c. 1999 Religion News Service
SILVER SPRING, Md. _ As it becomes an increasingly diverse religious body, the Seventh-day Adventist Church has begun grappling with how to address the the opportunities _ and sometimes tensions _ its various cultures and races pose for the denomination.
About 350 Seventh-day Adventists gathered recently at the world headquarters of the denomination for a four-day summit on race relations, turning the tune”Make us one, Lord”into the event’s theme song.”We believe this is a critically important time together, a history-making event, one that is designed to help us be that which we sang about,”said Elder Alfred McClure, president of the denomination’s North American Division.
While the worldwide denomination has more than 10 million members, Adventists number about 900,000 in the United States and Canada.
In North America, 53 percent of adult church members are white, 30 percent are African-American or immigrants from the Caribbean of African heritage, 13 percent are Hispanic, and the remaining numbers are those of other ethnic backgrounds including Asian, Pacific Islander and Native American. Ten years ago, whites made up 62 percent of membership.
Chicago-based consultant Samuel Betances urged the church to embrace the differences within it.”Diversity is not about counting heads,”said Betances, the keynote speaker at the conference, which ended Saturday (Oct. 30).”It’s about making heads count.” Betances, who said he is working with a variety of religious and secular groups on race relations, said churches should commit themselves to moving beyond acknowledging difference within their membership to developing strategies to deal with such issues as racial pride and placing people of diverse backgrounds in leadership positions.”Remember that diversity is not something we introduce to fragment the church or fragment the society,”said Betances.”Diversity or multicultural education is something you introduce to unite that which is fragmented.” He said the Seventh-day Adventist Church, in which he was raised, has been”successful”in gaining minority members, but now must take a further step in outreach.”If you bring them into the church, don’t deny them access to responsibility,”he said.
The increase in minority members among Adventists in North America occurred in part because regional structures called conferences were organized in the 1940s _ a century after the denomination’s founding _ that are led by African-Americans and focus on bringing in more black members. The effort has worked: the African-American membership grew from 20,000 in the denomination’s first 100 years to 130,000 by 1975, said Louis Preston, ministerial director of the Potomac Conference of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
Today, there are close to 265,000 members of African descent in North America.
Elder Rosa T. Banks, one of the organizers of the summit, said the meeting was not designed to make structural changes but they may be considered in the future.”As we look at the structure, we know that that is something that has to be addressed,”said Banks, an African-American who directs the North American Division’s office of human relations.”I don’t think that we will address it by closing down any conference. Perhaps we need to look at the structural lines because it does give the impression or the image of two churches, but there is no conference that is not mixed with all of us.” In recent decades, there has been an increasing number of African-Americans and other minorities involved in the church outside of the regional conferences aimed at African-Americans.
Topics ranging from structure to art surfaced during the meeting as examples of continuing challenges regarding diversity.
The Rev. Tony Campolo, a sociology professor at Eastern College in St. Davids, Pa., pointed out the popular pictures of Jesus depicted as a white man that hung in the back of the auditorium where the summit plenaries were held.”The white establishment has defined the image of God and has called upon other races to worship the God that it has defined,”said Campolo.”If we’re going to have pictures of Jesus … it seems to me that all the white members of your church should have a picture of Jesus who was black and all the black members should have a picture of Jesus that was whiteâÂ?¦. Maybe we have to do something to break this consciousness that Jesus is one of us when in reality he’s one of them.” McClure said the summit _ the first of its kind for the denomination _ aims to diminish tensions between cultures within the church, but he admits that its results are yet unknown.”We would certainly hope that this would lead toward a greater acceptance of one another in its fullest sense, and that there would be a greater openness to involvement to people in leadership of all races and cultures and that our worship together might be enhanced or even made possible,”said McClure, who is white.”All too often we tend to worship in our own groups, which I don’t think is necessarily evil but I think it is evil if it is done with prejudicial intent.” In a workshop dealing with racial tension in congregations, participants spoke of their desire to see more attention focused on inclusiveness in their individual houses of worship. In some cases, they noted, diverse congregations never discuss the various cultures represented in weekly services. In other cases, more homogeneous congregations feel threatened when people of another race or culture start attending in noticeable numbers.”Whether we really want to accept it or not, there’s going to have to be a conversion,”said James Palmer, an African-American member of the predominantly black Allegheny West Conference who attends a church in Ashtabula, Ohio.”We are going to have to be a converted people. … Somewhere along the line, somebody is going to have to accept his brothers or sisters.” Ron Halvorsen Jr., the white pastor of Southwestern Adventist University Church in Keene, Texas, voiced his disappointment that his diverse congregation _ with Anglos, Hispanics, African-Americans and Asian-Americans _ is not the norm in the denomination.”I have this burning passion: We ought to be able to as Christians … worship together and … enjoy our differences,”he said.”I don’t believe when we get to heaven, we’re going to have 15 different services.” (BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM _ STORY MAY END HERE)
While discussions often centered on how the denomination and congregations can work to embrace diversity, some in attendance said much will depend on individuals.
Preston, an African-American who oversees a predominantly white corps of 102 clergy in Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C., said he came thinking the summit was a”formal exercise”but was personally challenged by Betances’ words about racial pride.”I realize that I have to not only talk about Christ-centeredness but I have to actually think it … and truly believe that everything centers from Christ and no group of people are preeminent over the other,”he said.”He opened my heart … I will be forever changed.” Richard C. Osborn, vice president for education of the North American Division, said the summit is likely to raise sensitivity and awareness, but changing attitudes towards diversity will take far longer.”Many people are uncomfortable being vulnerable on this topic because they may be misunderstood, they may be seen as being racist, perhaps,”said Osborn, who is white.”It has to be a long, long process and the question is can you get people to remain committed on a long-term basis?”he asked.
DEA END BANKS
