Over the past few decades or so we have experienced the "Burger King" ing of the church. What I mean is this: Your way right away. In some ways the church has lost the battle in America. The population at large doesn't care about church and has not desire to go. In response to this individuals developed this idea: Let's find specific, smaller populations within the larger population and create a church that caters to them. In this way we have witnessed the advent of the biker church, the middle-class white man's church, the bar church, the skeptic's church, the goth's church, etc. Each one caters to a specific niche population.
In planting a church, the church planter needs to ask two questions. First, are we going to be a niche church? Second, what niche is that? John Maxwell explains that, "Who you are is who you attract." This means that since Rick Warren dresses a certain way, thinks a certain way, and believes a certain way, his congregation is going to be and look a lot like him.
I am interested in the question of how does a church planter in the niche market of church planting today create a church that targets two niche populations for the purpose of diversity? For example, I am very interested in those who hate going to church, but are interested in spirituality. This kind of language seems to come from and cater to upper-middle class white Americans. But, I am also curious about the issues facing the African-American church. I am also interested in the 20 something African-American male who hate going to church. Honestly at first glance I wonder if creating a church that hopes to reach both the 20-something African American male and the 20-something white male is possible.
The difficulty is found in American culture. To cater to both cultures will require some level of discomfort in both groups. Americans hate discomfort and so are apt to find a place where they can be more comfortable. There is the biological idea that the human body is always fighting to stay in homeostasis. As soon as its temperature is up a few degrees, it fights to bring it back down. The same is true in church. We want to be comfortable. If we're not, we'll go to the church down the street where we are promised to be made comfortable.
This is my quandary. Maybe this isn't possible and so maybe the best we can do right now is to create a niche church that caters to people like me and the other leaders in the church and befriend a church that caters to a different population. I honestly don't know the answer. But, I do think that the church today is falling into the same traps of diversity that our parents fell into and unfortunately I believe that we're making them worse through creating homogeneous congregations where all are made to feel comfortable by being around people just like themselves.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
Diversity.
At the 2000 census, 12.3% of the American population was identified as black, and were primarily identified as African American (with some being Carribean Americans and African Immigrants). This is listed as the second largest minority group in the US, with Hispanics comprising 12.5% of the American population.
Persons of European descent comprised 69.1%.
I deal well with numbers.
Like you, I see an upsurge in churches reaching middle class white Americans, such as the churches we are involved in as well as other similar churches that have influenced ours...Niche churches. I agree that the concept of a "niche church" immediately creates difficulty in reaching the more broad American populaion, specifically African-Americans, because, like you've said, Niche Churches seek to enhance peoples' comfort levels.
Having not read as much on the subject as you have, I can honestly say that I don't come prepared with ideas on how to deal with the conundrum of making a church that is at once attractive to a diverse crowd AND comfortable for non-believers.
At the end of this particular post, you mentioned befriending another church. The trick is being very intentional that the "friendship" is focused on increasing diversity amongst the body. Like you, I truly don't know the answer. Sadly, I'm not extremely informed of what African-Americans are into, but I know that if I got to know the right people, possibly through a partnership, friendship, conglomeration, alliance, or whatever, I could learn/teach/enhance/share.
It would seem like the idea of creating a diverse church would be easier in an urban/semi-urban environment where cultures tend to be more diverse across a smaller geographical area, which leads to the idea of marketing. Marketing can be used to target populations, and effectively done acheives enormous success. On a broad scale, see the difference in advertisement on the Food Network vs. VH1 vs. BET vs. Nickelodeon. Having never been involved in such a church, I haven't any practical experience.
I know at my church, Common Ground, we attract military families and early 20 somethings because that is a large part of the population in our area. Do we appeal to African-American 20 somethings? I don't know. We don't have many attending, so that may be an answer. Strangely, we haven't attracted the original niche the pastor who planted the church aimed for, but again, the church was started with a niche in mind. We seek to save the lost, and the lost we are reaching fall into a niche. It is something to be joyful about (without question), but should we also be mourning the people we aren't reaching?
The problem of diversity speaks to the problem of fractioning of the church in general, and the American church in particular. Unfortunately, like you've said in your blogs, Americans have come to expect a certain level of comfort. Americans very much have an entitlement complex, regardless of race. So, do we live within the fractured church or attempt to bring it together? I think we have to, at some point, recognize the body as a whole rather than our niche, but I don't know how. I've never even really considered the problem, as far as church-planting, despite spending much of my life railing against institutional racism in American culture.
I just finished reading a book by Erwin McManus, called The Barbarian Way. His church, Mosaic (www.mosaic.org), in LA tries to actively address the issue of diversity. I don't really know how, honestly, but he writes good books.
I look forward to adding more questions and discussions. This topic is so far from one that has an easy answer, but aren't so many the important ones?
I tend to ramble when I think through things. I apologize if this is really rambling.
I thought your idea of how your church reaches the kind of people who live in your area in F-burg. That makes sense. I had not taken into account the idea that church like CG and MO seek to reach those who don't like church and so consequently, the congregation will probably look like a cross-section of that population.
But, I will say that we do need to be honest and careful about who the church caters to and who the specific kind of person that will probably like the church the best. In Rick Warren's The Purpose Driven Church they go so far as to have an actual person made up, including likes and dislikes. I don't know that's necessary. But, it is worth being self-reflective as a body and think about:
-What kind of people are attracted to us?
-Is this the kind of person we want to attract?
-Are we only attracting the personality and talent of the main pastor. (which as you mentioned may not happen as much as I've thought it might.)
-Are we becoming more of a homogeneous group than our surrounding population? (This may be ok, as long as you know it is happening.)
But, in the post you just posted, I love the idea of instead of starting to think from this angle, start with vision. From vision and passion will come people. If one starts with these questions from the beginning, you will be rowing in circles and end up nowhere.
I appreciate your reminder one starts with vision and it is vision that people follow.
About diversity in general, and we can move on from this subject to discussion on church in general.
The issue is cultural capital. Wealth is maintained through social and family connections. It is also maintained through access to resources. Our problem is right now there is a higher percentage of poor people and a higher percentage of African-Americans in the inner city. When the church is all white or all black, then those resources stay the way they are. If a church was in a poorer area, then Bob Do-well can find a job for poor Mr. Poor. So, then the church can become an agent of change and help create cultural capital for those who previously had none. That's the issue. If the Church (the American church in general) does nothing, then we will unknowingly perpetuate those in the inner cities with lack of resources, cultural capital, and connections that can lead to jobs.
Where does social responsibility and passion meet? Being honest, I don't feel passionate about feeding perpetually homeless people. Helping people find jobs, helping kids get into college...I'm interested in that. But, I haven't done a lot of that so it does intimidate me. I'm not sure where any of these ideas turn into action. But, it is cool to talk about so that it can move towards a specific idea and can turn into action somehow.
I totally agree with the idea of self-reflection. I think that more often than not, churches become more and more homogeneous because they don't do this.
I think self-reflection is the only way to combat that. Say, if you want to reach a certain area, but your aren't, the longer you go without taking the time to see that, the more and more difficult it will be reach it.
Also, I think self-reflection/self-evaluation can help with accomplishing what the church should be accomplishing, which, like you said, I see to be helping those in need find jobs, helping those in need go to college, helping those in need become an army of people capable of helping others in need.
I think there is truth to the Green Lantern idea, which is that God has assigned each of us a sector of the galaxy, and we are responsible to that sector. However, I think we have to be conscious of what our sector is and ask ourselves if we are truly accomplishing everything we can accomplish in that sector. I would imagine most people (myself included mostly) are not.
My friend, Juliette, though she is not a Christian thinks about the racial/socio-economic divide that seems to exist in many areas. She has a heart for the Hispanic population, and has set out to create a scholarship foundation, from scratch, to help immigrants go to college. How cool is that? How amazing would it be if a church not only did that, but ALSO shared the joy of an adventurous life with Christ?
You guys have hit so many good points, but far be it from me to miss an opportunity to beat a dead horse. Mainly I think your sense of balancing vision (reaching a certain group of people) with constantly rechecking that vision against being to narrow is spot on.
For what it's worth, I think there are some challenges for a church with a bold vision not to be a niche church:
1. Bigger churches simply have more people and resources and therefore more ministries. In that sense, they are more diverse because they can meet the different types of needs, physical and spiritual, of different types of people. We all know people that go to one church because of this one ministry, often it's youth group: the family goes to a church they're ok with because the youth group there is thriving, etc.
2. Any ministry, church included, that is based around friend-lationships, as the book is called, is absolutely doing it right, BUT people are most attracted to and feel most comfortable around others most like themselves. You can see this on a micro-level with a successful small group: often people most similar to one another. So, relationship-based ministry can actually reinforce homogeneity (spelling?). I'm not sure what the alternative is.
3. Traditionalism that we all know is inherint in churches works against diversity because too many non-moral "forms" are basically equated with the only valid mode of piety, be it worship styles, modes of behavior, emphasis or lack there of on the arts or humanities, preaching styles, etc.
4. Intentionality is perhaps the most important thing, but to actually achieve diversity, intentionality must be present in not only those reaching out but those being reached out to. It's kind of a two-way street, so even if you build it, they may not come.
5. I don't think post-modernism helps either because I don't see much of a drive for synthesis or relating to that which is different from myself. If logic cannot connect our thoughts and language cannot connect people, then we are basically little dots only capable of independent expression. If I may oversimplify further, I don't see post-modernism as capable of bringing UNITY out of the DIVERSITY it rightly champions. (Of course modernism's unity does not do well at sustaining diversity either).
I cite these additional challenges, ironically, as an encouragement: you should plow ahead with your vision because it is a good one, and you can't wait for those many forces to change.
Post a Comment