Wednesday, January 8, 2003
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Wednesday, January 8, 2003 |
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Local pastor heads back to his roots destination: Cuba By JOHN
HATCHER
Forty years is the number of a Biblical era. And it has been 40 years since Fayette area pastor Sam Calleiro fled Cuba, along with his parents and siblings. Now, today, he says he returns not only for sentimental reasons, but also to do business for the Kingdom of God. Calleiro serves as founding pastor of Perimeter South Community Church that meets in the LaFayette Center for Continuing Education (the old Fayette County High School). "I am going to reconnect not necessarily because I am a Cuban, but because I am a Cuban for the sake of the Kingdom of God," Calleiro said. During his weeklong stay, he said he would be establishing relationships with and encouraging Havana pastors as well as connecting with the churches that were planted by his grandfather, Miguel Angel Calleiro. The elder Calleiro was an ordained Southern Baptist pastor who assisted starting the Baptist Seminary in Havana as well as starting evangelical churches across the island until he was 75 years old. Abner Calleiro, Calleiro's father, fled Cuba with his family in the early '60s. Although their first stop was Spain, they eventually ended up in the United States. Abner got a secular job but also was strongly active as a lay minister, working with Baptist churches to reach Hispanics for the Gospel. He too is an ordained Baptist minister. In addition to Sam and Abner Calleiro, their travel party will include Calleiro's brothers, Joel, Reuben, Tony, and an elder in Perimeter South Community Church, Ron Book the only one who does not speak Spanish fluently. Expressing obvious excitement, Calleiro shared that he will see places where he was born, where his father owned a lucrative factory, where the family lived, and the churches started by his grandfather. "It's (the trip) is an answer to prayer. We're going back for the first time in 40 years. A whole generation has come and gone and we will go back (to Cuba) representing three generations of people who have served the Lord," Calleiro added and rhetorically asked, "How often does a family get to do that?" The dream of going back to Cuban was born in Calleiro's heart four years ago as he attended a Pastor's Summit in north Georgia. At that prayer event, Calleiro said that God began to show him that his Cuban ethnicity was an asset and advantage rather than just something to live with. Since then, Calleiro has been invited to lead Prayer Summits for Hispanic speaking pastors across America. Asked what his group will take with them, Calleiro said they would take Bibles and two guitars that they will donate to two of the churches in which they will minister. He said they have been cautioned to keep their remarks strictly in the realm of faith because Cuban authorities will be watching their movements. They will enter Cuba on a religious visa, a practice that Cuban President Fidel Castro has permitted in the last few years. For more information on Perimeter South Community Church or Pastor Sam Calleiro's Cuban mission, call the church office, 770-716-2332.
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