Ten Essential Strategies for Becoming a Multiracial Congregation

How do churches build immunity from racial and ethnic tensions that threaten to divide rather than unite congregations? Jacqui Lewis and John Janka believe that the answer lies in the development of multiracial, multicultural communities of faith.

Born of the authors' work with The Middle Project, an institute that prepares ethical leaders for a more just society, The Pentecost Paradigm is a collection of wisdom and best practices. Here you will find lessons, questions for conversation, and spaces for journaling. Use the workbook with your planning team, board members, lay leaders, and staff.

Ten essential strategies are presented to help build communities that celebrate racial/ethnic and cultural diversity:

• Embracing Call and CommitmentÂ


• Casting the VisionÂ


• Managing Change and ResistanceÂ


• Creating Congregational IdentityÂ


• Building CapacityÂ


• Cultivating CommunityÂ


• Celebrating in WorshipÂ


• Understanding Congregational ConflictÂ


• Communicating and Organizing


• Collaborating in the Public Square

In welcoming communities of faith where everyone is accepted just as they are, we can lead the way toward racial reconciliation and dismantle the prejudices that segregate our houses of worship.

Jacqueline J. Lewis is Senior Minister of Middle Collegiate Church, a dynamic nine-hundred-member multiracial, multicultural, inclusive congregation in the East Village of Manhattan. Lewis is also the Executive Director of The Middle Project. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Lewis is a nationally recognized author, activist, speaker, and preacher on the topics of racial, economic, and gender/LGBTI justice.

John Janka is the Executive Director of The Middle Project and a consultant to congregations and denominational systems on strategic planning and visioning; managing change and resistance; dealing with difference and conflict; and advancing cultural diversity and human relations. He has taught leadership skills in the Doctor of Ministry Program at Wesley Theological Seminary and is an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church.