WASHINGTON (ABP) -- Suzan Johnson Cook, an American Baptist pastor, author and motivational speaker, was sworn in May 16 as Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom by Undersecretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Maria Otero.
 
Nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate April 14, Johnson Cook will serve as a principal advisor on religious freedom to the Secretary of State and to the President and will head the Office of International Religious Freedom in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. 

The new ambassador is founder and president of Wisdom Women Worldwide Center. She retired in 2009 as senior pastor of the Bronx Christian Fellowship Baptist Church in New York City. Before that she was pastor of the historic Mariners’ Temple Baptist Church, the oldest church site in Manhattan.

The ambassador-at-large position was created in 1998 by the International Religious Freedom Act.

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Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

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