NEWS STORY: Presbyterians Hope Booming Asian Churches Can Reverse Membership Declines

c. 2000 Religion News Service LONG BEACH, Calif. _ Fifty years ago, Syngman Rhee fled communist North Korea with little more than the clothes on his back and a long look back at his divided homeland. Standing cold and hungry in the chaos of a refugee camp, Rhee prayed his Christian faith would bring him […]

c. 2000 Religion News Service

LONG BEACH, Calif. _ Fifty years ago, Syngman Rhee fled communist North Korea with little more than the clothes on his back and a long look back at his divided homeland. Standing cold and hungry in the chaos of a refugee camp, Rhee prayed his Christian faith would bring him through.

On Saturday (June 24), Rhee’s faith brought him a victory that must have seemed unimaginable a half century ago, as he was elected moderator of the 212th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) _ the first Asian-American to hold the post.


As moderator, Rhee is presiding over the church’s annual meeting here, but the symbolic importance attached to his election goes beyond that role. For years, Asian Presbyterians say they were an invisible presence in the 2.5 million-member church, and Rhee’s election signals a long-awaited recognition by the larger church.

But even more, Rhee’s election offers a look into the future of the church _ long the bastion of middle class white America _ as its Asian constituency continues to grow while its rank-and-file white churches continue to lose close to 30,000 members each year.

“For the minorities and racially ethnic parts of the church, their role is going to be increasingly important, not only in terms of numbers, but also in terms of leadership,” Rhee said as he munched on Pad Thai noodles and Ginger Chicken at a dinner sponsored by the National Asian Presbyterian Council.

While Asian Presbyterians still represent just a sliver of the larger church _ only about 450,000 members _ their churches have seen growth rates only dreamed of in the larger church. Since 1990, the number of Asian churches and missions has more than doubled, from about 200 to close to 500.

Within 10 years, Asian church leaders promise an across-the-board 10 percent growth increase in 12 different ethnic groups. And the larger church has launched an aggressive campaign to attract new minority members, with goals of boosting minority membership to 10 percent within five years, and up to 20 percent by 2020.

According to church figures, more than half of all Asian Presbyterians became Christians after arriving in the United States. Asian church leaders say recent immigrants immediately seek out a familiar environment. Far away from family and native traditions, they are effective targets for the gospel.

By offering an immediate sense of community, these churches are slowly building the institutions that make ethnic communities thrive, much like what the Roman Catholic Church did for the Irish and Italians, or synagogues did for Russian and Polish Jews, at the turn of the last century.


There are financial, as well as theological, motivations. According to the church’s Korean Congregational Enhancement Office, the church’s 50,000 Koreans last year gave more than $45 million to the church, including $3.4 million for missions outreach to their homeland. Church financial officials, however, expressed some skepticism and said they could not confirm the number.

Rhee said the growth rates seen in the Asian churches are directly related to their unabashed devotion to evangelism and making new converts, something the larger church has not focused on because of internal political and theological battles.

“Unlike most Americans who have lived much more secure lifestyles, particularly as Christians, the Christians in the Third World countries were pushed into situations that were hostile, uncertain, difficult situations, and we learn how to rely on the grace of God,” Rhee said. “And when we find that new faith, we want to share it.”

Church leaders agree that, faced with a background of persecution and an environment that can often be hostile to the Christian faith, Asian American Christians have a much needed dose of vitality to add to the U.S. church.

“The places where the church grows is where there is suffering, where there is prayer, where there is a commitment to evangelism, and all of our minorities share those commitments,” said the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, who as stated clerk, is the church’s highest elected official.

The surge in Asian membership, however, is not likely to come without growing pains. Asian Presbyterians tend to be far more conservative than the rest of the denomination, and are at odds with liberal factions in the church which want to move the church toward the blessings of same-sex unions and the ordination of gays and lesbians.


Much of that hesitancy stems from the conservative traditions of Asian society, which in part finds its roots in the Presbyterian missionaries sent to spread the gospel in the the 19th century, said the Rev. Shun Chi Wang, who heads up Asian congregational growth for the church’s National Ministries Division.

“Asians do not talk about (homosexuality) that much, either in the church or in the community,” said Wang, a Taiwanese pastor who has been planting immigrant churches since 1974. “To that society, it seems like it doesn’t happen.”

All of this leaves church leaders searching for a delicate balance between creating enough room for a new, conservative constituency and keeping the liberal-leaning church roomy enough for its established members.

“This is a golden opportunity for us to reach out to our own people,” said the Rev. Prachuab Dechawan, chair of the National Asian Presbyterian Council. “While the Presbyterian Church is losing members, we are the ones bringing people in. And we can grow, but we could grow faster if we could get some financial support.”

DEA END ECKSTROM

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