Mono-Ethnic Churches?

[steadfast7]

I'd like to hear your insights ...

Here in the west, we're all aware,and proud of, the proliferation of the ethnic churches that seek to serve to immigrant community. Such churches worship in their own languages and according to their ethnic traditions - this is fine and well.

Being a visible minority myself, this has very much been my church experience as well here in Canada. However, as generations become more rooted into North America, we're finding that ethnic churches are still very much on the scene, despite the fact that the congregation are native English (even monolingual) speakers. Language is no longer a barrier, but the church is still segregated ethnically from the rest of a city's population.

I think it can be argued fairly easily from scripture that the ideal picture of the church is multi-ethnic, and we should strive for this. But my question is whether this kind of segregation may actually be sinful? Is the gospel at stake in this type of ecclesiology? Do we find in this phenomenon a parallel with Paul's aggression against the Judaizers? OR, is there a valid and justified place for the continuation of ethnic churches in the west?

love to hear your thoughts...

thanks.

 

[au5t1n]

That's an excellent question. I don't have an answer, though, except to say that I agree with these two things, which you mentioned:

1)Ideally, the church should include all local ethnicities as much as is possible.
2)It is good to have churches that minister to groups that don't speak the native language and need a church in their own tongue.

But that doesn't answer your question. I'm sorry.

 

[DMcFadden]

We run around 450-470 on most Sundays.
45% - Asian (many directly from China)
35% - Hispanic (many directly from Spanish speaking countries)
30% - A mix of African American and "clear" people like me

We also have an unusually large number of interracial couples. Our pastor preaches a sermon that is translated (on the fly) into Spanish and Mandarin for those who need it (earpieces everywhere!).

We like it. Looks like heaven.

 

[(^^)Regin]

We are an English speaking church located in a non English speaking country.
We currently have the following nationalities attending our church:

• Japanese
• Chinese
• Canadian
• American
• African
• Filipino
• Samoan
• Hungarian
• Haflings (half x country half y country)

I have learned that there is absolutely no way for us to agree on all things (and even in small things), because of our cultural and ethnic backgrounds.

Our only common denominator is Christ Jesus and the wonderful gift of Salvation. So far its holding us together for more than 30 years.

 

[dr_parsley]

I think it can be argued fairly easily from scripture that the ideal picture of the church is multi-ethnic, and we should strive for this. But my question is whether this kind of segregation may actually be sinful? Is the gospel at stake in this type of ecclesiology? Do we find in this phenomenon a parallel with Paul's aggression against the Judaizers? OR, is there a valid and justified place for the continuation of ethnic churches in the west?

love to hear your thoughts...

thanks.

Context: I'm not aware of the ethnic churches you describe but here in South Africa it's quite a serious issue. There is one church here in my local area that is purposely multi-ethnic - white and black, but I don't think it's working very well. The black people have deep concerns over some things that the white people can't understand and don't take seriously and I think it might soon be splitting. The white population is not really big enough to support a church. All the other churches are 100% black.

Here's my take on it: anyone should be able to go to any church (doctrine allowing) regardless of ethnicity, but people can have worship styles based on their ethnicity and so different churches appealing and useful to particular ethnicities can organically arise. This is by no means sinful so long as people of different ethnicity would be welcomed.

When I go to a black church the worship is unhelpful for me; people just sing whatever comes into their heads and others follow and it sounds wonderfully glorious and there's me with my croaky English voice and lack of singing ability hungry for some food for my mind. People also have an opposite balance (to me) on the emphasis of emotional vs intellectual worship. My black friends tell me that the English style of worship (with set words) is unhelpful to them because they are used to a freer style.

 

[TimV]

Yes, SA is the classic extreme case. In all three churches I was a member of over 9 years there was not one Black or Coloured member, even though they were 80 percent of the population where we were at. Also, there weren't any White members of any of the Black churches.

It's just too different culturally. In our Reformed churches here in California it isn't the case, with Black, Hispanic and Asians, and people usually don't even think about it, but ironically even though Blacks and Whites have been together longer in SA than here in the US there's not any where near the same amount of cultural assimilation.

We were all standing outside of an Afrikaner church when one of the farmers, who was a notorious liberal said while looking over at a Black church "Why aren't we over there worshipping?" and I asked him why wasn't he over there and he just stared at me.

So I have to ask myself questions. There's a Black guy in our Bible study who's an accomplished theologian. Why am I not uncomfortable sitting next to him and listening when he speaks? There's a Japanese guy who has filled the Pulpit several times. Why am I looking forward to hearing him preach in a few weeks when the Pastor is at Presbytery? And why would I never have gone/go to a Black church in SA? The only thing I can think of is what is referred to above by Dr. Parsley, that the cultural and probably closely related theological divide is just too wide, and both groups just aren't comfortable together.

 

[ericfromcowtown]

I think that ideally your church should reflect your neighbourhood. So, if you live in a multi-racial and diverse neighbourhood and your church is mono-tone, then that might give you cause for reflection. If, however, your neighbourhood is overwhelmingly white or overwhelmingly black and so is your church, then I don't think that there is an issue. Forgive me for over-simplifying or over-reacting, but it seems like "diversity" is often held up as an ideal (idol) to be strived for in the local congregation even when local conditions don't make this realistic.

In regards to the OP, I don't think there is anything wrong with ethnic churches in diverse neighbourhoods if the issue is language. However, as you suggest, at what point is language no longer the real issue? The only ethnic church that I am familiar with is a Chinese free-evangelical church that graciously opens their doors (and very large building) to a wide variety of bible study groups including one that I attend weekly.

 

[Knoxienne]

As long as the church preaches and teaches biblical truth, the color of the congregation shouldn't matter. If it's all White, fine. If it's not, fine.

All of the nations coming to Christ just simply means that the gospel has gone out to all nations - it's not a mandate for every single congregation of Christians on the face of the earth to be multiethnic. Some will be, as Eric intimated, but others won't. Separation does not always have to mean hatred or disunity among the Body.

 

[Tripel]

I think it can be argued fairly easily from scripture that the ideal picture of the church is multi-ethnic, and we should strive for this. But my question is whether this kind of segregation may actually be sinful?

Having a mono-ethnic church is not sinful. Striving to have a mono-ethnic church is.

My church is 99.5% white. We would love to have more diversity, but it just never happens. We will occassionally have a non-white person or family attend, but they stick out like a soar thumb and never join. It has been mentioned from the pulpit several times about how white our congregation is, and the desire for it not to be that way.

But what are we to do about it? Should we change our worship style so that it is more appealing to other ethnicities? Should we ask our congregation to change the way it dresses so that we look less like a white, middle-class, suburban church?

The church shouldn't market itself to attract a diverse congregation. Our end goal is not diversity. Our end goal is the praise and worship of God while furthering the kingdom.

 

[BertMulder]

While our church is made up, predominantly, of Dutch descent (with a handfull first generation), our church is by no means a 'Dutch' church in its outlook, even though our doctrinal standards are also of Dutch descent (3FofU). We have, or have had members of a variety of ethnic and church backgrounds, including RCC Scottish, Maylasian, Korean, Singaporean (Chinese), and even a Dutch Mexican (our pastor)

 

[ericfromcowtown]

Having a mono-ethnic church is not sinful. Striving to have a mono-ethnic church is.

I like how you phrased that.

We should, of course, stress that we're talking about local congregations being a reflection of local realities, not about "the church." The church universal is becomming more diverse every day and we should praise God that when we're gathered around the throne we'll be surrounded by people from every tribe and tongue.

 

[steadfast7]

I think it can be argued fairly easily from scripture that the ideal picture of the church is multi-ethnic, and we should strive for this. But my question is whether this kind of segregation may actually be sinful?

Having a mono-ethnic church is not sinful. Striving to have a mono-ethnic church is.

My church is 99.5% white. We would love to have more diversity, but it just never happens. We will occassionally have a non-white person or family attend, but they stick out like a soar thumb and never join. It has been mentioned from the pulpit several times about how white our congregation is, and the desire for it not to be that way.

But what are we to do about it? Should we change our worship style so that it is more appealing to other ethnicities? Should we ask our congregation to change the way it dresses so that we look less like a white, middle-class, suburban church?

The church shouldn't market itself to attract a diverse congregation. Our end goal is not diversity. Our end goal is the praise and worship of God while furthering the kingdom.

A good point here. A church may open its doors to anyone and not turn anyone away who wants to attend, but if a congregation is 99.5% of a particular ethnicity, it is overwhelming and intimidating, albeit on a psychological level.

Missiologists use the Homogeneous Unit model to refer to churches that 'target' or cater to a single group of people with common ethnicity, caste, backgrounds. The quantitative data is clear: the church grows numerically. Thus, we can argue that for this reason, we can and should do church this way - afterall, the kingdom seems to be expanding by leaps and bounds. But, how different is this approach to that of Willowcreek's seeker-sensitive model, which most of us disdain so much? Theologically, it is severely lacking and in the long run, is it really a picture of the kingdom of God?

I see in the church's attitude in Acts, even in the midst of language barriers, a striving to keep the Hebraic and Gentile Christians together at all cost, for the gospel seemed to be at stake. Paul was passionate about it and even rebuked Peter for slipping. Some theological reflection is probably needed though, I'm not sure if I'm reading the present culture back into Acts!

Segregation can be very innocent at first, simply a matter of worship style. But you'll see how stark the results are when the entire congregation is homogeneous.

 

[CharlieJ]

Evangelism Issue

But what are we to do about it? Should we change our worship style so that it is more appealing to other ethnicities? Should we ask our congregation to change the way it dresses so that we look less like a white, middle-class, suburban church?

Quite simply, I think a lot of it is an evangelism issue. I grew up in a church (very not Reformed) where the whole church revolved around aggressive evangelism. I'm not saying that either their church philosophy or their methods of evangelism are commendable, but I noticed something. Once you weed out all the "pray a prayer" conversions and "yes I'll repeat after you if you'll just go away" people, there are some who stick. And no matter what their ethnicity, they're fiercely loyal to the church which brought them the gospel, at least for a few years.

So in that church, even though all the pastors and deacons were middle-aged, middle-class white guys, there were blacks, hispanics, asians, islanders, etc. So I think if you really want non-whites to attend your church, you just need to witness to non-whites. Most won't listen to you, but the ones who do will stick around even if they're a minority.