By KEVIN YOUNG
GLASGOW — The sounds of clapping and singing radiate from a Wednesday night Bible study. Around 20 congregation members laugh and hug and open up their hearts to one another. Children play tambourines to the beat of the music and run along the aisles of perfectly aligned maroon chairs. And the entire service is in Spanish, such is the routine at Iglesia Emanuel on Cleveland Avenue in Glasgow.
The church, which began its services in 1997 as the first Spanish-language church aimed at serving the Hispanic community, holds regular weeknight Bible study meetings in addition to its Sunday services.
Dimas Miranda is the pastor at Emanuel and said the church provides an opportunity for Glasgow’s Hispanic residents to come together during the week for fellowship and piece of mind.
“It is important to try to help the young people and adults to let them know the lives they are living can be better lives. We can live with security, we can be safe here. A lot of people can be afraid because of immigration (services) or they might do something like drink and drive and they are scared. But the important thing is that we can help and Jesus can change their life,” he said.
The Wednesday night service included a discussion about how the church members combine to form the body of Christ.
“In the body of Christ, every member, every piece is important,” Miranda told the congregation, in Spanish.
Miranda said such discussions are great for members who may feel out of place in the community but could come to church for guidance.
“The congregation needs to know what they can do in the church. Sometimes they don’t know what they need to do. So the bible study they can identify what they can do,” he said.
Mike Padgett, pastor of Glasgow Bible Church, helped Miranda establish Emanuel and get started in his ministries. Padgett said the comfort of having a church setting where the members feel comfortable and engaged is fundamentally important for the Hispanic community.
Members of Miranda’s church are all Glaswegians but many of them call countries like Mexico, Honduras or El Salvador home.
Padgett, along with his wife Rosana, an adult education teacher in Barren County Schools, has worked with the Glasgow Hispanic community for more than 12 years, after the couple spent some 11 years as missionaries in Costa Rica. He said he wants to help the Spanish-speakers by being a trustworthy person they can come to with concerns. He said he often directs Spanish-language churchgoers to Miranda’s congregation.
“Now that I’ve been here I can hardly go up to a group of Hispanics without one of them recognizing me, or knowing my wife from English-language classes,” he said. “They feel a total confidence and level of comfort with me, because I speak Spanish and know me as a North American who cares for them and is concerned for their well being. They feel that they can be very open to me.”
While a Spanish-speaker could attend an English language church service and recognize familiar cognates of words or general customs, the experience would not be all that familiar to someone who has attended Spanish services, Padgett said.
“It’s actually probably not very easy for them to follow along in an English service. A Spanish service is a totally different feel, with lots of activity and movement. North American church services tend to be dried and staid and just not the same feel that a Latin American church service has,” he said. “They feel more comfortable with their own language and their own customs in church.”
