So there are a lot of things you have to do if you’re going to move out of the country and become a missionary. You can’t just say hey we’re going to be missionaries and hop on a plane the next day (I wish); this kind of venture takes a lot of planning, a lot of prayer for patience, and A LOT of PAPERWORK! Shall we get started?
If you’re wanting to be recognized by your church as a missionary, such as we did, then you’ll want to get approval from your church organization. For us, since the Church of God of Prophecy spans worldwide, we had to get approval from the international offices. As described in a previous post, we had to get several endorsements from officials at our church from within the country of Paraguay, from the NC state office, and from the international headquarters levels. This process in itself took many months and lots of prayer and faith in God. However, in the end everything has worked out and we are official!!!
After getting approval from the church, we then had to think about what we needed to do to satisfy both the U.S. and Paraguayan governments in terms of our move. We are making at least a two-year commitment to living in Paraguay so we’re definitely going to need to apply for permanent residency status. But how does an American apply for permanent residency in Paraguay? With Paraguay being such a rural and remote country there wasn’t a lot of information on the internet to answer our question; but with a lot of help from expats living in Paraguay and just plain dumb luck, this is what we’ve discovered. There’s a whole other list of things we need once we get there, but that story will be for a later date. So, before you leave the country you will need the following:
- Passports
- Country VISA
- Original birth certificates
- Marriage certificate
- FBI Identity History Summary Check
- International Health Certificate for Sampson (the dog)
- Apostille stamps for everything
Most of the stuff we pretty much already had, except for Stephen could not find his birth certificate so we had to send off for another copy. Your vital records, such as your birth certificate, are fine to use as is within the United States. However, if you intend to use them outside of the country, such as us when we apply for permanent residency in Paraguay, you’re going to have to get them legalized. What does this mean you ask? Simply, you must get your vital document legalized by its country of origin so that other countries know the document is legitimate and not a work of fraud.
The first thing you need to know about getting your documents legalized for international use is whether or not your destination country is a member of the Hague Conference. Countries who are members of the Hague Conference have signed an agreement saying that citizens may legalize their documents in a less costly way for foreign use by applying for an apostille stamp within their origin country. Before the Hague Convention, people had to get their documents legalized by both the U.S. government via the State Department and by the foreign government they were traveling to. The apostille stamp is a one-stop shop for legalization and once the document has this certification it is ready for international use. Luckily for us, Paraguay is a member of the Hague Conference! Yay!
For state documents, such as birth certificates and marriage licenses, you must send that document to the Secretary of State for which the document originated. For me, because my birth and marriage licenses both originated from Georgia, I had to apply for an apostille stamp for those documents with the Georgia Secretary of State Notary and Apostille Division. For Stephen, his birth certificate had to be legalized by the Missouri Secretary of State. Information on how to obtain an apostille from a particular state is usually readily available via the internet and each state charges a different amount per document for a stamp. For Georgia it was $3 per document and for Missouri it was $10 per document.
Once you get your state documents legalized, you need to apply for an Identity History Summary Check conducted by the FBI. This is a document that let’s the authorities of the country you are moving to know that you’re not some kind of wanted fugitive. To obtain an identity history summary check you must complete a form, have your fingerprints taken by your local authorities, and pay $18 per person for each summary check. You can only pay with a certified check, money order, or you can fill out a credit card form. The most daunting task for us with this process was getting our fingerprints taken. The city police where I live charged $10 per fingerprinting; however, I discovered that the county sheriff’s office would do it for free if I could prove I was a resident of that county. The whole process of getting our fingerprints taken was painless and very clean. They did not use ink but instead took our fingerprints digitally using a live scan. The ladies at the sheriff’s office were very nice and even printed us a duplicate copy of our fingerprints in case we needed it. So, if you’re looking for somewhere to have your fingerprints taken, I suggest you contact your county sheriff’s office first as they will probably provide this service to you free of charge. This document has not been returned to us yet, but once it does it must also get an apostille stamp from the U.S. Secretary of State as it is a federal document.
One of the final things we need to accomplish is acquiring an international health certificate for our dog Sampson. We have yet to accomplish this task because the law of Paraguay says this document must not be dated more than ten days prior to our departure. After we get the document we have to immediately send it to the U.S. Secretary of State as it’s classified as a federal document and cannot be legalized (another apostille stamp) by our home state. More to come on that later.
From my experience, I think all the hustle and stress involved with moving to a different country can seem really daunting. There’s lots of paperwork and lots of planning involved. Things must be done in a certain way and in a certain order so that we can leave the U.S. on schedule and prepared for our new life in Paraguay. In the end though, I think all of it’s going to be worth it because we’ll be doing what God would have us do in our lives. I was talking to someone really important to me the other day about everything I was doing and how stressed it made me feel. She reminded me that a lot of times in life the things that are most worth it are sometimes the hardest to achieve. I am looking forward to my new life in Paraguay and I will get there no matter how much red tape I have to go through.