Divided by Faith

First, ethnic and racial groups, in and of themselves, are amoral. Second, people prefer to worship in their own cultural groups. Third, denominations and congregations that use the “homogenous units principle,” which means that volunteer organizations function best when composed of just one cultural group, grow and are more vital.

But, as the church grew, something happened to its mixed-race nature—it disappeared, and the congregation became nearly all-African American. Perhaps because the pastor was black and thus practiced a nonwhite style of preaching and leadership, perhaps because white Americans are accustomed to being the majority, a pattern developed in who visited a

“Because of our cultural backgrounds,” said Nancy, a white Presbyterian woman, blacks and whites “might not enjoy the same kinds of worship.

“Christianity is not just reconciliation to God but reconciliation with people. You start out at the personal level and you see people as people. We also address systemic injustice, looking for ways to help either advocate for people who don’t have a voice or help make the playing ground a little more equal.”

The sin of “indifference” is noted by many of these early advocates of racial reconciliation. To sit on the sidelines while unequal and oppressive forces harm part of the Christian community is a grievous wrong.

As Stokely Carmichael and others have noted, when problems are at least in part structural, they must be addressed at least in part by structural solutions. If a building is on the verge of collapse due to an inadequate design, improving the quality of the bricks without improving the design is not a solution. Evangelicals, for all their recent ene