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LEADER OF LOTT CAREY BAPTIST FOREIGN MISSION CONVENTION AMONG ORGANIZERS OF NEW BAPTIST COVENANT CELEBRATION

(WASHINGTON – January 11, 2007) Dr. David Emmanuel Goatley, Executive Secretary/Treasurer of Lott Carey Baptist Foreign Mission Convention and President of the North American Baptist Fellowship, is sharing leadership of the New Baptist Covenant Celebration scheduled for 2008.

Former presidents and prominent Baptists, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, announced the Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant Jan. 9 at the Carter Center in Atlanta after meeting with Goatley and about 80 other leaders from Baptist organizations in the United States and Canada. This unprecedented collaboration of Baptists sharing traditional Baptist values is tentatively scheduled to be held at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta Jan. 30-Feb. 1, 2008. Organizers expect about 20,000 people to attend the convocation.

“I am pleased to join Presidents Carter and Clinton, as well as Mercer University President William Underwood, in this historic event,” said Goatley. “We hope this endeavor will work to unite Baptists everywhere in our commitment as Christians without regard to race, ethnicity, partisanship or geography.”

Plans for the collaborative celebration grew out of the North American Baptist Covenant, a document signed by Goatley and other Baptist leaders following a meeting at The Carter Center last April.

The North American Baptist Covenant affirmed the leaders’ desire to speak and work together to create an authentic and genuine prophetic Baptist voice during these complex times. The leaders who signed the Covenant reaffirmed their commitment to traditional Baptist values, including sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ and its implications for public and private morality.

Lott Carey Baptist Foreign Mission Convention is a leading global missions agency of African-American heritage. The North American Baptist Fellowship is a fellowship of more than 20 Baptist denominations and organizations representing more than 20 million Baptists in the United States and Canada.

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Media contact: Alayna Adams, The Carter Malone Group, (901) 278-0881, aadams@thecartermalonegroup.com