gcrj

Book Review: Latino Protestants in America: Growing and Diverse by Mark Mulder, Aida Ramos, and Gerardo Marti

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