The Nuevo Amanecer (New Dawn) Awards celebrated their fifth edition in the Spanish city of Alcalá de Henares (near Madrid). Fifty guests attended the award ceremony for Pedro Tarquis and Pablo Martínez Vila.

The prize honoured the two meidcal doctors and communicators, for the creation of the Spanish evangelical news website Protestante Digital, that they both founded, along with journalist and evangelical pastor Juan Antonio Monroy, in 2003.

During the presentation of the awards, the director of the NGO Star of Hope, Marcos Sancio, stressed that with their initiative, Tarquis and Martínez opened unexplored doors of communication in the evangelical sphere.

The awards seek to honour the work that evangelicals do for the benefit of society as a whole.

20 years of persevering work

Juan Antonio Monroy, who was present at the event at the age of 95, presented a portrait of both winners, highlighting biographical aspects as well as personal memories of their work together.

Monroy, a reference figure for evangelical journalism in Spain, recalled the importance of launching a project such as Protestante Digital, which from its beginnings seeks to impact the society and today has a worldwide audience of hundreds of thousands of readers every month.

Monroy was the one who handed out the awards and added a touch of humour to a happy and cordial event.

Journalist José de Segovia, who is a weekly collaborator of Protestante Digital and of Evangelical Focus since its first edition, underlined the need to “respond from our faith to a changing Spain”, and “not only inform the evangelical world, but also the whole of society”.

In these 20 years, the cultural challenges and questions have changed, and that is why “perseverance is so valuable, since many publications start but soon disappear. There is a lot of worth in constancy and perseverance”, pointed out de Segovia.

During the ceremony, Protestante Digital's director, Daniel Hofkamp, thanked founders Tarquis and Martínez for their example over the years: “They are teachers, not only for the vision that God has given them, but also for the way they have carried out this and other projects for the growth of the evangelical people”.

Building for the future

Pedro Tarquis, director of Areópago Protestante - the platform associated with the Spanish Evangelical Alliance that brings together Protestante Digital, Evangélico Digital and Evangelical Focus - expressed his gratitude to the organisation for the award.

“God's mathematics are peculiar: one day is like a thousand years, five loaves of bread feed five thousand”, said Tarquis, recalling the miracle of a news website that is 20 years old “without getting subsidies or help from large financial groups", but with “the work and perseverance of hundreds of people over the years”.

“Those divine mathematics are what have directed our steps, with the desire to inform, educate and have an impact on society. One can build a tower, which eventually breaks and wastes away, or build a well, which becomes a space that endures, for the encounter and blessing of a needy and thirsty society”, he added.

The battle for truth

Meanwhile, Pablo Martínez recalled the words he shared on the 15th anniversary of Protestante Digital about “the word with grace seasoned with salt”, and added the need to transmit “the word of truth, seasoned with love”.

That is why today it is necessary to “defend the truth, to speak the truth in love”, something that seems “simple but is glorious, and it is the goal of Protestante Digital”.

Martínez pointed out that our current society, influenced by post-modernism, has lost the truth, which is “one of the anchors, along with hope, that sustain human beings”. It is therefore a “crucial battle” in a world full of fake news and “the globalisation of lies, where truth has been diluted in the subjective”.

According to the Spanish psychiatrist, “the ease with which people lie in communication is dangerous. Jesus talked about that in Matthew 5: to calumniate is like killing [...] The battle for truth is the battle for Christ”.

Martínez encouraged the audience to defend the truth and to practice truthfulness in their communication, and left a triple challenge: “To firmly hold on to the Truth in order not to sink; to faithfully guard the truth; and to vigorously proclaim the truth to the world”.

Keep going forward

The event closed with a time of prayer in which several leaders and pastors thanked God for the work of Tarquis and Martinez, and also commended them to continue their work, knowing that they still have a long way to go to continue blessing the evangelical people and influencing our society.