I was able to capture an image from the service tonight at First Baptist Curritiba. Focus for the service was a celebration of what appeared to be about 350 men who had attended a national men's conference somewhere in the country. The men are "the priests of their home" said the preacher and the pastor is "the captain of the ship, keeping us all on course". Each choir member was given a small radio with earbuds for listening to an interpreter while the sermon was being being preached. Altogether there might have been about 5,000 people in the congregation tonight. Note all the hundreds of people gathered below the choir. These are bringing their gifts and tithes to the front of the church. At one corner of the room is a new autombile ---driven in through a large unfinished doorway. One of the families had donated this to help with the building program. Another family had donated a family heirloom. FBC has a five year building program but builds only as the money is offered, as is the custom in Brazil. The santuary is far enough along in construction to provide space for worship, but has several more years work to be completed. Even at this early stage, it is a beautiful building. The people were very hospitable. Earlier today, we has lunch served in a private dining area while the rest of the church (about 1500 people) ate in the regular dining room. Lunch is served each Sunday for $5.00 U.S. currency.

This morning we sang to the English speaking church from this same congregation. We celebrated the Lord's Supper as the Pastor stood at the alter and offered the bread and juice to about 500 people. It was a beautiful sight from the choir loft as the people streamed to the front of the church. The Pastor, Jim Davidson, also leads the choir for the main congregation. His wife Rosemary, works with Jim for many of the ministires.

We also visited the memorial site for the Ukranian Church of Curitiba. The building is no longer the meeting place for the church, but has been coverted to a beautiful park. Once again, the North Carolina Baptist Singers gathered in the building to sing the Doxology.