Palau brings historic event 'home' to Argentina

As a young mother, Matilde Palau prayed daily that her son Luis would someday impact the world for Christ. Last week, global evangelist Luis Palau's Si A La Vida festival brought a historic response to a mother's prayer as the Argentine capital Buenos Aires saw over 800,000 fill the world's broadest street, the famed Avenue 9 de Julio over two days for one of the largest faith celebrations ever seen in South America.

In the tradition of the Luis Palau festivals seen in over 70 countries, the programme was diverse in content and focused on straightforward Gospel messages from Palau and his son Andrew.

Musical genres ranged from the tango to hip-hop, rock to gospel, all presented on a massive stage constructed at the foot of Argentina's legendary Obelisk. Online viewers around the world joined in to watch a live "streaming" while hundreds of thousands more watched images captured by news helicopters hovering over the site.

More than 23,000 trained "Friends of the Festival" provided personal counselling to the thousands who responded to Palau's invitation to follow a life of faith in Christ. More than 16,000 "decision cards" were collected at preliminary events and on the weekend.

In an unprecedented cooperative effort among government officials, the media, and thousands of churches, the Palau team coordinated a week of activities that included meetings with Argentine president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, the nation's vice president, national deputies and senators, and hundreds of civic and church leaders.

Palau spoke at gatherings for women and for business and union leaders representing hundreds of thousands of Argentine workers. A conference for pastors focused on training clergy to lead a growing number of congregations across the country.

The Luis Palau Association said, meanwhile, that media coverage surpassed any experienced by the ministry in over four decades of outreach. The massive crowds - an estimated 300,000 on Friday and 500,000 on Saturday - were captured on the front pages of the nation's major newspapers and magazines.

As the Palau ministry celebrates the historic events in Buenos Aires they continue planning for upcoming festivals in Jamaica, Mexico and Palau's home base in Portland, Oregon. Luis Palau's latest book, co- authored with Chinese leader Zhao Qixheng titled "A Friendly Dialogue Between an Atheist and a Christian" (Zondervan) was recently released in English and Spanish.