Baptism in river “Afon Taf”
October, 2018
Dec.2017- Cardiff- For many years, a wave of disbelief and atheism has become widespread in the west, and in the UK particularly. Most of the churches in the UK were abandoned and became empty of prayers for many years. However, a reverse wave has grown recently and number of churches have been flourishing around the UK. These churches are filled by Iranian-born Christians. Namely, the Saint James church in the Normanton district of Cardiff is one of them, a church which led by an Iranian priest, Agha Reza.
In recent years, there have been an increasing number of Iranians, mostly from Muslim background, began to turn to Christianity, and Reza is one of the pastors of the preaching mission in Persian language.
Standing in the large auditorium in a popular Christian gathering, where a big music band began playing, Reza was playing his guitar alongside others. “We were created to worship,” they were singing. The overwhelming majority of the audience in the gathering had been baptized by Reza in the last 6 years.
Agha Reza came to Britain in 2002. He was born in a very religious, Muslim and Shia family in the north of Iran. When he was a teen, his father decided to send him to a seminary. “It was my father’s desire to have a clergyman in the family,” he said. After eight years of studying Islamic philosophy, Sharia and Islamic basics, he became a Shia sheikh at the age of 22. Thereafter, he went back to his town and became an Imam in a mosque.
Living in a society under a rigorous government, without a doubt is hard for ordinary people, but for someone who’s working for the system; “It was more than pleasant, I’m telling you.” Reza said and smiled. The government justifies all its acts with religious beliefs and leaves no room for the voices of others, but that wasn’t the case for Raza at that time. “Although I witnessed all the pressure and deception imposed by the religious government on people, I never thought deeply, about it,” he said. But very soon he doubted all those beliefs that he’d learned in the seminary.
Everything changed when Ladan’s story came out. Ladan was Raza’s relative. A teenage girl in northern Iran, who was raped by the governor of the town. The girl, after a long term of depression, informed her family and they asked Raza’s help. “The only thing I suggested was an official complaint to the main Islamic court,” he said. But he was unaware that the judge of the province’s court was a cousin of the governor.
After a few days, the Islamic court ruled that the girl had been in a temporary marriage contract which is called “Mota”, and there had been no coercion. Moreover, the girl was condemned for her “attempt to tarnish the governor’s reputation”, and sentenced to 80 lashes. A day later, Ladan committed suicide. “The poor girl killed herself because of a swinger devil,” Reza said, while wiping his tears. “The government had always been claiming righteous from morning to night, while the corruption and hypocrisy was one of its foundations, that intensively disgusted me,” he added.
From that day on, Reza was sceptical about everything he was taught. After taking off clergy’s clothes, he came to the ultimate conclusion to getting a new job. “I had only my passion in music left, after I lost my belief. I needed something to restore my hurt soul,” Reza said. Therefore, he went to an old Armenian musician, named Vigen and soon he got in with him. Vigen was a Gregorian Christian and had a small family church. Vigen was always very keen to answer Raza’s questions and welcomed him to attend their rituals. “No questions were out of bounds and I was free to discuss as much as I wish,” he said. Their definition of god and the effects of their belief on their life was inspirational to Reza. Iranian law forbade people such as Vigen from sharing Christianity, but it didn't stop him. He invited Reza to attend house churches in secret and over a period of three years, Reza became a Christian.
However, within the closer and friendlier society, Reza found himself at the centre of big trouble. In Iran, conversion from Islam is considered apostasy and punishable by death according to the Islamic constitution. So, Reza decided to leave Iran. He fled to Turkey, and then France and finally ended up in Britain. “I remember when I was kept in a lorry for several days, it was a very hard and very cold journey,” he said.
Furthermore, he settled in Wales and was baptised at the Saint James community church. “I was born again on my baptised day,27th September 2002,” he said. After worshiping at the Saint James church for a while, he’d been “chosen” to be its next pastor. “When I got close to the people of god in the church and they knew about my story, Jonathan the head of the community recommended a bursary in order to become a pastor.” Reza said. The community gave him a bursary for a two-year “Christian theology” course at the Calvary Theological College where he studied the Pentecostal tradition, theological education, the basics of the Christian faith and Evangelism.
After finishing his theological training, he “Entered the Ministry” and was leading the Saint James worships since then. Because of his ability to communicate in Farsi, he convinced many Iranian migrants and refugees to convert and join the church. “We have regular baptisms at the end of each week,” Reza added, “more than 800 Iranian and Welsh families coming here for prayers on Sundays.”
As a Muslim clergyman, he invited people to Islam for many years, and today as a pastor, he is inviting people to Christianity. Regardless of whether he is a Muslim or Christian, he was born to serve god and be a spiritual leader, a “clergyman”. “I insist to be a human before a clergyman, or whatever,” he said.
The legacy of all that hardship in Raza’s life is that, today, Reza’s the preacher and the person who stands at the pulpit every week and brings the word of “Lord” to the Christians followers.