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157
Let’s
Question
the
Ministry
of Women
Graciela Esparza
.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Graciela
Esparza belongs to a small but distinguished
and .respectable
new genre in Latin America: The women who have founded and head and
large
growing autochthonous Pentecostal oMfoc?fAo/touj denominations, in her M /Mr case, the Iglesia Iglesia Mexi- Mexi- cana del Evangelio de Cristo. She is also an example of the leader who was born in an “old” or traditional Protestant church and now heads a Pentecostal
Dr.
organization.
Esparza’s family has been in the Methodist Church of Mexico for a hundred but at a certain moment she was
years
given the choice of “Methodism or tongues” and she chose
sonal
tongues. From a very early age she was very active in church work and per-
evangelism. After finishing
her theological studies at Asbury Seminary, she became a teacher at the Methodist School for Deaconesses in Mexico City. During a visit with friends in the U.SA. she was baptized in the Spirit and to Mexico was
prevented from continuing
her
returning
teaching
at the School
of Deaconesses and thus
began what-is now a Pentecostal denomination. She has also received a Doctor- ate in
History of Mexico at the National
and was some time in
