Stephen Kriss, Philadelphia Praise Center
I know I am a child of the 1980’s when in the midst of a moving worship event, I am drawn to a line from the A-Team, “I love it when a good plan comes together.”
At the time of the first Sunday morning worship of Centro de Alabanza de Filadelphia in June, I couldn’t remember where the line came from. but it was what came to mind. After years of planning, preparing, waiting and building relationships, a Spanish-speaking Anabaptist worshiping community is evidencing itself in South Philadelphia.
To use the more biblical Pauline framing, it was a recognition of the many parts that bring the community together and extend the Good News with each person in the Body of Christ carrying out a task, using a gift. To be in the midst of that expression made flesh was to be overwhelmed by the movement of God around the globe, across the connections that make up Franconia Conference from Jakarta to Mexico City to Blooming Glen to Kansas to Philadelphia to Washington. And on the first launching date of worship, we gathered together to celebrate, to listen, to wonder, to worship, to rejoice, to move ahead.
Centro de Alabanza is the Spanish-speaking expression of Philadelphia Praise Center. Begun less than five years ago, Philadelphia Praise was birthed among immigrants from Indonesia with an intent to “reach the nations” according to Pastor Aldo Siahaan. It was a journey begun in earnestness with a sense of calling but not a strong sense of how to actually accomplish this Pentecost vision of many people of different tongues, tribes and nations worshipping together.
Soon after it’s birthing, Philadelphia Praise Center connected with Franconia Conference through friends at Souderton Mennonite Church via Mennonite connections that ran back through Indonesia as well. Philadelphia Praise Center has become the largest Mennonite congregation in Philadelphia, a group of people living, working and worshipping in South Philadelphia, which has likely emerged as the urban neighborhood with the highest percentage of Anabaptist congregations in the country—speaking Indonesian, Cantonese, English and Khmer. And now Spanish.
With the migration of members of the LaPaz congregation in Mexico City, formerly pastored by Franconia Conference Leadership Minister, Kirk Hanger, the foundation was established for Spanish-speaking outreach alongside the primarily Indonesian congregation. The Spanish-speaking home groups and possibilities have continued to proliferate, opening the possibility of a new expression of praise in this barrio of 8,000 Spanish-speaking immigrants, mostly from Mexico.
On the first Sunday morning worship, all the parts of the body carried out their role. Members of Blooming Glen Mennonite Church who have been supporting the Spanish-speaking initiative joined in worship. Maria Byler, a Goshen College student working in South Philadelphia for the summer, provided translation from Spanish to English. Indonesian members of the congregation played instruments for the worship while the songs were sung in Spanish. Spanish-speakers from across the neighborhood and from sister congregation New Hope Fellowship in Alexandria, Va., made the trek northward on I-95 along with their pastor, Kirk Hanger, who was preaching for the kick-off worship in Spanish.
Afterward, the 60 of us ate together, speaking in Spanish, English and Indonesian. We celebrated over food from Mexico, El Salvador and Honduras. It was a spicy table of communion. And its all the Lord’s doing. And it’s marvelous in our eyes. Gloria a Dios.
Philadelphia Praise Center continues to worship bilingually in Indonesian and English on Sunday at 9:30 am. Centro de Alabanza worship in Spanish and English begins at noon. A multilingual fellowship and food time begins around 11am. Home groups meet throughout the week in Chin (an indigenous language from Myanmar), English, Indonesian and Spanish.
The opinions expressed in articles posted on Mosaic’s website are those of the author and may not reflect the official policy of Mosaic Conference. Mosaic is a large conference, crossing ethnicities, geographies, generations, theologies, and politics. Each person can only speak for themselves; no one can represent “the conference.” May God give us the grace to hear what the Spirit is speaking to us through people with whom we disagree and the humility and courage to love one another even when those disagreements can’t be bridged.