Center for Continuous Learning

Rev. Dr. Marie Onwubuariri serves as Director of Intercultural Ministries of the American Baptist Home Mission Societies, where she leads a team that champions ABHMS’s historic commitment to relevant ministry within ethnic and language-specific communities while also raising the attentiveness and ability of all leaders and disciples to engage in transformative mission work in the increasingly multiracial and multicultural United States and Puerto Rico. With a lifetime of experiences and learning at the intersection of a multiplicity of cultures, Dr. Onwubuariri brings to this role a cumulative approach to cross-cultural communication and competency; diversity, equity, and inclusion assessment and praxis; and racial justice and anti-racism commitment and action. Her education includes the Master of Divinity and Doctor of Ministry at Berkeley School of Theology in California, where she is also an affiliate faculty member in Practical Theology and Intercultural Studies. She is author of “Reframing tension for transformation: bridge-crossing | bridge-making | bridge-being” (Review & Expositor, 118, April 2022), and coeditor of Trouble the Water: A Christian Resource for the Work of Racial Justice (Nurturing Faith, 2017).

The Rev. Abigaíl Medina-Betancourt is the National Coordinator for Intercultural Engagement at American Baptist Home Mission Societies. In this position, she encourages sensitivity to cultural awareness, supports ministries in multicultural and intercultural contexts and works to strengthen American Baptist leaders’ capacity to implement effective ministries. Previously, she served as the Puerto Rico Volunteer Coordinator for the American Baptist Home Mission Societies’ “Rebuilding, Restoring, Renewing Puerto Rico” initiative from 2018 to 2020. And from 2021-2022 she was called to serve as the full-time Intercultural Ministries strategist. She has served in short-term missions in Thailand, Haiti, and the Republic of Georgia in addition to speaking at theological ecumenical encounters in Tanzania and Brazil. Her passion for mission and social justice defines every aspect of her ministry. In 2018, she earned a Master of Divinity degree at Seminario Evangélico de Puerto Rico. In 2020, she became a certified Project Management Professional (PMP®). And in 2024, she completed a certificate on Leading Diversity-Oriented Ministries from the Berkeley School of Theology. She has been an ordained minister in Iglesias Bautistas de Puerto Rico since 2022.