We Need To Talk About Race: Understanding the Black Experience in White Majority Churches

by Ben Lindsay

until the majority culture engages with minority culture issues, structural injustices will remain (this happened with slavery and the civil rights movement in America). Second, silence will be interpreted as apathy or collusion. Sitting on the fence when it comes to racism or racial inequality is not an option – action is required.

To pursue racial diversity without inclusivity is problematic

Integration means being included in, and creating and contributing to, church culture.

Useful for our role in welcome and integration

As black people, we are constantly code switching in ways that white people do not have to, adapting to our environment depending on who the audience is. For some, the pressure is too much to handle. They yield and become ‘the mask, while others overcompensate’11 and turn every perceived offence or violation into warfare.

the UK Church must also acknowledge the crucial and significant role it played in starting the barbaric transatlantic slave trade in the first place. The ‘narratives of abolition cannot be reduced to a story of angelic white benefactors gifting freedom to their black wards’.

The UK has and continues to benefit from slavery, whether it’s the innovation

of the Industrial Revolution, which was a direct result of the wealth generated from the slave trade, or our current banking system, which can trace its roots to financing and insuring slave ships (the Bank of England, Lloyds, HSBC and Barclays to name a few). Even though the slave trade ended in 1833, the UK, through colonialism and neocolonialism still profited from countries impacted by slavery in the first place. From ordinary UK middle-class families to current well-known UK millionaires, there are scores of people who benefited from UK government compensation at the end of the slave trade, through inherited wealth.

White couples are the power holders in these spaces and being a black man with a white wife seems to be the second-best thing, which leaves black women in the cold twice over.

in general, I’ve observed that where black majority churches readily speak on issues that affect the community, such as youth violence, unemployment, financial struggles, many of the white majority churches I’ve attended will speak more broadly on issues of ‘the human condition’, often neglecting to acknowledge the disproportionate struggles that minorities face.

Or the amorphous "sin".

We cannot want a multicultural church yet expect everyone to look white, speak the Queen’s English and worship in the same way.

The growth of the black church can be traced back to the prejudice that black people experienced arriving in the UK in the 1950s and 1960s. Migrants from the Commonwealth came to the

UK expecting a warm and friendly welcome. What many black people experienced on arrival were churches discouraging them from attending or, in more extreme instances, refusing them admission to their church buildings.

At no point was the minority culture first told to forgive and reconcile; the onus fell on the majority culture to actively make the situation right. The minority culture was given responsibility and authority. They were heard, empowered, valued, trusted, loved and respected. As we attempt to live in a diverse

Referring to Acts 6 where there was conflict regarding the distribution of food to widows of certain Jewish groups.

There is clearly a race problem relating to black representation in senior church leadership positions in the UK. Is there a tendency for only certain ‘types’ of black people (middle-class, university educated, African rather than Caribbean people, black men married to white women) to be elevated to positions of leadership in churches?

So interesting that there is a divide between African blacks and Carribean blacks. What is this about? Also, Owen Hylton speaks about how education can also be a barrier for leadership in church.

Earon James when he says, ‘Because of the white-centred bent that is inherent in Christianity, if you’re going to have something that is genuinely multi-ethnic, I would say it has to be minority led.’

Genuine food for thought.

The Bible is a firm advocate of church leadership that reflects the community it serves. One of the best examples of diverse leadership in the Bible is in Acts 13.1, with the leadership team at Antioch. This church leadership team was wonderfully heterogeneous. The team comprised Barnabas from Cyprus and a black man called Simeon (aka Niger, which, as we’ve seen, is Latin for black). Then there was Lucius, who was possibly black as he was from Cyrene/North Africa. The team also included Manean, who was raised among royalty, and, finally, Paul, a Jew.

Revd Les Isaac has witnessed: There are some races who say ‘we’re brothers but I’m your big brother’. For the white guys when they meet you they want to know where you were educated, what you studied, what social class you’re in before he is seeing your Christendom.

As a black leader in a majority white movement of churches, I suffer integration fatigue on a regular basis. This is how it works. I get tired of being the black pioneer in a predominantly white church space. At times I feel exhausted by the struggle of racial integration – trying to build relationships with people who are not like me and do not understand me. I get worn out by being the de facto voice of black people in white settings. I get frustrated at being the only black cultural ambassador in all-white environments. I get jaded by going to church conferences and being literally the only

black face.

The lack of senior black leadership in white-led, black majority churches is known in the black community as the ‘Guinness effect’ – white majority leadership on top, black majority employees or congregation at the bottom.

What I’ve seen from my anecdotal research is how complicated it can be to develop a racially diverse senior leadership team. There are many factors to this – for example, issues like the practice of unpaid gap-year leadership programmes that can benefit some and be a barrier to those from less wealthy backgrounds. The intern method of employment, which we see frequently in a church context, often leads to a part-time or full-time job. Unpaid internships require a level of financial support from family members rarely seen outside of the white community.

Faaacts.

Often within churches, leadership development opportunities are based on relationship and not on a transparent recruitment policy, which can only make this cycle harder to break.

Once again, very true.

It is my belief that one of the reasons black majority Pentecostal churches are growing rapidly is because people see others like them at the front of the church in the leadership positions and it gives some black people a sense of belonging, commonality, familiarity and trust.

It is important to allow emerging black leaders to be themselves while acknowledging that the journey of leadership for black people is not the same as it is for a white person. We do not start at the same starting point and we sometimes require a hand to work through white spaces from those who have navigated the path before us.

You are perceived as ‘too black’ for white people and ‘too white’ for black people. This can leave the black leader in a strange grey, lonely vacuum. Unfortunately, because of the desire of some churches to pursue diversity as a tick box exercise instead of a key biblical principle, some of these accusations are true.

When putting together a church programme, and considering who should be in church leadership, it’s vital that the church intentionally and deliberately discovers diverse leaders from the variety of people represented in the church. We can call this contextualized leadership – this simply means leadership from the culture you’re trying to reach, in the culture you’re trying to reach.

For the UK Church to implement Kwon’s words, leadership development for black people cannot be left to chance. A deliberate and robust strategy that gives the minority culture opportunities to lead can only happen when the majority culture is giving away permission to control and shape the culture.

"Permission to control and shape the culture". That is probably the key difference between tokenism and taking diversity seriously.

Person of colour What are your experiences of pathways to leadership in your church?

There are none, really. But need clarity on what that actually means.

The effects of issues such as the increase in racism and hate crime after Brexit, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, xenophobia, extremism and immigration problems on people of colour are not often seen as pulpit-worthy topics, but they are faced in the daily lives of ethnically diverse communities.

As a black person, I struggle with the continued fascination with and fetishization of black children in Africa, but the lack of interest in black children suffering in the UK.

Churches miss an opportunity to bring hope into hopeless situations when the focus is solely on personal salvation and not at all on how the Church can serve the local community all around.

Good point. I suppose this is because Western culture is generally individualistic.

We cannot achieve this [a post-racial future] until we confront the fact that this is a racial present.

Afua Hirsch

As black people, even if talking about race is uncomfortable and is the last thing we want to do, like Kaluuya, we need to be aware of the issues and be prepared to speak on them when we see injustice.

Challenging. Passivity unfortunately isnt a viable option lol.

The fundamental difference between white allies and white saviours is that one listens and has empathy while the other tries to control and dominate.