IMMIGRANT FELLOWSHIP COMPLETES CYCLE TO BECOME A NEW CHURCH On September 28, 2003, the New Hope Presbyterian Church of Orlando was chartered as the first Brazilian church in Central Florida Presbytery. This event completed a process begun in May of 1999 when the Rev. Wesley Porto officially started meeting at the Orlando YMCA Headquarters with a group of Brazilian Christian immigrants called the Igreja Presbiteriana Nova Esperanca. Beginning with a small group of 40 people, they soon grew to 100. After a few months, the group moved to the St. Pauls Presbyterian Church in Ocoee where they worshipped for four years. |
| On September 11-12, 2000, Central Florida Presbytery received the group as a Presbyterian Fellowship to be guided by the Presbytery Committee on New Church Development. Later as the Fellowship grew, the Presbytery approved making the young church an official New Church Development in March 2001. In May 2003 the NCD moved to share the facilities of the Conway Presbyterian Church on the eastside of Orlando, just a few months before they were chartered. The pastor of the New Hope Church is the Rev. Wesley Porto who has provided pastoral leadership for the church during the whole process of its development. The New Hope Church is proud to have been self-supporting from the beginning although it has received occasional financial support from the Presbytery and General Assembly for special projects. |
 The choir sings at the charter worship service of the New Hope (Brazilian) Church on September 28, 2003 |
|
A second highpoint
for the young Brazilian congregation was the Graduation Ceremony for
30 lay leaders after completing 12 months of Lay Leader Training.
The training took place for 8 hours one weekend a month for an
entire year and included homework assignments and a variety of
faculty leaders from the Southeastern United States. They taught in
Portuguese, Spanish and English (translated into Portuguese.) The
Dean who coordinated the Training Program was the Rev. Silvana
Franca. |
|
|
|
|
THE COLLEGE PARK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF ORLANDO HAS OFFICIAL BEGINNING ON FEBRUARU 8, 2004 Over a year of conversations, planning and negotiations by two small churches in Orlando will culminate in a Merger Service of Worship on February 8, 2004. It all began when the pastor of the John Knox Church left for a new call, and the church began to consider choices for its future. At the same time, the Calvary Presbyterian Church located just a few miles from the John Knox Church began to think about its future given its shrinking membership and changing commercial neighborhood. Conversations began between representatives of the two churches, and they soon realized that many of their members came from the same area. They also noted that neither church was effectively reaching the residents of nearby College Park, a community near downtown Orlando that was very attractive to people of a variety of ages who worked in the downtown area. A Futures Committee developed a list of requirements to be approved by both congregations before the merger could take place. The two congregations voted in May 2003 to proceed with the merger, including plans to sell the Calvary property and redevelop the John Knox facilities. The Calvary property was sold just before the end of 2003, and the new College Park Presbyterian |
