A Quiet Exodus: Why Black Worshipers Are Leaving White Evangelical Churches

[zephcom]

“A Quiet Exodus: Why Black Worshipers Are Leaving White Evangelical Churches

In the last couple of decades, there had been signs, however modest, that eleven o’clock on Sunday morning might cease to be the most segregated hour in America.”

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/03/09/us/blacks-evangelical-churches.html

Fascinating article about the effects Trumps election has had on Black worshipers at white evangelical churches. Well worth a read.

Thousands of things flashed through my mind reading that article. I'm white. I've lived most of my life in parts of the nation which just doesn't have many Black people so I don't have much personal experience. Outside of four years in the military, I've not been around many Black people.

I 'discovered' Twitter during the protests over the killing of Michael Brown (NO, I am not going to debate anything about that case) and watched on Twitter live video feeds posted by Black people actually in the protests themselves. I watched things happen that were never covered by the media like a young Black man grabbed by his pony tail by a police officer who snapped his head back and drug him to the ground and a Black woman who wedged herself between a young Black man who was loosing control and the police officer who was about to lose his control as she talked the young man down and got him back into the crowd so he wouldn't get beaten by the police.

I watched the Twitter feeds as Baltimore exploded. Baltimore issued a city wide curfew which was only enforced in the Black areas of the city. I watched as the Black organizers arranged for a rally in a white neighborhood with white people in the rally. I watched how at ten o'clock the water canons and rubber bullets came out at the rally in the Black part of the city and at the rally in the white part of town the officer in charge begged the protesters to go home, he even offered to give them more time to break up the rally. There was never any water canons or rubber bullets at the white people's rally. It was videoed live and the media never mentioned it.

I took an on-line implicit racism test...look them up...and flunked it miserably. Why? Because American Society is inherently racist and I grew up in American society.

What I've learned since then is that white people...as a block...absolutely refuse to accept that America is not the perfect nation we all learned about in public school. I suspect that is because accepting that America is a radically racist nation conveys a guilt that is so huge that fixing it means reinventing America from the arrogant 'Protector of the Free World' to a humble servant to those who's backs and lives we've built our success on.

And White people in America don't know how to be humble. The article in the opening post makes it very clear that American Christianity doesn't know how to be humble either even though the One these same people worship taught this:

Mark 9:33-35 NIV

"
33 They came to Capernaum. When he was in the house, he asked them, “What were you arguing about on the road?” 34 But they kept quiet because on the way they had argued about who was the greatest.

35 Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, “Anyone who wants to be first must be the very last, and the servant of all.”

36 He took a little child whom he placed among them. Taking the child in his arms, he said to them, 37 “Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.”"

Us white people just can't imagine ourselves as 'the servant to all' mostly because our church celebrates our egos so we will fill the offering plate.

Sorry about being so wordy....and I'm sorry I grew up a racist without even knowing it.

 

[Yonny Costopoulis]

Well, interestingly enough, my wife, daughter, and I had also attended Morris's Gateway in Dallas, and departed for a predominantly black church--the first predominantly black church we've joined in 30 years--for the same reason Mrs Pruitt left Gateway. Politics. Not theology, not even the issues of abortion and sexual orientation, but flat out partisan politics.

However, the discomfort started much earlier than Trump, while George W Bush was president. Their mantra then was Romans 13 and 1 Timothy 2.

But that changed during Obama's presidency. They didn't want to be reminded of Romans 13 and 1 Timothy 2. Hmmm.

But when Trump was elected...out trotted Romans 13 and 1 Timothy 2 again.

It would have been a lot more palatable had evangelical pastors taken the stance of John Piper:



How to Live Under an Unqualified President

As an outsider,I have been shocked by some American Christian's behavior.

The fiercest advocates of family values and justice now constantly make excuses for dating inappropriate content stars, sexually assualting women by grabbing their genitals, scamming desperate people out of their last dollars with a fake "University", supporting Nazis and KKK, and many many other acts that the opposite of family values.

Thank you for pointing out that this behavior is not new.

 

[UnseenSaviour]

Black Church? White Church? Sorry but if your church welcomes people through their doors based on the colour of their skin then I for one wouldn't want to go to that building. Find a church that looks at the heart not the skin colour. God Bless

 

[zephcom]

Black Church? White Church? Sorry but if your church welcomes people through their doors based on the colour of their skin then I for one wouldn't want to go to that building. Find a church that looks at the heart not the skin colour. God Bless

I suspect that is the way those Black people feel too.

 

[Dave-W]

Black Church? White Church? Sorry but if your church welcomes people through their doors based on the colour of their skin then I for one wouldn't want to go to that building. Find a church that looks at the heart not the skin colour. God Bless

That shows you know little of evangelicals in the US. It has been said that Sunday morning is the most segregated time in the country.

A small town (< 4000 residents) near where I grew up houses a major seminary for the Adventist church (Andrews Univ) and for that small town there are about a dozen SDA congregations, divided by language and national origin. My aunt has attended the Korean congregation there for over 30 years.

In 1965 my mom and step dad met in a COGIC congregation (black pentecostal) when they got engaged the next year and wanted to get married there, they (we) were asked to leave the congregation. The congregants were ok with an occasional white visitor, but to have a family there was too much. We got kicked out because of our skin color.

 

[FreeinChrist]

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[ToBeLoved]

As I implied earlier, even the latter position could be tolerable if the pastor doesn't still insist that you must celebrate that man who is an enemy of my race.

There are white evangelicals who took the position (like a lot of Republicans), "Hold your nose and accept him for the sake of the children." Or John Piper's position, "He's unqualified, but the Church has survived worse."

The problem is when the pastor insists from the pulpit that Trump is God's Main Man and that we must all love him or we're not good Christians. Sunday after Sunday, that eventually becomes intolerable. And that's pretty common in Texas.

That is a bad pastor. It’s shameful mixing politics into preaching. Shameful

 

[bugkiller]

Oh gosh a typo? Someone call the internet police immediately!



Its an article about black people feeling that white evangelical congregations don't understand their problems, don't care about their problems, and are supportive of a man who causes them problems. I think your response about 'white hospitality' makes their case for them pretty well.

Yeah church is not about God any more.

bugkiller

 

[RDKirk]

I saw an interesting statistic, about 25% of blacks are evangelical and yet very rarely support Trump. I tend to wonder if being evangelical has much to do with it at all. There has to be a better demographic, there can't be a dimes worth of difference between what black and white evangelicals believe religiously.

Well take the set of all actions that are "Actions Righteous Unto God."

Now, take the set of actions that are "Republican Party Intentions" and "Democratic Party Intentions."

The set of "Republican Party Intentions" overlaps the set of "Actions Righteous Under God" by about 2%.

The set of "Democratic Party Intentions" overlaps the set of "Actions Righteous Under God" by about 2%.

Of course, it's a different 2%. And the difference varies between the governmental levels. There are some cases in which at the local level, Republican officials very much have absolutely evil intentions toward blacks in their localities.

That's why politics doesn't belong in the pulpit or the pews--because it's 98% ungodly. This is true of all black people who are members of predominantly white churches: They don't mind their white fellow members vote Republican. If they minded, they wouldn't be there in the first place. But then they discover that those members greatly mind if the black members vote Democrat.