March 17, 1999
Baptist serves soul food to Rangers trainees
___By Shari Schubert
___Florida Baptist Witness
___PORT CHARLOTTE, Fla. (BP)--As a director of missions, interim pastor, practicing attorney and avid fisherman, Rafael de Armas wears many hats--and a Texas Rangers jacket.
___De Armas, director of missions for Florida's Peace River Baptist Associa-tion, began serving as chaplain to the team's Spanish-speaking rookies in 1996. The rookies, who train and play in Port Charlotte, were "tough guys," reluctant to come to chapel, he said. "They'd scatter whenthey saw me."
RAFAEL DE ARMAS
___Two years later, though, de Armas had a different kind of problem. After a couple of weeks of spring training, a coach complained to de Armas that whenever the chaplain came to the field, the boys would stop playing and run up to greet him, which the coach considered "unprofessional."
___Despite that minor concern, de Armas clearly has won the respect of the players and team officials.
___Last year he was asked to give a prayer and devotional at a motivational meeting for the Hispanic players and management of the Texas Rangers organization. At the end of the meeting, de Armas was given the jacket. Making the presentation were two players he once had helped when they had difficulty getting housing.
___"It was a complete turnaround, from open hostility to love and affection," de Armas said.
___De Armas' ministry to the players, which resumed with this year's spring training, has run the gamut from chapel services to help with transportation and tax returns, along with meals at the de Armas home and at the Spanish mission of First Baptist Church of Port Charlotte, where de Armas serves as interim pastor.
___His wife, Clysta, started inviting the players and their wives for meals when she learned they missed the traditional foods from their homes--which might be Puerto Rico, Venezuela or the Dominican Republic.
___"That's been my main ministry, to feed them," she said. She also does a good bit of "mothering." Rookies often are as young as 17, 18 or 19; some come from rural settings and never have lived away from home. Unlike the stars of major league baseball, these boys do not earn huge salaries, and their jobs are not necessarily secure.
___During the 1998 season, about 80 percent of the Hispanic rookies attended chapel services, Rafael de Armas said. "Maybe one or two" are Christians, he added, and others have expressed interest in becoming Christians but have not followed through with a decision yet.
___"They have a lot of questions, and they participate," he said. "They like to sing."
___Dan Sherman, most recently pastor of Eastside Baptist Church in Punta Gorda, has led chapel and Bible studies with the English-speaking Rangers players for about six years, de Armas noted. "He's had good success with those boys," with a number making professions of faith in Christ.
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