The Deaf Bolivians of Bolivia

The Deaf Bolivians of Bolivia, numbering approximately 120,000 people, are Engaged yet Unreached. They are described as a community of individuals who are culturally Deaf and actively participate in Deaf culture, often using sign language as their primary means of communication They are an Indigenous people, with Deaf as their ethnic/kinship group and are in the Deaf people cluster of the Deaf Peoples. Their primary religion is Roman Catholicism. They primarily speak Bolivian Sign Language.

Photo by Google. (2026). Image generated by Gemini 2.5 Flash: Deaf Bolivian

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Deaf Peoples
Country: Bolivia
People Cluster: Deaf
Primary Language(s): Bolivian Sign Language (bvl)
Primary Religion(s): Roman Catholicism
Population: 120,000
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): Engaged yet Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Active CP Activity
People Group ID: PG017387
View on Joshua Project

Pray for the Deaf Bolivians of Bolivia

Join others around the world in praying for the lost to be saved, the gospel to advance, the global Church to grow, and for laborers to be sent out and sustained in the harvest.

Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Roman Catholicism
Religious Affiliation: Christianity

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Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Bolivian Sign Language
Language Family: Sign Language

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Media Resources in Bolivian Sign Language:

Films:

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Bible Resources in Bolivian Sign Language:

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Or check out the Bolivian Sign Language bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

Explore Lostness and Next Steps

Unengaged and Unreached

Strategic Priority Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached (SPI: 1), which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations among which there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.
Lostness Priority Index (LPI): Frontier Unreached People Group, (LPI: 0), < 0.1% Evangelical.
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Active CP Activity (GSEC: 1), this people group is less than 2% evangelical, some evangelical resources are available, but there has been no active church planting among them within the past two years

Next steps for the Deaf Bolivians:
Begin signifcant prayer and fasting for this group
Send cross-cultural teams to discover and research this people group
Begin gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group

SPI: Unreached yet Engaged

The Deaf Bolivians are Engaged yet Unreached, which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations but there are sustained efforts at establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.

Next steps for the Deaf Bolivians:
Continue prayer and fasting for this group
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group
Begin training up local leaders to lead and develop strategies to reach their own people

SPI: No longer Unreached

The Deaf Bolivians are No Longer Unreached, which means there are more than 2% evangelical Christian populations and there are churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice. There is still more to be done among them.

Next steps for the Deaf Bolivians:
Empower local believers to begin praying for their own people
Continue gospel seed sowing and church planting
Encourage local leaders to being leading church planting strategy and looking for Unreached and Unengaged groups nearby

Pray specifically for the Deaf Bolivians of Bolivia

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.
readPsalm 51:1

Give thanks to God that He is able to forgive all the sins people might commit, and pray that many who don't yet know this will hear the good news and turn to Him for mercy.

And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
read1 John 4:21

Pray that the good news of God's love will reach everyone in this people group, and that His love will compel them to love others as Christ has loved us.

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
readPsalm 51:10

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, they will quickly repent when they sin and walk with clean hearts and right spirits as they grow in their relationship with the Lord.

But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
read1 Corinthians 15:10–11

Pray that God's people will preach the message of Jesus' death and resurrection and that it will spread among the lost through the selfless witness of believers.

Deaf Bolivian Across Countries (ROP3 - 116563) reported in the following countries:

To download a comprehensive people group list in spreadsheet form, visit our Research Data page.

Peoplegroups.org relies on updates from the field and other organizations for much of our data, so if you have any updates, please contact us. We use various international naming standards. For a list of these standards and fields, visit our Definitions page.

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