Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Marrero Castellanos, Bárbaro Abel

Titel

Cuban World Christians: The Case of Doctrinal Identity Expressed by Domingo Fernandez (1909-1999)

Ort / Verlag

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses

Erscheinungsjahr

2020

Quelle

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses A&I

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• This dissertation is about the doctrinal identity of the Western Cuban Baptist Convention (WCBC). The first Baptist church in Cuba was organized in 1886. In that decade, three other Evangelical denominations entered the island and preached alongside Baptists: Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Methodists. Of these four, Baptists are unique in their preservation of doctrinal identity, while the others have experienced significant changes in this area through the years. That reality prompted the research question: What is the reason for the unique doctrinal consistency of Baptists in Western Cuba? The thesis states that Domingo Fernandez was the key factor in the continuity of doctrinal identity in the WCBC as a translator of the message communicated by the Southern Baptist missionary Moses Nathanael McCall. McCall was the architect of the WCBC in general, and particularly of its doctrinal identity. He came to Cuba in 1905, the year the WCBC was established, and the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention appointed him its superintendent on the island soon after his arrival. The next year, Cuban Baptists elected him as president of the WCBC (and continued reelecting him every year for forty years) and McCall founded a Baptist Seminary. From these pivotal roles, he consolidated the doctrinal identity of the WCBC. When McCall died, Fernandez, who was Spanish-born and had come to Cuba as a teenager, took his place of doctrinal influence. He contextualized the message more than McCall, but he kept the core of the teaching. With that cultural translation, faithful to the content, he guaranteed and strengthened the nationals' appropriation of the message transmitted by the missionary. That outcome was evidenced when missionaries had to leave the country in the 1960s and the nationals decided by themselves to keep their doctrinal identity, even without external pressure. The first chapter introduces the topic and presents the methodology. The second provides a brief history of the WCBC. The third details the life and ministry of McCall. The fourth explores Fernandez' life and ministry, while also specifying how he contextualized the message. The fifth compares the soteriological thinking of McCall and Fernandez, confirming that the message's essence was not distorted in the contextualization process. Finally, the sixth chapter draws general conclusions.