Last week, we told you about the announcement that 200+ churches outside of Belize City broke away from the Belize Association of Evangelical Churches.
That's after they were kicked out by the Belize City Chapter of the Organization, which then - according to them - hijacked the appointment of the
Senator for the Churches and installed Reverend Ashley Rocke.
These Churches, who say that they've been disenfranchised, HAVE formed a new association called the National Evangelical Association of Belize. They
say that they were forced to do that when the interim President, Pastor Howell Longsworth, kicked them out of the BAEC.
Those 2 grievances are among a series of complaints that they have against Longsworth who they accuse of running the BAEC like a dictatorship. These
out-district leaders say that Longsworth stalled the process of instituting a new constitution for the BAEC. The intention of this new constitution was
supposed to decentralize the leadership of the association so that it is more democratic and representative of the entire evangelical community
throughout the country. They say, that from their perspective, they only thing they did was to pressure Longsworth to move forward as planned, and
shortly after that, they received a letter informing them that they had been kicked out of BAEC.
Well, today, these aggrieved churches, held a press conference to introduce themselves under their new organization, the National Evangelical
Association of Belize. Several of the Leaders and a few of its members discussed how they intend to move forward given the difficulties they're facing
with the Howell Longsworth-led BAEC. Here are those comments:
Pastor Lance Lewis - Pres. National Evangelical Assoc. of Belize
"Though as the BSE is officially recognized by the government along with the council of churches, so they are still the people the government would
talk with. We are hoping that with our broader base and that was the plan of even the interim president who has declared himself president; that he
will realize that we have gone the wrong way and come back in. We are open to them becoming fully involved in us because right we represent the vast
majority of Evangelical churches and pastors in the nation of Belize. We were following the constitution that is now being put in place, so we did no
wrong as far as we saw. They put us out but we hope that we are willing to take them in."
Pastor Scott Stirm - VP. National Evangelical Assoc. of Belize
"We have a national executive team for the national Evangelical association of Belize which is 11 leaders from all over the nation. But our
conservative estimate of the number of churches that are actively represented by that is over 200 and when we begin to communicate by email another
denomination corresponded with us and said we are 100% together with you and our 44 churches. Our conservative estimates of 200 churches before have
now jumped to 244 just within the last couple of days. We've gotten numerous responses from leaders all over Belize that are saying yes, we're together
with you guys."
George Ferrar - Secretary National Evangelical Assoc. of Belize
"The previous question was how we were responding to the election of Ashley Rocke as Senator by the Belize district group. And we discussed that last,
despite the fact that we are diverse bunch of people who represent diverse churches around the nation. We were unanimous in agreeing to appoint a
committee to meet with Ashley Rocke to chart our way forward and establish a working relationship fully representing the entire Evangelical body."
Pastor Lance Lewis - Pres. National Evangelical Assoc. of Belize
"We will meet with him but we are not going to try to get rid of him but we want to meet with him."
Richard Smith - My Refuge Christian Ministries
"We are called as the church with integrity and with right order to make sure that bills that are tabled is being consulted with the church from every
district. And that is the reason why we push very hard to establish each. We did not rebuild these chapters, they were already established chapters in
their district and we just bring them online to work together for the common good of reporting back to the church."
David Diego - Asst. Minister Czl Church of Christ
"We need the church to be the guiding force behind everything, hence the reason why I decided that I will be a part of this group."
Pastor Enrique Novelo - Asst. Sec. Natl Evangelical Assoc. of Belize
"We are ambassadors of Christ and we aren't fighting for any political agenda."
Today, we contacted Longsworth for comment. He directed us to speak with Scott Stirm, who told us that it is still unclear to them why the 200+
churches were kicked out.
When we pressed Longsworth for comment, he told us that he has a policy not to speak on church issues publicly. He told us, quote, "That's God's
business; he is big enough to take care of it." End Quote
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