The Rev. Dr. Hector N. Laporta, a Global Missionary with the General Board of Global Ministries of The United Methodist Church. He was commissioned in May 2016. His new placement is as professor of theological sciences at the Latin American Biblical University, San Jose, Costa Rica. The Universidad Biblica Latinoamericana (UBL) is the center for theological formation for most Methodist churches in Central America and the ecumenical community. It is also an important center for gender studies for the entire region of Latin American and Caribbean. As professor of theological sciences, Hector will boost the UBL’s capacity to provide such training and respond to a challenging context where the oldest and most-respected ecumenical seminaries in the region face difficulties in staying active. Key updates to this position in 2023 include supervising student research projects, attending meetings of the School of Theological Sciences and the Academic Council, participating in the General Assembly of the governing body of UBL, serving on academic or other committees, and assuming administrative tasks as agreed upon by both parties. Online teaching skills are now increasingly desirable. Hector is a citizen of Peru, born in Uruguay, where his father was a pastor for a time. He is an ordained elder of the Methodist Church of Peru, but served pastorates in the New York Annual Conference for 15 years before entering missionary service. He holds a master’s degree in anthropology from the Latin American School of Social Sciences in Ecuador, an intergovernmental organization for Latin America and the Caribbean dedicated to researching, teaching and spreading the social sciences. He earned a Ph.D. degree in 2013 from Union Theological Seminary in New York City. His New York Conference pastoral appointments included Bethelship Norwegian and Fourth Avenue United Methodist churches, both in Brooklyn, and the Church in the Village (United Methodist) in Manhattan. Earlier, he spent 15 years in ministry in Peru. He also participated in ministry while in school in Ecuador. Much of his work has been with the poor and marginalized. Hector sees his role at the seminary in Costa Roca partly as that of sharing his experience “with young generations as a manner to return the opportunities I had to serve God and the poor,” he said. Hector is married to Milagros Ricourt.

Jennifer Moore is a missionary with the General Board of Global Ministries of The United Methodist Church serving as a Christian educator with The United Methodist Church in the Republic of North Macedonia. She was commissioned in May 2016. The United Methodist Church in Macedonia officially began in 1922. Their community of 11 congregations is a testament to perseverance through harsh economic times, wars and religious oppression. After the fall of socialism in the 1990s and Macedonia gaining its independence from Yugoslavia in 1991 came increased religious freedom and a desire to expand the church. As a missionary of Global Ministries, Jennifer walks alongside congregations to help them develop ministry resources, train new leaders and reach their surrounding communities for Christ. Jennifer grew up in the Church of the Nazarene and was always active in her church. “I accepted Jesus into my heart as my Savior at a very young age,” she recounts, “and I did my best to obey him. When I was 15, I went to a youth conference called the Festival of Life. As a result of the messages I heard there, I decided to dedicate my life to God and give him full control over my present and my future.” Drawn by God to mission work after participating in a short-term mission journey in college, Jennifer has prepared for a life of cross-cultural Christian service through her educational, volunteer and vocational endeavors. She earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia; a Master of Arts in intercultural studies from the Nazarene Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Missouri, and a master’s in teaching English to speakers of other languages from Azusa Pacific University, in Azusa, California. She taught English classes to recent immigrants in the U.S. for two years; worked as an elementary schoolteacher in Virginia and Missouri for four years; spent four years teaching university students in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, with English Language Institute/China; and partnered with a church-planting team in Cambodia for two years before moving to North Macedonia in 2016. Jennifer mainly works with the Commission for Working with Children and Youth in the Macedonian district. The commission aims to bring the gospel to every child, teenager and young adult in the district by providing training, resources and spiritual support for the leaders of children’s, teen and young adult groups, as well as organizing districtwide events. Jennifer strives to model and establish good practices for running the commission and investing in the other members as they all work to serve the children, teens and young adults in their district. Jennifer shares, “While serving in Cambodia, I became conscious of the ways cultural beliefs and societal systems play a role in societal ills, and that the church is the main way God has for combating these systems to bring his kingdom on earth. I decided I wanted to invest the rest of my life [in] building up the church and empowering leaders to bring God’s kingdom to their communities.”