Photo via lutherricechurch.org

Baptist ’Mother Teresa’ to receive human rights award

Often referred to by some as the “Baptist Mother Teresa,” Leena Lavanya of India is the 2009 recipient of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA) Denton and Janice Lotz Human Rights Award.

Lavanya is being recognized for her work among the poor and dispossessed of India. Her “Serve Trust” organization operates several ministries, including homes for the aged, lepers, and adults and children living with HIV/AIDS.

Serve Trust operates a school for children in one of the most depressed areas of Narasaraopet, a town of approximately 100,000 in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. In another town, Chilakaluripet, Lavanya operates training programs for female sex workers and their daughters with the hope that these women and their daughters would break the cycle of prostitution.

Chilakaluripet reportedly means “the place where prostitutes live,” and is populated by descendants of women who were once concubines of kings, who have since evolved into a caste where their role and function is prostitution. HIV/AIDS infection is high among this population, where many men depend on the earnings of the women by being pimps or part of the mafia.

In addition to operating a free HIV/AIDS counseling center, Lavanya distributes rice and lentils to female sex workers and blankets to Hindu beggars, many of whom live on the streets or in depressed communities.

Lavanya is the granddaughter of B.R. Moses, a former BWA vice president and seminary professor, who raised her until she was 18 years old, in keeping with a Telugu tradition of grandparents raising the first grandchild. The Telugus are a people group that lives in several states, mostly in Southern India, among whom Baptists have a significant presence. Her maternal uncle, Bontha Moses Sudheer, is a pastor and a member of the BWA Commission on Freedom and Justice.

Lavanya began her ministry after attending the Baptist Youth World Conference in Harare, Zimbabwe, in 1993, in response to a challenge by noted speaker Tony Campolo for youth to fully surrender their lives to Christ.

The Denton and Janice Lotz Human Rights Award will be presented during the meeting of the BWA General Council in Ede, Netherlands, in July.

New director for Freedom and Justice to be appointed

Meanwhile, Raimundo César Barreto Jr. of Brazil is being recommended for the position of Director of the Division of Freedom and Justice (F&J) for the Baptist World Alliance (BWA).

The recommendation, which was made by the Executive Committee of the BWA on March 4, will be presented for a vote at the next meeting of the General Council (GC) in Ede, Netherlands, in July.

If appointed by the GC, Barreto would be the first person to become director of the F&J Division, which was established on September 1, 2008, following the decision of the GC in July 2008 to create the newest division of the international Baptist organization.

An ordained Baptist pastor since 1993, Barreto holds a doctoral degree in Christian Social Ethics from Princeton Theological Seminary in New Jersey in the United States, as well as degrees from the McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University in Atlanta, Georgia, also in the US, and from the North Brazil Baptist Theological Seminary in Recife. He also studied at the International Baptist Theological Seminary in Prague, Czech Republic.

He has worked extensively in academia in Brazil and in the US, including at the North Brazil Baptist Theological Seminary, the Northeast Baptist Theological Seminary in Feira de Santana, the Christian Education Seminary in Recife, Lancaster Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania, and at Princeton Theological Seminary.

Barreto has conducted research on Christian and social justice issues in Latin America. He has special interest in working with organizations in human rights, and in advocating for those who have special needs.

Currently the pastor of Igreja Batista Esperança (Hope Baptist Church) in Salvador, Bahia state, he worked as General Coordinator for the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Social Ethics in Brazil, among several other appointments in church and community organizations.

The F&J Division addresses issues of human rights and religious freedom, and will coordinate the relationship between the BWA and the United Nations, with which the BWA holds membership in several UN agencies.

Barreto is married to Eliã, a nurse working in public health, and is the father of two sons, Caio, 14, and Cauã, 2.

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TAGS: USA Mother Teresa human rights award Leena Lavanya “Serve Trust” organization Tony Campolo

[03/08/2009]

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