Under the NAR's anti-Catholic influence, a 3-week long April-May 2011 prayer initiative, cosponsored by the NHCLC, was spearheaded by National Hispanic Christian Leadership Vice President for Governmental Affairs Mark Gonzalez, per the order of his apostolic overseer Cindy Jacobs--one of Peter Wagner's top NAR movement colleagues. The genesis of the initiative was covered in an April 27, 2011 Charisma magazine story.  

The Cinco de Mayo prayer initiative featured, as one of the daily prayers in its "21 Day Prayer Guide" (which Cindy Jacobs helped write), a prayer against "UN-HOLY SPIRITS, THE OCCULT AND IDOLATRY". Among the "forms of religious occultism" identified in the lengthy prayer was Catholic veneration for Saint Jude (one of Jesus' apostles) and the Lady of Guadalupe (sanctioned by Catholic Church through an act of canonization). According to the prayer,

"the worship of numerous patron saints, such as Saint Jude, the Lady of Guadalupe... have led to an increase of violence often linked to human sacrifices and beheadings." - from New Apostolic Reformation prayer guide, distributed in both English and Spanish

[video, below: Generals International head Cindy Jacobs interviews NHCLC Vice President Mark Gonzalez concerning their shared project, the Cinco de Mayo prayer initiative. During the discussion, the two enthusiastically discuss how the initiative's 21 Day Prayer Guide had been translated into Spanish.]

Over the Summer of 2011, publicity concerning Texas governor Rick Perry's August 6th, NAR apostle-dominated The Response prayer event led to an unprecedented wave of media scrutiny of the New Apostolic Reformation, including the widely read August Texas Observer story Rick Perry's Army of God, and an appearance on NPR's Fresh Air, by researcher Rachel Tabachnick, to explain the NAR movement.

Amidst the publicity, C. Peter Wagner was moved to present his side of the story, in a writing published on August 24, 2011 by Charisma magazine, The New Apostolic Reformation Is Not a Cult which, explained Tabachnick, seemed to address criticism of his movement coming not from liberals or from the secular world but, rather, from conservative evangelicals and fundamentalists.

In early September, publicity following Tabachnick's expose' concerning National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference President Samuel Rodriguez' position as Vice President and co-founder of the NAR apostle-dominated Oak Initiative led Rodriguez to quietly withdraw from the Oak Initiative and downplay his extensive ties to its parent movement, C. Peter Wagner's NAR.

Perhaps as problematic as the Oak Initiative's rhetorical attacks on American-Muslims and Islam, the Initiative has also demonized Obama Administration efforts towards health care reform, an issue of strong concern to many Hispanic-Americans; according to a 2009 Gallup poll, 41.7 percent of Hispanic-Americans over the age of 18 lack health insurance.

Beyond the Oak Initiative, Samuel Rodriguez' NAR ties have included being listed, for two years (2009-2010), as a member of the elite, invitation-only, dues-paying, International Coalition of Apostles, the biggest apostolic network among Peter Wagner's numerous apostolic entities. Two of the NHCLC's advisory board members, Cindy Jacobs (who was Rodriguez' fellow board member in the Oak Initiative) and Stephen Strang (publisher of Charisma magazine), are current or former International Coalition of Apostles members as well.

One other prominent NHCLC leader, who also serves as an apostle and leader in Wagner's New Apostolic Reformation movement, has escaped scrutiny: National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference Vice President For Governmental Affairs Mark Gonzalez who, among other NAR affiliations, serves in NAR leader Cindy Jacobs' apostolic network.

As described on his biography page at Mark Gonzales' United States Hispanic Prayer Network,

Currently, under the apostolic covering of Mike and Cindy Jacobs, Mark [Gonzalez] is a part of the Apostolic Council for the United States Reformation Prayer Network and is also a part of the Emerging Leaders Group for the Apostolic Council of Prophetic Elders.

This identifies Gonzales as an apostle under the direct apostolic authority of one of the top generals in C. Peter Wagner's movement, Cindy Jacobs; Gonzales is also a member of a spinoff group of the elite Apostolic Council of Prophetic Elders (ACPE), whose prophets are believed to receive direct, extra-biblical revelation from God.    

New Apostolic Reformation bigotries are extreme and wide ranging; Mark Gonzalez' apostolic overseer Cindy Jacobs has recently claimed that Texas Governor Rick Perry's The Response prayer event (which both Jacobs and Gonzalez endorsed) lifted a longstanding curse over large swaths of Texas. The alleged curse was incurred, according to Jacobs, by violent and cannibalistic practices of Native American groups indigenous to the Lone Star State.

[video, below: Cindy Jacobs explains Texas' "Native-American cannibal curse"]

Cindy Jacobs has also asserted that flocks of blackbirds dropped dead from the sky as a result of the Obama Administration's decision to repeal the Pentagon's "Don't Ask/Don't Tell" policy for gay members serving in the US military.

In her writing, Jacobs advocates burning of Books of Mormon, statues of Catholic saints, and native art. The destruction of such "idolatrous" objects is, for Cindy Jacobs, a current concern, judging by video footage from an October 7th, 2008 New Apostolic Reformation conference in Argentina (held by Jacobs' and Peter Wagner's close colleague Ed Silvoso), during which Jacobs exclaimed,

"Pastors, sanctify your people! You go and you tell 'em, if you have any idols in their homes we're gonna to burn 'em! If you have any witchcraft items in your homes, you bring 'em Sunday and we're gonna burn 'em! We're not gonna have witchcraft in this church!"

In her chapter in the book The Queen's Domain - Advancing God's Kingdom in the 40/70 Window ( edited by C. Peter Wagner, with contributions from Chuck Pierce, Cindy Jacobs, Roger Mitchell, Martha Lucia, and Marty Cassady, published by Wagner Publications, 2000), on page 90, Cindy Jacobs describes Spain as in the grip of a demon spirit referred to by Wagner, Jacobs, and movement leaders as the "Queen of Heaven" (see footnote 1), a global level demon held to block the prayers of Catholics and Muslims from reaching Heaven:

"We cannot finish this chapter without discussing the serious idolatry that grips Spain through the worship of the Queen of Heaven.  I have heard some cities worship as many as 52 virgins!  The oppression for those who try to stand against this spirit is very strong and they are often opposed by the spirit of death who tries to kill those in opposition to the Queen of Heaven.  I know that there will be a day when her grip is broken off of this land and the people there will honor Mary, the mother of Jesus, without worshiping the Queen of Heaven."

As Cindy Jacobs describes on her Generals International website (and also in this video),

"In late January, I received a phone call from some top leaders in Mexico with a "Macedonian Call" appeal for help in prayer to break the spirit of violence in their nation. In response, I contacted Mark Gonzales, an Apostolic Council Member of the United States Reformation Prayer Network, and charged him with developing a joint prayer effort between the United States and Mexico.

Beginning April 15, 2011 and leading up to a National Day of Prayer on Cinco de Mayo, the 5th of May, Mark Gonzales and the Hispanic Prayer Network will spearhead an extremely powerful 21-day prayer strategy that we have named the Cinco de Mayo Initiative. Using a comprehensive 21-day prayer guide that I helped to write, both nations will unite their voices to contend in prayer for righteous trade, peace and security at the Mexico-U.S.A. border. "

The ties are both organizational and also personal. As Gonzales' United States Hispanic Prayer Network bio page describes,

Partnering with his spiritual mother, Cindy Jacobs of Generals International and with his great friend, Lou Engle of TheCall, Mark has played a key role in mobilizing prayer, especially among the Hispanic church, all over America.

Both Lou Engle and Cindy Jacobs serve as prophets in the Apostolic Council of Prophetic Elders. Engle's The Call events are known for their strident antigay and antiabortion rhetoric, and he came under heavy international criticism for taking his The Call event to Uganda, in May 2010.

Lou Engle's May 2010 highly controversial The Call Uganda event was interpreted by some leading Ugandan evangelicals as supporting the internationally condemned Uganda Anti Homosexuality Bill, widely known as the "kill the gays" bill, that would, based on their sexual preference, establish the death penalty for many Ugandan citizens and mandate Ugandans to report homosexual activity or face substantial prison sentences.  

At his November 1, 2008 The Call San Diego rally, Engle made calls, from onstage, for acts of Christian martyrdom to stop gay marriage and legalized abortion. In a 2007 doctrinal statement on legalized abortion titled "Doctrine of the Shedding of Innocent Blood", ACPE prophet Lou Engle appeared to endorse religious terrorism to stop the practice, writing,

"Where there is shedding of innocent blood, there is no atonement for the land. There is a blood pollution problem on America's soil. The most "dangerous terrorist" is not Islam but God. One of God's names is the avenger of blood. Have you worshipped [sic] that God yet.""

Mark Gonzalez' ties to ACPE prophets go back, at least, to early 2008, when he appeared in a video advertisement, together with ACPE prophet Lou Engle, to translate into Spanish Engle's invitation to his August 16, 2008 The Call rally in Washington, DC.  

[video, below: Mark Gonzalez translates Lou Engle's invitation, to Hispanic-Americans, for Engle's August 16, 2008 The Call DC prayer rally]

Quieter and less charismatic than NHCLC president Samuel Rodriguez, Mark Gonzalez is nonetheless a political force in his own right. National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference President Samuel Rodriguez has described his NHCLC Vice President Mark Gonzalez as a "die hard Republican operative" who "represents a walking billboard for the Hispanic versions of Family Research Council, Focus on the Family, Council on National Policy and Christian Coalition."

In 2008 Gonzalez chaired presidential candidate John McCain's national advisory council for Hispanic evangelicals, and by at least one description claimed to be McCain's top evangelical adviser for the campaign.

Gonzalez' New Apostolic Reformation ties, which go back at least as far as 2006, are of especial interest in light of John McCain's surprise choice, in late August 2008, of Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate. Shortly after McCain's pick, Gonzalez (as quoted by B. Adriana Venegas Chavez, writing for the University of Southern California's TRANS/MISSIONS project) weighed in on the decision, to Dallas Morning News editorial columnist William McKenzie,

"Even though [Palin is] not Hispanic, or from the part of the country where many Latinos live, she resonates with her everyday life story and her values.

She's pro-life and pro-family, and that's what connects her to Latinos." Gonzales continues, "Family issues resonate no matter where you are. She's going through a tough situation at the moment, and this will bring out compassion for her. There's a struggle going on as well in Hispanic families, often because of immigration."

In retrospect, Gonzalez' studied enthusiasm is notable both for Sarah Palin's subsequent, boisterous participation in racism-tinged Tea Party rallies but also because of Gonzalez' simultaneous ties to both the McCain presidential campaign and to C. Peter Wagner's apostles, which included Gonzalez' early 2008 partnership with ACPE prophet and The Call founder Lou Engle [see footnote 3], and also a working relationship with Wagner's ICA apostle Alice Patterson going back at least as far as 2006.

One of the listed leaders of Rick Perry's The Response prayer event, who stood onstage alongside Perry before he gave his keynote speech at the event, Alice Patterson is author of the book Bridging the Racial and Political Divide: How Godly Politics Can Transform a Nation (2010, Transformational Publications, a division of apostle Ed Silvoso's Harvest Evangelism ministry.) In her book, Patterson writes,

"Thank you, Pastor Mark Gonzales, for your sacrificial leadership across the nation, for your friendship and your endorsement. May the Lord continue to give you His favor as you educate and mobilize Hispanics across the nation."

Along with Wagner apostles Cindy Jacobs, Doug Stringer, Chuck Pierce and Alice Patterson, Mark Gonzalez serves on the advisory board of the Texas Apostolic Prayer Network, whose current leader, apostle Tom Schlueter, anointed Texas governor Rick Perry, in a September 28, 2009 ceremony at the governor's office in the Texas State House (see Rick Perry's Army of God.)  

While TXAPN is called a "prayer network", it is organized more along the lines of a political campaign. The Texas Apostolic Prayer Network's organizational brochure shows the state of Texas neatly divided up into sixteen sub-regions, each with one or more regional leaders who, in turn, supervise the "intercessors" (who could also function, one would suppose, as political volunteers) of their respective regions.    

Four years prior to Rick Perry's The Response, in a 2007 ceremony at the Texas State House auditorium, ICA apostle Alice Patterson passed leadership of the Texas Apostolic Prayer Network to ICA apostle Tom Schlueter. During the ceremony, Patterson led apostles Schlueter, Doug Stringer, and Chuck Pierce in "breaking the curse off of black and Hispanic legislators." Patterson has also endorsed a book by another of Wagner's ICA apostles, Willie Wooten, with the title "Breaking the Curse Off Black America", that claims African-Americans carry a special curse tied to the Civil Rights Movement.  

Mark Gonzales' relationship with Patterson, a former Texas field director for the Christian Coalition, traces back at least as far as 2006, when the two served together in the 501(c)(3) nonprofit Council on Faith in Action (CONFiA) which according to the CONFIA mission statement sought to,

"build a "Hispanic values" movement linked with other fundamentalist Christian evangelical groups. The group opposes abortion, embryonic stem cell research, same-sex marriage, and euthanasia. CONFiA has also worked to build support in the Hispanic community for a publicly funded voucher program open to any "public, private or Christian school." The organization also posts on its web sites voter guides from the Free Market Foundation, the Texas affiliate of Focus on the Family."

The CONFiA board of directors has included David Barton, who claims that Jesus Christ opposes the minimum wage, having stated, "Jesus did not like the minimum wage. He's got a whole teaching against it."

On April 12-13, Alice Patterson and David Barton headlined a "Government Transformation Summit For Visionary Leaders" held at the Life Center Christian Fellowship near San Antonio, TX. Joining the two as the top-billed speaker was apostle Ed Silvoso, who can lay claim to being one of the godfathers of Peter Wagner's New Apostolic Reformation; according to the official ICA web site, Silvoso convened the 1999 Singapore meeting that led to the formation of the International Coalition of Apostles, in 2001.

In her 2010 book, Patterson calls Silvoso her "spiritual father" and has become a featured speaker at Silvoso's conferences. As the "Government Transformation Summit For Visionary Leaders" brochure (PDF of brochure) posted at Patterson's Justice at The Gate ministry website explains,

"God's heart is to transform nations, not just individuals. God wants to heal governments, not just churches. Whether your calling is to the church, the marketplace, education or government, God wants to use you to affect [sic] a larger sphere than you ever dreamed possible."

As his nutshell brochure biography describes, Silvoso is author of the 2007 book Transformation: Change the Marketplace and You Will Change The Nation (2007, Regal Books/Gospel Light). On page 42, Ed Silvoso describes his vision of "transformation", which comes about through a process of "discipling". Explains Silvoso,

"To disciple someone means to turn them into a follower of the teachings you espouse. In the case of a nation, it means to impact its life so that it will conform to a set of specific values and develop a corresponding behavior... The Romans "discipled" nations by conquering them and imposing on them the Pax Romana. Lenin and his followers "discipled" Russia and the Soviet Union by molding in a regimented and all-encompassing way the lives of millions with Communist philosophy. Mao did the same in China, the largest nation on Earth. Militant muslims actively take over nations and "disciple them a la Ayatollah Khomeini..."

Related Stories

Rodriguez Signed Evangelical Call to Stop Mercury Poisoning While Working to Oppose Regulation (by Rachel Tabachnick)

Rodriguez and the NAR (Tabachnick)

Overview of the controversy (by Frederick Clarkson)

Resignation of Rodriguez from the Oak Initiative (Tabachnick)

Rodriguez, the Oak Initiative, and Religious Supremacism (Tabachnick)

Burning Buddhas, Books, and Art: Meet The New Apostolic Reformation (by Bruce Wilson)

Footnotes

[Footnote 1] In the Volume 1., No.3 July-September 2000 issue of Peter Wagner's Global Harvest Ministry's publication Global Prayer News (general editor Doris Wagner), C. Peter Wagner writes,

"it is important to note that the Vatican and the Pope are also the world's strongest promoters for devotion to the cult of Mary- the catholicized expression of the Queen of Heaven."

As detailed in his book Confronting The Queen of Heaven" (1998, Wagner Institute For Practical Ministry), the "Queen of Heaven" is, according to Wagner, a global-level demon spirit, a subject of idolatrous worship in many different incarnations around the world, which prevents the prayers of Catholics and Muslims from reaching Heaven.

In the Volume 6. No. 2, April-June 2005 issue of Global Prayer News, in an article entitled "Defeating Rome In Your Life - A Seven Day Prayer Focus To Defeat Rome In Your Life", Marty Cassady, then serving as the Strategic Prayer Coordinator of Global Harvest Ministries (under Peter and Doris Wagner) wrote,

"In his book Confronting the Queen of Heaven, Peter Wagner states, "The Queen of Heaven is the demonic principality who is most responsible under Satan for keeping unbelievers in spiritual darkness." Since Rome is the global seat for the Queen of Heaven we need to look at both Rome and the principality known as The Queen of Heaven."

[Footnote 2] Published in the Volume 6. No.3 July-September 2005 issue of Peter Wagner's Global Harvest Ministry publication Global Prayer News (general editor Doris Wagner), Alice Smith's letter "Housecleaning Breakthrough" provides a "case study" of "spiritual housecleaning":

"Every room had dozens of crucifixes (Jesus hanging dead on the cross). I asked Jane about this, and she told me that her background was Catholic even though she was born again and now a faithful member of a Spirit-filled church. Her mother, a strict adherent to praying to Mary, had continued to give her pictures of Mary and crucifixes, all different one from the other. Out of respect, she had kept them all.

Jane had read our book about the origin of the rosary, and how the image of a dead Jesus hanging on the cross is symbolic of Satan's greatest achievement. (We explain more about this in the book "Spiritual Housecleaning.")....

Jane agreed and she and her husband eagerly began to gather the many icons that she had spread throughout the house. We found Masonic emblems, scores of crucifixes, coffee cups with bad words on them, sensual novels, questionable movies, and pictures...

[...]

I instructed them to clean their home one room at a time, and pray over each room, dedicating it to the Lord and his glory....

Two weeks later I called Jane.

"How's it going?" I asked, praying that she had taken my advice.

"Oh, my goodness, you won't believe it, Alice! We have thrown away so much stuff that our neighbors continue to come to the door and ask if we are moving"

[...]

One month later I called. With incredible excitement Jane said, "Our house is so clean. I found over 100 crucifixes and unbelievable junk that we didn't even realize we had kept from our ungodly days. We are both sleeping soundly now and our aches and pains are very few. It is remarkable the miracles we have experienced and it is all from reading yours and Eddie's book, Spiritual Housecleaning.

"But I must tell you about the final night." Jane continued, "I was about to fall asleep, when I heard the Holy Spirit say to me, `Jane, you missed a crucifix. It is caught in the back of your standing jewelry box.'

According to the account, the crucifix was there, exactly as the Lord had predicted,
"a European version that was "really gory as Jesus looked skinny and defeated."
After "Jane" repented, threw away the crucifix, and broke "contracts" with the spirits of "unbelief" and "death", she "slept like a baby" and proclaimed, "We are free, free, free!"

[Footnote 3] Mark Gonzalez' early 2008 partnership with ACPE prophet Lou Engle, to produce a video promoting Engle's March 16, 2008 Washington, DC The Call rally, and his quick rhetorical support for John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as running mate in the election, are notable given that top ICA and ACPE apostles and prophets in Peter Wagner's movement met on July 12-14, 2008, at the Sonrise Chapel in Everett, WA, near Seattle, during which ACPE prophet and ICA apostle Mary Glazier (credited with bringing Wagner's movement into Alaska) told the assembled leaders that Sarah Palin had, as a young woman, joined Glazier's personal Wasilla prayer group in 1989, around the time, emphasized Glazier, that Palin decided to go into politics.

Mary Glazier has directed an Alaska division, then a regional division, of Wagner's Spiritual Warfare Network, later renamed as the Global Apostolic Prayer Network. GAPN has been evolved into a series of prayer networks in all 50 states, under apostles Cindy Jacobs, John Benefiel, and Dutch Sheets.

The Texas Apostolic Prayer Network is "strategically aligned" with those prayer networks, and Mark Gonzalez serves TXAPN as an adviser, along with his "spiritual mother", ICA apostle and ACPE prophet Cindy Jacobs, ICA apostle and ACPE prophet Chuck Pierce, and apostle Alice Patterson.