Posted on 02/25/2014 2:03:24 PM PST by SeekAndFind
While most churches say they already have or are working on having a multicultural congregation, the majority fall short when it comes to reflecting a diverse community of believers coming together during church services on Sundays, said an expert on multi-ethnic church planting and staffing.
"If you were to judge church brochures across America you would say that there is not a multicultural problem in the American church," Tony Kim, former pastor at Newsong Church in Irvine, Calif., told The Christian Post recently. Kim is the Communication Lead Associate for Slingshot Group. The Orange County-based organization specializes in church staffing and coaching pastors and leaders. "So everyone is open to it, but very few are willing to make a decision to step into that."
Kim said the Internet has created a deeper transparency between the church and the community. Someone new to a community, looking for a church to attend, can simply go to a church's website, take a look at the staff page, and make assumptions as to whether the church is representative or accepting of their ethnicity.
"I tell churches that it's great if you want to hire a worship leader of a different ethnic background, but if you want to bring long-lasting systemic change then you have to have those ethnic minority leaders in the decision-making process, somewhere near the core," Kim explained. "That's where the rubber meets the road."
Intentionally growing a multi-ethnic church is still a relatively new conversation, he said, but more and more churches are talking about it.
Kim, who is Korean, said that he still observes a lot of naivety among churchgoers in the U.S. when it comes to his culture and the Asian culture in general.
Several years ago, in a predominately Caucasian church that he served as one of its pastoral leaders, he said he was the go-to person for any new Asian "guests," such as a Chinese exchange student or a Japanese missionary. The assumption was that he could translate languages simply because he "looks the same."
Kim said that even though Christians in America read the same Bible as other cultures they often do not realize how the learning process can be different.
"They don't stop to realize how Christianity and the Gospel and the Church are absorbed. It's much different than the majority Caucasian context," he said.
"A lot of well-known leaders, no matter what profession, are successful because they have this ability to cross cultures. They know how to do that and that is trickling down to churches," Kim said. "More churches are requesting someone who understands multiple cultures, and likes to lives in multiple cultures and likes to bridge those multiple cultures – they are not afraid to do that."
Prior to helping Christian leaders connect with churches for ministry work of all types, Slingshot was focused primarily on getting worship leaders positions within a church. Kim said that it was a year ago that Slingshot "stepped into this whole multi-cultural conversation."
"We all love the local church and we all recognize the fact that as wonderful and beautiful as the Church is there's nothing more that affects the church culture and strength than the type of leaders and staff it has," he said.
The big question, Kim explained, is should the Church be multi-cultural?
"It's more than arguing about what is best for the culture or best for the Church, it really needs to be looked at through a theological lens – more of a biblical mandate versus a church growth strategy or what looks good on the Internet."
Kim is part of the organizing team for a major multi-ethnic church conference hosted by Mosaix Global Network and scheduled for November. The first conference of this type was held three years ago and attended by 400 people. Organizers say Mosaix 2013 will be an even bigger event featuring 60 speakers.
Maybe he should step into a Catholic church. One faith. Multiple ethnicities. That was one of the benefits of the use of Latin. You could go into any church in the world and have the same Mass. No balkanization.
Yeah, I can see the advantage. Every church service in Latin where less that 5% understand vs the local language where all but 5% understand. Much better.
What is the lesson of Pentecost to you when the apostles spoke to the crowd in their respective languages?
Let us not forget that the Catholic church is the universal Church. The evangelization of the world to Christ is not immune (for lack of a better word) to practical considerations. One of those is to preach the same message to all regardless of linguistics. Latin was and is unifying. As it was in the past and still is today.
Perhaps there is too much emphasis on “partcipatory” worship.
I stand by comment and the acts of the apostles. I don’t want to attend any of your further lessons.
So be it. Have a nice day.
Fifty years of vernacular liturgy and "active participation" by the laity and what do we have to show for it? Two, going on three, generations of people who can't articulate the Faith in any language whatsoever.
No church should sacrifice it’s doctrinal values for the sake of a more diverse congregation.
This is kind of silly. What the heck do they mean by “multicultural” ?? In theory shouldn’t the Church be of a singular “culture” ??
Multi-racial or Multi-ethnic seems like it would be a more appropriate term
So what?
people want to worship where they want to worship.
are they bitching that black congregations are racist for being black?
jeez some people have nothing better to do.
they don’t actually care about the people,but what their skin color is, and what percentages of which color is around, like that alone is evidence of good or bad.
it’s just so tired.
the diversity industry is a big, stupid, racket.
I guarantee you -- my congregation is a WHOLE lot more welcoming to non-Caucasians than any inner city "historically black" Baptist congregation would be to me!
WELL SAID
My dad grew up in a town of less than a hundred people. It had a Swedish Lutheran church, and a Norwegian Lutheran church. All attempts at ‘multiculturalism’ failed. My dad explained why: “The Sweeds sung three hymns and the Norwegians sung two. There was just no way you could compromise on that.”
not my responsibility to show anything.
I’d have more respect for the Romeulans if they adopted Aramaic instead of Eurotrash Latin, the latter of which was adopted centuries ago in support of the Empire that persecuted the early Christians.
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