Kuwait’s homegrown priest celebrates Bible and bedouin culture
kuwait city — Dressed in a traditional white Arab headdress and with two red crosses embroidered on his black clerical robe, Kuwait’s first homegrown priest cuts a unique figure in the predominantly Muslim emirate.
Father Emmanuel Benjamin Jacob Gharib, 68, celebrates both the Bible and Arab culture with his Christian congregation in Kuwait City.
In an interview ahead of the 20th anniversary of his ordination, he stressed the level of acceptance he has felt from fellow Kuwaitis.
“Everyone welcomes me wherever I go,” said Father Emmanuel.
Born in the Qibla district of Kuwait City, Gharib was raised in a devout Christian family and surrounded by mostly Muslim neighbours.
Emmanuel Gharib was not always destined for the priesthood.
He graduated from engineering school with a degree in geology in 1971 and soon found a job at the Kuwaiti oil ministry.
Ten years into his career, Emmanuel Gharib and his wife took part in a religious conference in Kuwait. “That was the turning point,” he said. He quit his job and embarked in 1989 on a theology degree at the Evangelical Theological Seminary in Cairo.
He was ordained as a priest in 1999 and subsequently elected to head the National Evangelical Church of Kuwait, becoming the first and only Gulf Arab priest.
Father Emmanuel also serves as vice president of the Islamic-Christian Relations Council in Kuwait, which he co-founded in 2009.
Father Emmanuel’s own landmark next year will coincide with the 85th anniversary of the Evangelical Church in Kuwait.
But the presence of Christians in Kuwait dates back even further, to the arrival of American Evangelical missionaries and the founding of the American Mission Hospital in the early 1900s, he said.
Kuwaiti “society began to have a positive view of the missionaries during the Battle of Jahra because the Mission Hospital played a big role in treating the wounded”, Father Emmanuel said.
Over the past century, Christians have immigrated from Turkey, Iraq and Palestine during periods of upheaval. — AFP