HAMPTON, Va. (Mennonite Mission Network) – As “Hope for the Future,” co-sponsored by
Mennonite Mission Network, helps
Mennonite Church USA make institutional changes to mirror its evolving racial and ethnic demographics, some participants are inspiring local congregations to address diversity in their communities now.
The Hope for the Future gathering, the first being in 2011, consists of Racial/Ethnic leaders interested in advancing multicultural leadership at decision-making levels within Mennonite Church USA. This is particularly important as the church grows rapidly among people of color. The next gathering, scheduled for Jan. 23-25, 2015, at
Iglesia Menonita Arca de Salvación in Fort Myers, Fla., is also sponsored by Mennonite Church USA,
Mennonite Education Agency,
Mennonite Central Committee,
Everence, and the Goshen (Ind.) College
Center for Intercultural and International Education.
“The essential identity of the church is that of a community where the walls have been broken down,” said Stanley W. Green, executive director of Mission Network and a convener of Hope for the Future. “In the Bible, the church is a place where hostility, injustice and alienation are overcome. Dismantling racism, thus, and crossing borders is a key missional calling. More importantly, it is what Jesus modeled. It is at the heart of the kingdom God he announced.”
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Ewuare Osayande, anti-oppression coordinator for Mennonite Central Committee and Hope for the Future participant, has been visiting various congregations with presentations about the negative impact of racism, gender and class discrimination on all of God’s people. Osayande has particularly encouraged congregations to understand the concept of race as a social construct developed in colonial America to systematically privilege white people over other groups of people. Before this policy change that eventually became law, people were not categorized based on skin color. When Jesus walked the earth, there was no such group known as “white people.”
If clearly understood, racism can be unlearned and eventually dismantled in communities, Osayande says. Anabaptist churches could lead the way to racial reconciliation.
Osayande presented at
Calvary Community Church (C3) in Hampton, Va., Aug. 23-24 at the invitation of Bishop L.W. Francisco, who is also a Hope for the Future participant.
At C3, a predominantly African American congregation, Osayande said local churches should be at the forefront of seeking justice in their communities. He cited the positive role churches played during the aftermath of the recent racially explosive shooting death in Ferguson, Mo., of black teen, Michael Brown, by white police officer,
Darren Wilson.
Osayande quoted a 1967 speech by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in which King urged America to become a more people-focused society dedicated to peace and justice, rather than one focused on war and materialism. The speech,
“Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break the Silence,” was drafted by revered civil rights activist and scholar
Vincent Harding, a recently deceased African American Mennonite pastor.
King’s detractors criticized him for lamenting America’s military buildup during the Vietnam War. Osayande said the television images from Ferguson of armored tanks and police officers in riot gear pointing assault weapons at U.S. citizens who were demonstrating, was a chilling revelation that King’s prediction of America’s spiritual demise had perhaps come true. Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson would later apologize publically for Brown’s death and the four hours that his body was left on the street. Osayande said that local churches must take a peaceful stand against injustices.
Osayande, who also
shared at a Franconia Conference pastor’s breakfast in January, said he believes that if the Mennonite church put equal emphasis on justice along with peace, there would be an outpouring of support for the church. Globally Anabaptism resonates particularly in communities torn by war, he said. In America, Anabaptism appeals to people of color who have come out of a tradition of non-violent direct action against racism and poverty. During the civil rights movement, blacks in the south gathered in a church and decided that they had had enough of discrimination. This led to the year-long 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott. King, then a relatively unknown 26-year-old pastor, was drafted as its leader. The courage of ordinary people inspired by the gospel of Jesus changed American history.
“I think that the Anabaptist tradition of nonviolence is one that certainly has a critical role to play in the church community in this country,” Osayande said. “It’s a voice that the Mennonite community should make stronger use of – calling on the forces of power in this country to practice nonviolence in their relationships with oppressed communities.”
“Many C3 members commented on Osayande’s message and felt re-invigorated to be more proactively involved in making sustainable changes in our congregation and community,” Francisco said.
Sandy Miller, director of Church Relations for Mennonite Mission Network, said that she learned as an adult that Goshen, Ind., where she was raised, was once a “sundown town,” a city that was purposely white only. Her dear friend, Lefuarn Harvey, also of Mission Network, who grew up in neighboring Elkhart, could not live in Goshen at that time because she is African American.
“It’s important for us as white folks to recognize the privilege that is often part of our community and churches,”
Miller said. “The Jesus story has room for all of God’s children, and I want to be part of the healing, not the problem.”
Improving diversity is key to achieving peace and reconciliation. Mission Network’s
DOOR (Discovering Opportunities for Outreach and Reflection) program increased its staff to 50 percent minority by emphasizing people of color among its new hires as the team increased from 8 to 13 today. In 2004 the staff was 13 percent minority.
DOOR began recruiting beyond the Mennonite community to draw diverse applicants. The effort has been
led by its
Beloved Community Council, which explores how to foster diversity in the church and neighborhoods.
“If DOOR was going to become a ‘multi’ ministry, we realized we were going to have to begin paying attention to different things,” said Executive Director Glenn Balzer, adding that DOOR is “less white,” but still at a crossroads regarding diversity.
While Anabaptist church membership among white North American and European churches is declining, Asian, African and Latin American churches are growing rapidly. A 2006 Young Center of Elizabethtown College study found that from 2000 to 2005, 25 percent of new Mennonites were non-white compared to just 6 percent from 1995 to 2000. Meanwhile, Mennonite Church USA in 2012 reported a 6.6 percent membership decline the previous two years from 104,687 to 97,737, a nearly 19 percent drop in the past 12 years. The U.S. Census estimates that non-Hispanic whites will become a minority of the total population after 2040.
Osayande said that his anti-racism message is relatively the same to each congregation –
“Actively embrace diversity and work for racial justice. These are the actions that will lead to the lasting peace we all seek.”
“When I go into a church bringing the message of embracing multicultural change, theological diversity, worship and ministerial difference, I show through the Scriptures how biblical communities addressed those similar dynamics in the past,” he said. “We are all God’s children.”
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Mennonite Mission Network, the mission agency of Mennonite Church USA, leads, mobilizes and equips the church to participate in holistic witness to Jesus Christ in a broken world. Media may contact
news@mennonitemission.net.
