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Welcome to Wycliffe Caribbean!
Wycliffe Caribbean is part of the Wycliffe Bible Translators
International family of organisations. We believe the worldwide
Christian Church is responsible to evangelise the world and to
disciple the nations. Wycliffe, therefore, exists to assist the
Church in this task.
This site focuses on how Caribbean people and churches can be
involved in the worldwide task of Bible translation. It also
provides links to the websites of other Wycliffe organisations
around the world.
Meaning in Translation
Wycliffe Bible Translators Caribbean gets new
office
Adapted and revised from publication in The
Daily Gleaner, Saturday July 9, 2005
Ian Allen/Staff Photographer
Building housing new offices of Wycliffe Caribbean, located at 20
West Avenue, Kingston 8.
On Saturday 9 April 2005, the work of Wycliffe Bible Translators
Caribbean received a significant boost as this regional
parachurch organisation officially opened new offices at 20 West
Avenue, Kingston 8. This is in addition to the Wycliffe Caribbean
head offices located in Trinidad & Tobago and a committee
office in Barbados. The new building will house a library and
resource centre, a training room, an audio/visual editing studio,
and offices for some staff of Wycliffe Caribbean, including the
local Jamaica committee.
Those in attendance at the dedication and opening included heads
of denominations, other members of the clergy as well as a good
number of believers from a cross-section of the Christian
community. The act of dedication and opening was conducted by the
Custus of Kingston, Rev. Dr. Carmen Stewart. The guest speaker
was Rev. Dr. Gerry Seale of Barbados, General Secretary of the
Evangelical Association of the Caribbean (EAC). There were also
representatives from other Caribbean nations as well as from the
wider Wycliffe Bible Translators International. Greetings and
congratulations were received in person from a number of the
local and overseas leaders present and a highlight of the
afternoon was a parade of Caribbean flags while a citation was
read in three of the major languages from the region –
English, French and Spanish each done by a representative of the
language group.
Wycliffe Bible Translators is named after John Wycliffe, who in
1380 was the first person to translate the Bible from Latin into
everyday English. At present, the statistics by
Wycliffe's estimates indicates 95 per cent of the world now
has access to the Christian Scriptures in whole or in substantial
parts. That leaves five per cent of the world or 380 million
people who do not have even a verse in their own tongue. The
world, says Wycliffe Bible Translators International, has over
6,912 languages of which close to 500 are in decline. The
complete Bible to date has been translated into 414 languages
with an additional 1,068 having all of the New Testament, 873
with portions of scripture and work in progress in about 1,678
others. The challenge for Christians is to get the Scriptures in
at least 2,644 languages considered to be in desperate need for
scripture in order to reach that five per cent that don't
already have a translation of the Bible. This last figure is
really a great improvement over the estimated 1999 figure of
3,000 in need. This indicates that a lot of ground has been
covered since then.
Wycliffe International Announces new Chairman of the Board of Director
(May 5, 2005, Ft. Worth, Texas, USA) Wycliffe International announced
today the selection of a new Chairman of the Board of Directors. Reverend
Roger Welch of England was chosen by fellow board members to serve as
Chair. Mundara Muturi, General Secretary of Bible Translation and
Literacy of East Africa in Nairobi, Kenya was selected as Vice-Chairman of
the Board.
Welch has served for twenty years as Chairman of the Board for Wycliffe
United Kingdom, and has been on the International Board since 1996. A
researcher of Church history and frequent lecturer, Welch also serves as
lead pastor of Merland Rise Church, an Evangelical Free Church in Surrey,
England. In stating his vision for Wycliffe International, Welch said, "I
am fully committed to the pursuit of Vision 2025, having been involved on
the Board from the first presentation of the vision. I am so excited by
the increased pace of new Bible translation "starts" in the last five
years. The Board will need to do all things possible to maintain the pace."
Vision 2025 is a statement of Wycliffe's desire to work with partners
worldwide so that, "by the year 2025 a Bible translation program begun in
every language group that needs it."
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Reverend Roger Welch |
Mundara Muturi |
Welch fills a newly developed role of "Chairman of the Board" which
replaces the former governance model of having a President serve as Board
leader. Former President of the Board is Richard Hugoniot, who will
continue to serve Wycliffe International in a senior administrative role.
Wycliffe International's work is to facilitate the translation of God's
Word into every language that needs it. Wycliffe has organizations in over
forty countries and has had a part in translating over 600 New Testaments
into minority and indigenous languages. Thirteen hundred more projects
representing over 70 countries, are in progress. Because Wycliffe
organizations believe Bible translation is part of the Great Commission's
mandate given to the Church, Wycliffe actively seeks to engage the
worldwide Church in the Bible translation ministry. Wycliffe helps recruit
personnel, raise funds and promote prayer for this worldwide task.
www.wycliffe.net
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From 150 years to 23 years!
At the rate at which Bible translation have taken place over the
last 60 years, it would take about 150 years to get the Bible
translated for the people who don't already have it. In 1999,
several Bible translators got together and resolved that 150
years was too long a wait before everyone could have a copy of
the Bible in their own language. From this Vision 2025 was born.
Under this arrangement, Bible translators came up with a plan to
step up Bible translation work so that everyone might have access
to the Bible translated in their own indigenous tongue by 2025.
This means that translation needs to be started in a new language
at the rate of one every three days for the next 23 years.
The role of John Roomes, Wycliffe head in the Caribbean, is to
chart a course for the organisation to effectively inform
Caribbean nations of the need that exists globally;
motivate Caribbean believers to participate prayerfully, to
go personally and to financially support the regional
organisation as well as those individuals who will go to the
field; and finally to mobilise our people to actually go
by the hundreds to where our help is so desperately needed. To
realise this, he seeks to promote and expose the Caribbean's
young people to the prospects of a career on the mission-field
especially as Bible translators. He does so at a time when the
nations with the fewest missionaries (this includes Islamic
countries) are becoming increasingly hostile to the Christian
gospel. Persecution is at an all time high and missionaries have
not been exempted. The young traditionally have never been
daunted by the prospects of hardships when their imagination and
passion have been stirred into action, so the time is now ripe
for a movement to begin.
John Roomes, chief executive officer of Wycliffe Bible
Translators Caribbean, in an interview with The Gleaner shared
the following perspectives on the new Wycliffe facility.
DG: What is significant about the new offices of Wycliffe
Caribbean?
Roomes: It signifies the strategic direction in which the
Caribbean organisation is going – particularly its location
in the vicinity of the premier evangelical seminaries of the
region – the widely regarded Jamaica Theological Seminary
and the Caribbean Graduate School of Theology (JTS/CGST). (The
recently opened offices are located adjacent to these educational
institutions.) It speaks to the fact that Jamaica will be a major
player in the mobilisation of Caribbean believers for missions
– after all we have roughly one third of the
English-speaking believers in the region and we are located next
to the two largest language groups in the Caribbean (French and
Spanish). It also speaks to the kind of responses that we have
been receiving from persons with whom we have shared our vision.
We are responding to a ground swell of interest among Jamaicans
and other Caribbean people to become significantly involved in
cross-cultural missions. It became abundantly clear that in order
to effectively process the people showing interest and to handle
future responses, we needed adequate facilities to do so. It
signifies the more-than-expected growth potential of our
mobilisation work in the region.
DG: How will the new offices help the work of Wycliffe
Caribbean?
Roomes: There is a distinct recruiting advantage that
will result from the proximity to JTS and CGST. Already there is
a high level of interest from students about the prospects of
finding out more about the needs in other nations and how they
can become involved in cross-cultural mission. In fact, for many
it is the call of the Great Commission that brought them to the
institutions in the first place. The building also gives us room
to develop the organisation and to provide quality services to
our churches as we seek to facilitate them in raising up
Caribbean missionaries to go and help in providing translated
Scripture to the Bible-less people groups. The offices will be
providing a base for the executive director, financial and
personnel management, a hub for digital communication media
development, a source for the dissemination of mission-related
information through a network of resources, including the Web, a
reading/research library, low cost books and the provision of a
variety of videos, CDs, DVDs, brochures, etc., all in order to
help our churches develop a mission-focused ministry and to usher
hundreds of individuals into mission. This will also provide a
base for the Jamaica Wycliffe Team.
DG: Give a little background about the persons from
overseas that have been assisting with the preparation of the
offices and the nature of that assistance.
Roomes: We have had the volunteer assistance of about
nine persons so far from the USA through a sister organisation
called Wycliffe Associates. They came with a variety of skills
(some unrelated to building refurbishing) and have put in long
hours getting the building ready. They were joined by a variety
of skilled local individuals who provided certain specialised
inputs. Funding for the project has come from overseas as well
and this is based on a financial approach we are adopting. We
seek help from our foreign partners for infrastructure and
equipment in getting started but we are very clear in taking
local ownership for the provision of financial resources for our
day-to-day operations. Our local people need to share in the
blessings and this will happen when we give of our own resources
for the payment of our bills – water, phone, light,
stationery, etc. – and also for the financial support of
our missionaries from the Caribbean. We need to experience the
joy and privilege of financially supporting mission – we
now have the opportunity to do so and we are counting on our
local churches and believers to make the most of it.
Send feedback to
mark.dawes@gleanerjm.com
Wanted Immediately!
Fifty Caribbean men and women of exemplary Christian character.
Good education. Competent in any of the 185 listed positions
listed below. Not afraid to work hard under difficult conditions
in dangerous parts of the world. Click
here for more information.
Total Number of Languages in the World: 6,912
Most people are surprised to hear that there are over 6,900
languages in use around the world today. More than 380 million
people speaking 4,147 different languages do not have any part of
God's Word available in the languages they know best. There
is no translation project yet begun for the speakers of 2,737
languages.
Bible Translation Status for the World's Languages
Over 611 New Testaments have been produced with the help of
Wycliffe Bible Translators. Wycliffe members are currently
helping to translate the Bible into the languages of an
additional 1,376 people groups. We also work closely with these
people groups to encourage literacy, so that the Bible, once
translated, does not remain a closed book.
Caribbean Languages and Bible Translation Status
Many of the living languages of the Caribbean already have
either the full Bible or at least the New Testament. Others have
Bible translation projects in progress. The 500th New Testament
produced with the help of Wycliffe translators was for Javanese of
Suriname in 2000. Click here
for more information.
Wycliffe Bible Translators
For the last 70 years, Wycliffe has been helping to bridge the
gap between God's Word and Bibleless peoples around the
world.
Vision 2025 is our international co-operative strategy to
have a translation in progress for every language that needs it
by the year 2025.
The Caribbean arm of Wycliffe Bible Translators is still a young
organisation. Yet, in spite of this, we believe that God has
empowered us to take on a significant portion of that load, as
the Caribbean Church is a strong and growing Church and has a
great deal to contribute in every area of cross-cultural world
missions. We share and fully embrace the charge, "Moving
from mission field to mission force,"the electrifying
declaration of the Caribbean Church, made in May 2000 by the
Evangelical
Association of the Caribbean (EAC).
Whether you are willing to support this work in prayer and other
ways, or whether you are looking for dynamic and life-changing
career choices, we hope that this site will help you find the
information you need.
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