New Quin Road base for Ennis Evangelical Church

THE Ennis Evangelical Church will be officially opened this weekend, after more than three decades without a permanent home.

Thirty-four years after a small group of people came together to pray and study the Bible, the Ennis Evangelical Church have moved to their new home at the Quin Road Business Park.
Mossy Angland, an elder of the Ennis Evangelical Church explained, “We are an independent evangelical church, we are not part of any worldwide church. We hold to the Bible and this is a church for people who have a personal relationship with Jesus.”
In recent years, the church has operated out of other premises, such as the Old Ground Hotel and more recently, the Clare Education Centre. However, this Saturday, the group’s new church will be officially launched with facilities including a main sanctuary and three room plus bathrooms. As well as holding public worship services on Sunday, the new church will also be used for Sunday school, a crèche, mid-week Bible studies and other activities.
He went on, “Back in 1977, a group of people began to meet in each other’s homes to pray and read the Bible on a regular basis and from that time, we have been meeting. As numbers increased, we began to move from place to place. For years, we were going from pillar to post and we have been very fortunate that the places we were in previously were very good to us. Then last year, we saw this premises come up for sale and eventually, we purchased the building,” Mr Angland said.
He added they are delighted with the new church, saying, “On a purely practical level this is ideal, we’re a functional church and we have a lot of activities such as Sunday school, worship and Bible studies. With our own building, we don’t have to be moving chairs to get the place ready and then putting things back when we leave. Also, having our own church gives us a public witness, we can now put a sign up and people passing by can see it. We are much more visible in the community.”
According to Mr Angland, the church now has more than 100 members, with people coming from as far as Lisdoonvarna and Liscannor to attend service.
“At the beginning, it was just three or four people coming together, now on a Sunday morning, if everybody is there with their families, you’re talking about 110 people. It’s a very cosmopolitan church, we have people from all over the world who are now living in Ireland attending.”
The new church is a result of more than 30 years of collecting funds, he explained. “Over the years, we saved money in a building fund from the weekly collection in the church. And when the opportunity to purchase this building came up, we approached the Ulster Bank about a mortgage and they were very good to us. Also we got some help from Christian trusts. It was a huge step for us to make the decision to own our own church building, up to now we only just paid the rent and everything was looked after. But we are delighted that we made the move.”
While the church has now moved to the Quin Road, its Friday Club for children will continue running in Cloughleigh every week. “That has been a great success, it’s a real fixture in Cloughleigh and the committee there have been very generous in accommodating us,” Mr Angland said.
The church’s official opening will take place on Saturday at 3pm at Unit 6, Block E, Quin Road Industrial Estate. “This opening is really a thank you for everyone who helped us get this off the ground, we wanted to acknowledge publicly what they have done,” he concluded.
For more, check www.ennisevangelicalchurch.org.