Religious Affairs Office

Learning about the Philadelphia Evangelical Church is a way to learn about Roma religious life, as this Pentecostal denomination, one of the leading evangelical organisations in Spain, is known as the main Roma-majority church in the country. The Philadelphia Evangelical Church takes its name from one of the Seven Churches of Christ mentioned in the Book of Revelation ("Letter to the Church in Philadelphia" Revelation 3:7-13).

ORIGINS

In 1914, the denomination known as the Assemblies of God was founded in Springfield, Missouri in the United States, and sent missionaries all over the world, including to France, the home country of Clément Le Cossec. Le Cossec was born in the small town of Treffiagat in north-western France on 20 February 1921, and in 1935 decided to devote his life to God. In 1952, he received a special calling from God to preach to Spanish seasonal workers who came to France for the wine harvest. After work, they would gather in a shack to hear Le Cossec preach God’s word. When they returned to Spain, they shared his message with their friends and families, starting a slow but steady process of evangelisation, first in Catalonia and later throughout the Iberian Peninsula.

The first baptisms took place in 1952, and in 1957 Le Cossec created the Mission Évangélique Tzigane (Roma Evangelical Mission). It spread throughout Spain thanks to contact among Roma families, who told each other about this new spiritual movement. The Philadelphia Evangelical Church, so named after rejecting the name of Roma Mission, as well as the Vie et Lumière name used by evangelical French Roma (manouches), was officially founded in Balaguer, Lleida province, in 1965, with the creation of the first church. Emiliano Jiménez Escudero, known as Brother Emiliano, was tasked with evangelising all of Spain. Balaguer, Bilbao and Alicante were among the first cities to receive the word of Spanish and French Roma preachers known as Apostles, at a time when it was an underground movement. The dynamic, powerful nature of the transmission process, together with the ability of this denomination to connect with the unique characteristics of the Roma people, explain the huge wave of conversions that took place in the 1980s, when thousands and thousands of families embraced evangelical Christianity.

However, the establishment of this branch in Spain did have to overcome certain hurdles in the Roma community, as most Roma belonged to the Catholic Church and many were hesitant to accept a new and unknown religious movement. As such, many of the Roma who converted to the Philadelphia Evangelical Church in Spain had to struggle to get their friends and family to accept their conversion. But following these initial challenges, there was a gradual acceptance of this denomination, ultimately leading to the aforementioned mass conversion in the 1980s.

MAIN CHARACTERISTICS, AT A GLANCE

Like all other Protestant denominations, the Philadelphia Evangelical Church is based on the reformation of Christianity introduced by Martin Luther in the 16^th century. But while it is similar to other evangelical denominations in many ways, it also has certain distinctive features as a result of its Pentecostal nature.

As a Pentecostal Protestant denomination, the Philadelphia Evangelical Church is guided by the following principles: by God alone, by Grace alone, by Scripture alone. As such, its doctrinal and organisational aspects reflect belief in the miracles of the Holy Spirit which, as recounted in the Bible, took place on the day of Pentecost. Other related tenets include the following:

• Rejection of hierarchical and priestly structures: the title of pastor is earned based on the charismatic qualities of the candidates (novices). The highest authority is made up of a group of elders who establish the general guidelines to follow.
• Rejection of infant baptism: baptism, seen as a redemption of sins, can only take place at an age when the person is able to choose it consciously and voluntarily.
• Worship based solely on the Bible: the Bible is the only written source referenced in their rites and beliefs.
• Iconoclasm: like all other Protestant branches, the Philadelphia denomination forbids the worship of images.
• Importance of inner inspiration: at services, worshippers are free to publicly express their love for God at any time; pastors generally only prepare a starting point for their sermon and let the rest unfold naturally as inspiration strikes. For evangelical Roma, "going with the flow" is at the heart of religious experience. 

Worship in the Philadelphia Evangelical Church is particularly festive, as it brings together elements of Roma culture with popular spontaneity and the ritual traditions of religion. The spontaneous displays of emotion, open-ended worship, passion and individual participation that are typical of these services contrast with other denominations, often colder and more rational and liturgical in nature.

Hierarchy is based on regional divisions. The Philadelphia Evangelical Church is structured as a single church throughout Spain, but for organisational purposes, it is divided into 18 "zones" that loosely mirror the country’s regions. These zones, in turn, make up six regions, each with its own representatives. Despite shunning hierarchy, seen as a source of corruption, there are internal organisational structures inherited from traditional Protestantism in the form of ministries, reflecting the gifts or "charisms" of the members of the community. These ministries are grouped into the Ministry of Responsibility (led by teachers and apostles), the Travelling Ministry (entrusted to evangelists), the Ministry of Local Focus (pastors and preachers) and the Ministry of Music, through which brethren devoted to God guide the people in praise and worship. In the Philadelphia Evangelical Church, this ministry is as important as – if not more important than – the others.

MUSIC

Roma religion and music come together in the Philadelphia Evangelical Church, an unprecedented religious phenomenon in the history of the Roma people, and a key part of socio-religious and musical diversity.

As is typical of a Pentecostal denomination, services focus on praise and worship. And as a majority Roma church, the main vehicle for this praise and worship is music. The Ministry of Music is based on traditional evangelical doctrine that cites the highest authority, the Bible, in exhorting the faithful to praise God through psalms, hymns and spiritual songs (Epistle to the Ephesians, 5:18-19). All Protestant denominations have made music a part of worship, albeit in different ways depending on the unique features of each branch. The Philadelphia Evangelical Church incorporated the guidelines conveyed by Clément Le Cossec in his Assemblies of God, and reinterpreted them in the context of Spanish Roma culture. As Soledad Flórez explains in her article "El poder de la música: la música com a generadora d’un status social a l’Església Evangèlica de Filadèlfia" [The Power of Music: Music as a Source of Social Status in the Philadelphia Evangelical Church], the Roma people see music as a gift from God, a fundamental way of expressing romanipén – Roma identity and culture – as well as an instrument, present in all areas of life, for channelling profound, intimate emotions. The Bible, specifically Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians (Ephesians 5: 18-19), establishes three overarching categories of song: psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. The differences have to do with the musical components and parameters and the content of the text being sung:

• Psalms are sober, strophic and syllabic in order to facilitate understanding of the text, taken verbatim from the Book of Psalms.
• Hymns, which are more dynamic and emphasise the refrain, have Biblical messages that seek to teach doctrine.
• Spiritual songs are recent compositions and are much freer, with musical parameters similar to those of contemporary secular songs, and lyrics that draw on the composer’s personal spiritual experiences. In their services, the different Protestant denominations use the types of songs that best reflect their spirituality. 

This repertoire, much of it composed recently, together with worship-style Pentecostal songs by renowned Christian Latino artists, are referred to by Evangelical Roma as songs of praise, or alabanzas. These songs of praise, in turn, are grouped into sub-genres based on their purpose in the pastor-led, largely unstructured worship services that are held almost every day and last approximately an hour. For example, festive songs of praise encourage worshippers to participate, clap their hands and shout joyful expressions such as "Glory to God!" and "Hallelujah!" Others encourage reflection and communication with God through more restrained tunes and lyrics often based on personal experiences: these are worship songs of praise, performed by a soloist and accompanied by the choir for the refrains. Some experts have also identified a third category, teaching songs, which feature doctrinal or moral lyrics performed by a soloist who is usually the composer of the song of praise. And there are even more.

Though there is essentially no bibliography for songs of praise, they have had a clear influence on many Roma artists in recent decades. This genre has also influenced, and continues to influence, Spanish music, albeit discreetly. In many cases, the Roma or "Roma-esque" music of recent decades is inextricably linked to Roma spiritual music, as seen in the works of artists such as Los Chichos, Niña Pastori, Ketama, Lole y Manuel, La Barberia del Sur and Manzanita, for example. Many of these artists are also themselves evangelical Christians who regularly perform songs of praise.

PERET

Following a vision, in 1982 Pere Pubill Calaf, known as Peret (1935-2014), decided to put an end to two decades of rumba and fame to focus on religious work within the Philadelphia Evangelical Church. Music is an omnipresent, essential part of evangelical services, and Peret, a prolific musician, composed a number of religious hymns. One of them described Jesus Christ as powerful, a refrain that became “Barcelona is powerful” in his 1992 song Gitana hechicera.