Wanderlust of a Flâneur: NAMS Conference in Metrenco, Chile (2017)

The conference of NAMS (New Anglican Missionary Society) this year took place in Metrenco, South of Chile, in a Christian retreat place named Koyamentu. I, Emerson, as a member of the Anglican church in Pindamonhangaba, went to the event as a Brazilian representative of the Free Church of England.

My Report

"In 2017, by Andres Casanueva’s suggestion, I was commissioned by my bishop Josep Rossello to go to Chile, to participate in the annual meeting of NAMS (New Anglican Mission Society). As the name suggests, NAMS is a global missionary work concerned on finding solutions to effective spread of the gospel in the current century, it was created after a calling Rev. Canon Dr. Jon Shuler had in 1994. In 2016 the event which covered the Latin American part of NAMS’ work (NAMS Latino) was held in Pindamonhangaba (São Paulo) and I was there to support that and there I got to know many people involved in NAMS.

In 2017 I was then appointed to be a representative of Brazil and The Free Church of England at the next annual Latin event. During those meetings, I could understand better the work made by NAMS as well the new strategies and plans for 2018. I was given some time to talk about Brazil and the challenges we were facing. I was kindly welcomed and received by everyone and I made very good friends there, including some brothers and sisters from Cuba. I also got to know the Argentinian Marcos Yñiguez and his involvement with Parlamento & Fe (Parliament & Faith), as well Manik Corea, a Singaporean Global Executive for NAMS, among other people of equal importance who made me impressed by their ideas (all included in the photos and I had the amazing opportunity to talk to them all).

The event was held in a bucolic complex named KOYAMENTU, which has a very interesting history. The extensive piece of land was bought by SIM Latinoamérica (Sociedad Internacional Misionera) of Chile in 1998 after a vision of having a quiet and rural place for spiritual retreats and courses. Since then it has been used by churches and groups and has blessed many ministries. Koyamentu is led by Tim Sandvig and Sharon Sandvig and is located in the region of Araucanía, Metrenco (Chile).

My plane then arrived in Santiago and I waited for Juan Tamayo and Maida Gimenez, two very good friends I met in 2016 in Brazil. I stayed over their place before going to Koyamentu. Still in Santiago we met Maralee Gutierrez (American of Latin background), who accompanied us in our long bus journey to the event. Once there, we also had the opportunity to spend some time in Andres Casanueva’s house with him and his family, a time of fellowship and good talks.

My biggest challenge there was the mission Juan gave me, which was to prepare a devotional speech for the next morning. I call it a challenge because it was supposed to be in Spanish, but thanks God everything went well. Another interesting situation was when some who speak Spanish as native language asked me to translate what they were saying to a person who could understand only english, so I was translating from one non-native language of mine to another. Our worship moments were together with a great band which played there: KyriosBand Chile

I’m thankful for the opportunity of being there and meeting such interesting people with their different kinds of work but the same love for Jesus Christ and I hope I can meet them all again one day."

Emerson de Souza