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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, August 21, 1979
Page 14
new subscribers on our list this month through unsolicited personal referrals
of readers. The effectiveness of personal referrals will be exploited on a
larger scale next y8ar.
God also seems to be opening a door in East Germany. One of our young
East German members, Joerg Har-;;;, has applied for permission to leave the
country t'.J .study at Ambassador Colleg-e in. Pasadena. So far his application
has not been ri2jected, as is usually :Lnstantly the :::ase, but has instead
been forwarded 0n to higher administrative levt�ls i.n East Berlin.
Joerg has beE:n visited twice by government and police officials, who have
interviewed ;�1im as -to his reasons for wanting to study at Ambassador. They
have told him that his chances of getting the necessary permission are
fairly good
r
but that this would be a "first" for the country. Never before
has a student of �heology been allowed to leave East Germany to study 3 to
4 vears in a noncomHmnist country. Please pray that Joerg may receive the
ne�essa.ry authorization to J.eave. Havinq an Anibassador-educated resident
of East Germany, with automatic access to most countries of the Warsaw Pact:
would be a key to future expansion in those areas.
Spanish Work
The Spanish language edition of the Plain Truth magazine--La PURA VERDAD
--is presently sent to 72
f
447 subscribers in 73 countries worldwide. The
number of subscribers is growing very rapidly and growth in Central and
South America is severely stretching the resources of the Spanish Depart
ment under Regional Director, Mr. Walter Dickinson.
One fact that is not commonly realized is that the United States has the
5th largest Spanish-speaking population in the world behind Mexico, Spain,
Argentina, and Columbia.
This year it has been further emphasized that the Spanish-speaking population
in the U.S. has been largely untapped in reaching them with the message of
the Gospel. On several occasions when campaigns have been scheduled in
the U.S., a simultaneous translation into Spanish has been provided as well.
Recently two Plain Truth lecture series were conducted in the
area of Florida by Mr. Al Kersha, pastor of the Miami church.
for each lecture was "Formula for Global Crisis" and "Formula
Success'' respectively. A simultaneous translation in Spanish
by Mr. Ronald Dopico, a Miami member.
Miami-Hialeah
The theme
for Global
was provided
A special invitation to 1376 Spanish-speaking subscribers to La PURA VERDAD
was posted at the same time as the invitation to J..730 PT subscribers.
Attendances were excellent with 101 new Spanish-speaking and 52 English
speak:.ng people attending one or more of the lectures. One PURA VERDAD
reader flew 180 miles from the island of Key West to attend both of the
northside lectures.
Most PV readers who attended were subscribers who had started receiving the
magazine through PV newsstand distribution, an effort which has been going
on since January 1976. Miami and some nearby communities are 60-70% Spanish
speaking, the majority of those being Cubans. Upwards of 750,000 Hispanics
reside in this area.