United by Faith: The Multiracial Congregation As an Answer to the Problem of Race - Hardcover

DeYoung, Curtiss Paul; Emerson, Michael O.; Yancey, George; Kim, Karen Chai

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0195152158 ISBN 13: 9780195152159

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2003

Synopsis

In the last four decades, desegregation has revolutionized almost every aspect of life in the United States: schools, businesses, government offices, even entertainment. But there is one area that remains largely untouched, and that is the church. Now comes a major new call for multiracial congregations in every possible setting--a call that is surprisingly controversial, even in the twenty-first century.
In United By Faith, a multiracial team of sociologists and a minister of the Church of God argue that multiracial Christian congregations offer a key to opening the still-locked door between the races in the United States. They note, however, that a belief persists--even in African-American and Latino churches--that racial segregation is an acceptable, even useful practice. The authors examine this question from biblical, historical, and theological perspectives to make their case. They explore the long history of interracialism in the church, with specific examples of multiracial congregations in the United States. They cite examples ranging from the abolitionist movement to an astonishing 1897 camp meeting in Alabama that brought together hundreds of whites and blacks literally into the same tent. Here, too, is a critical account of the theological arguments in favor of racial separation, as voiced in the African-American, Latino, Asian-American, Native-American, and white contexts. The authors respond in detail, closing with a foundation for a theology suited to sustaining multiracial congregations over time.
Faith can be the basis for healing, but too often Christian faith has been a field for injury and division. In this important new book, readers will glimpse a way forward, a path toward once again making the church the basis for racial reconciliation in our still-splintered nation.

About this title

About the Author

Curtiss Paul DeYoung is an Associate Professor of Reconciliation Studies at Bethel College, St. Paul, MN, and an ordained minister in the Church of God (Anderson, IN). Michael O. Emerson is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Rice University, and is the co-author of Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America. George Yancey is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of North Texas. Karen Chai Kim is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Houston.

Reviews

As America grows ever more ethnically diverse, Christian churches remain racially homogeneous. This state of affairs must end, argues this earnest blend of religious moralizing and social science; indeed, church integration is so central both to the Christian mission and to racial equality at large that "the twenty-first century must be the century of multi-racial congregations." The authors, professors either of sociology or "reconciliation studies," base their claims on theology, church history and sociology. They look back to the diversity and cosmopolitanism of the early Church as a model for contemporary Christians, and trace the legacy of racism and segregation in American churches and attempts to overcome them. Drawing on questionnaires, interviews with church members and leaders, and on-site studies of four racially mixed congregations, they probe both the promise and pitfalls of church integration. The authors respond to minority critics who value uniracial churches as hothouses for distinctive worship styles, rallying points for activism and refuges from white social hegemony, and stress that integrated churches can and should guard against assimilationist pressures, preserve the unique cultures of all racial groups and cultivate a racially diverse church leadership. They never quite demonstrate the world-historical centrality of racially mixed congregations, and they concede the aura of awkward dutifulness that accompanies self-conscious attempts at church integration, observing that congregations are not truly integrated until all the racial groups feel somewhat uncomfortable in the resulting milieu. Still, the authors make a good case that this is a cross that Christian churches should take up.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0195152158
• ISBN 13: 9780195152159
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 240