As the problem of antisemitism continues to plague countries around the world, more and more Christian groups are actively standing up for the Jewish people and the Jewish state. The US’s evangelical Hispanic community, which amounts for nearly 4% of the US population, should be a central part in leading that effort, according to Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference (NHCLC).
“What if the Latino community emerges as the most pro-Israel, pro-Jewish community on the planet?” Rodriguez, a pastor, movie producer, and civil rights activist asked The Media Line. “That’s my commitment, to engage the Latino Evangelical church as the firewall against antisemitism for generations to come.”
Rodriguez came to Israel on a visit of pastors and church leaders organized by the NHCLC and Eagles Wings, a global movement of Christians fighting antisemitism led by Pastor Robert Stearns.
“We have formed an alliance between Eagle Wings and the NHCLC, bringing emerging Latino leaders, Latino faith leaders, from across America, Central America, and South America here to the Holy Land, believing that this growing influence of the Latino community in America and around the world is a necessary connection for Israel and the Jewish people,” Stearns told The Media Line.
Having an influence on the Hispanic community is especially important given the rise of antisemitism in many Spanish-speaking countries, Rodriguez said. “Many Latino nations have, unfortunately, they are drinking the Kool-Aid, and we need to push back. My generation is committed to saying, no, jamás, esto se termina aquí,” he said, using the Spanish for “never, this ends here.”
The NHCLC represents tens of thousands of Hispanic evangelical churches in the US. Rodriguez described those churches as unified in their “commitment to orthodoxy” but otherwise diverse. “As it pertains to social, political issues, and even our expressions of worship, we are a beautiful mosaic, a tapestry,” he said. “Diversity is our strength, and we are grateful to God for it.”
As a Latino evangelical leader, I have yet to find a Latino evangelical church that has antisemitic notions or policies or spouses or sermons that even smell like antisemitism.
One thing notably absent from evangelical Hispanic churches is antisemitism, Rodriguez said. “As a Latino evangelical leader, I have yet to find a Latino evangelical church that has antisemitic notions or policies or spouses or sermons that even smell like antisemitism,” he said.
Outside of the church, Hispanic solidarity with the Jewish community is less of a given. “In the Latino community, there’s an attempt through Spanish media to conflate the Latino struggle, be it the immigrant struggle or whatever it may be, with the struggle of the non-Jewish population in the Middle East, and there is a brotherhood supposedly in that,” Rodriguez said. “And my objective is—with integrity, recognizing the image of God in every single human being without exception—to push back on that.”
I do believe we have the ability, we have the God-given ability, to create a better world. Societal architecture, cultural reformation. So what if we use our faith to build something better for our children and our children’s children, where we recognize the image of God in one another, where we bring down the giant of bigotry and discord?
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A self-described “cultural architect,” Rodriguez has devoted himself to directing his own community in a better direction. “I do believe we have the ability, we have the God-given ability, to create a better world,” he said. “Societal architecture, cultural reformation. So what if we use our faith to build something better for our children and our children’s children, where we recognize the image of God in one another, where we bring down the giant of bigotry and discord?”
Rodriguez has long been a fan of the phrase “today’s complacency is tomorrow’s captivity.” Amid the rise in antisemitism and following a visit to Israel’s Holocaust museum, he’s updated that line. “I would say today’s complacency is tomorrow’s holocaust. We can’t be complacent,” he said. “And silence is not an option.”
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump tapped Rodriguez to serve in the new White House Faith Office, which is led by Pastor Paula White. Rodriguez described the office as a “stronger, healthier” version of the initiative started by President Trump during his previous term.
“We were there in the first iteration, Trump term one, and we had the privilege, the God-ordained privilege, of advising on a number of issues, including religious liberty, yours truly on the issue of immigration, and other public policy issues,” Rodriguez said. During that term, the office brought a group of evangelical leaders to Israel in the lead-up to the signing of the Abraham Accords, agreements which normalized relations between Israel and four Arab nations, he added.
Rodriguez said that the current White House Faith Office is focused on addressing religious persecution and specifically anti-Christian bias in the US and around the world.
The Jewish-Christian reality is the future of humanity as it pertains to preserving stability. It’s common sense over nonsense. It’s making certain that truth is never sacrificed on the altar of political or cultural expediency. That’s the Judeo-Christian value system.
Solidarity between Christians and Jews is about more than just preventing bias, Rodriguez said. “The Jewish-Christian reality is the future of humanity as it pertains to preserving stability,” he said. “It’s common sense over nonsense. It’s making certain that truth is never sacrificed on the altar of political or cultural expediency. That’s the Judeo-Christian value system.”
“It’s not the agenda of the donkey or the elephant. It’s the agenda of the lamb, which is a Judeo-Christian value system that undergirds who we are as a civil society,” Rodriguez continued. “We have no choice. Jews and Christians must work together to push back on Islamic extremism, to push back against secular totalitarianism, perversion, hedonism, moral relativism, and cultural decadence. All of that can be pushed back. Jews and Christians come together. We will have a better world.”
Better education is necessary in order to achieve that goal, Rodriguez said, lamenting the widespread problem of “biblical illiteracy” among youth.
Education is everything. And it begins from not when they’re in high school, college. It begins from the moment they’re born, when Christian Latino families teach their children the vertical and the horizontal elements of our faith. And that includes from Genesis all the way to Revelation, our commitment to the Jewish people, to the state of Israel, and to building again that multigenerational firewall.
“Education is everything,” he said. “And it begins from not when they’re in high school, college. It begins from the moment they’re born, when Christian Latino families teach their children the vertical and the horizontal elements of our faith. And that includes from Genesis all the way to Revelation, our commitment to the Jewish people, to the state of Israel, and to building again that multigenerational firewall.”
Among the members of Generation Z, more young people seem to be shifting toward support of policies that reflect “the image of God in every single human being,” Rodriguez said, noting his optimism regarding the power of education.
Pastor Stearns, who has brought five solidarity missions to Israel since October 7, 2023, also highlighted the importance of education, especially education on the ground in Israel. “The difference between those voices that you hear buying into the oppressor-versus-oppressed narrative and those who are like me and like Pastor Sam, standing boldly on the side of Israel, is the difference of those who’ve traveled here and seen it for themselves,” he said.
Even something as minor as seeing an Arab Israeli working behind the desk at a hotel can have a big impact on a visitor to Israel, Stearns said.
“You can’t be here for a matter of hours and not see this is a country—not a perfect country, there are no perfect countries—but this is a country that values the worth of every human being,” he continued. “It is the only functional democracy in the Middle East that preserves the right of freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, protection for social minorities, all of these things that we enshrine as the best of human values.”
Alongside the importance of shared biblical narratives, the power of the land of Israel is one of the key factors in the bond between Christians and Jews, Stearns said. “In the Christian Bible, we have something called the Gospels. It’s four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. I sometimes say the land of Israel is the fifth Gospel because the land of Israel tells the story,” he explained. “And people say, what, the story of Jesus? Yes, but it’s the story of the arc of Jesus from Abraham all the way through. And to be here today is to understand miracles are still happening today.”
Normal, everyday people are waking up and saying, enough is enough.
In the aftermath of the October 7 attacks, many people in the US have changed how they think about Israel. Seeing news coverage of the atrocities and then witnessing college students protesting against Israel and harassing Jews was “a tipping point,” Stearns said. “Normal, everyday people are waking up and saying, enough is enough,” he said.
With President Trump’s recent announcement of a plan to remove civilians from Gaza and rebuild the enclave, a change may be on the way. Stearns described the president’s plan as unorthodox but noted that the orthodoxy of providing financial aid to the Palestinians and promoting a two-state solution hasn’t borne fruit.
“President Trump’s idea, though it comes out of the blue and is completely out of the box, I think is a welcome step,” Stearns said. “I think, honestly, it mirrors his bold stance of actually moving the embassy to Jerusalem, which was, the world went into uproar. This is going to be a shock to the Middle East. But look, it began to normalize things in a deeper way. You had the Abraham Accords. You have, even in the midst of this difficult time, a thawing relationship between the Saudis and the West. So I think that the world has to say, yes, it’s out-of-the-box thinking, but that’s what’s needed at this time.”