Recently there was an annual conference for the committee of cultural diversity. Its secretariat which was to be taken before the numerous ethnicities, races, and cultures which make up the Roman Catholic Church. The primary objective of this conference was to bring all people of God to serve him together and to come up with Catholic identity and thus promoting a spirit of diversity. In the United States, there has been a demographic shift due to the rise of Asians, Africans, Hispanics and as well as other non-Europeans. Today, the mission of the church to preach God's Gospel and enhance life and dignity for human beings is mainly influenced by cultures. The Catholic Church is putting efforts to shift from mono-cultural worship pattern to multicultural whereby different cultural and ethnic groups can worship together as one Christian community. However, to achieve active ministers and pastoral workers, there is need to employ appropriate skills, attitude, and knowledge. This paper seeks to identify the role of the church in promoting diversity and inclusion in the community by examining my worship service visit at a Presbyterian church.
Diversity in the Church
Through the Holy Spirit who inspires me to preach God’s word, I have had numerous opportunities to worship in various churches of different denominations and races. From these experiences, I have been able to deduce a fact that no matter how much doctrinal differences there might be, different worship styles and races, the body of Christ presents so much in common than all those differences. Christ’s love for human beings has been visible in saving the lost and healing those who are in pain whereby the church members and leaders are continually used as objects of wholeness and healing(Banks, 2015). In my previous experience in the Presbyterian Church, the church eliminates those critical aspects that bring people together and focuses on those that separate us. Fundamentally, this could be the reason why there are so many denominations which tend to divide the people and make them see each other as different people before the eyes of God. Additionally, the fact that the way of doing things and the service program in the Presbyterian church is different from Church of Christ made me not enjoy the service and think they were not doing the right thing. In my opinion, denominations are not bad, but at some point, they tend to chase people away from God instead of inviting them.
For instance, the leper in the bible who was cleansed after stretching out of Jesus' hand would have started a church by the name Church of stretched out hand
which would have been the basis of the followers' faith. The servant of Centurion's in Capernaum who was healed by Jesus sending a word would also have started a church by the name church of the sent word, and his followers would have faith in the sent word of Jesus which heals (Banks, 2015). The two churches were located in the same geographical place and had a communal fellowship period together and should celebrate the aspect of witnessing Jesus. However, they opt to have denominational walls which divide them over the healing issue. The scenario may be just an exaggerated version of the real situation of things, but the fact is that the church needs to make sure that prejudice to lead to division and make a point of celebrating diversity in worship.
Cultural Diversity
From my worship experience at the Presbyterian Church, I came to realize that most of the worship experience is cultural whereby culture is most clearly defined in the church. In this church, there was loud singing, brief preaching, heavy foot stamping and hand clapping and people believed that if it is not loud, then it is not a church. The preacher is the finest and the best Bible preacher I ever heard and conveyed his message with conviction and power. The congregation would respond to the word in agreement while the drums would echo back in a rhythm. The worship service grew louder and louder that one would hardly hear the preacher's words. These qualities run in most of the black's churches. On the other hand, the whites' churches which I have attended, had no clapping, no saying Amen and the organist played nothing absent in the hymnal.
The entire worship service was calculated allowing no spontaneity. In most cases, the sermons delivered by these white preachers are powerful and should receive a thousand amen’s, but instead, the congregation remains silent and attentive without saying anything in response. There is a massive difference between the two cultures concerning worship and faith. However, there is a change of things nowadays where many churches are coming together to worship in churches and concerts and ceremonies (Banks, 2015). The worshippers who practice freestyle of worship give a chance for the conservative members to have fun in the Lord. The quiet worshippers are also free to respond and clap their hands in agreement to the sermons delivered.
Similarly, the quiet worshippers give an opportunity to the loud and liberated members to quietly sit and listen attentively to the sermon. It is wonderful to watch those who used to shout Amen as if being commanded sit quietly as they reflect and digest God's goodness for his creation. The most important aspect here is balance whereby no group should be monopolistic in their worship. They ought to balance between the emotional and intellectual approach of the worship. One thing that I felt I should employ in our community is the issue of coming together to worship regardless of one's race, culture or ethnicity. As people worship together, they start appreciating and acquire what is brought by other races and religions to the worship experience. If the nation wants reconciliation and peace, the people must be ready to have legitimate acceptance of one's worship experience and culture.
There are numerous challenges which come along with having many cultures worship together. At some point, there are communication struggles especially in cases where there are limited English skills or the pronunciation used by the members or the minister is challenging to understand. In other cases, there may be a rejection of the new minister due to race or ethnic issues. Essentially, this can occur whereby the new minister will experience a shock due to the different languages, the functioning of the church which is different from his original country and customs. The minister suffers pain which is from one’s culture as well as the complexity in having a good relationship with family and friends and having new positive networks in the new environment (Ore, 2009). All these aspects may result in isolation, low self-esteem, and lack of confidence, loneliness, and rejection of the person's culture, especially in cases where no one is available to assist the new minister in adapting to the new environment quickly.
One of the critical elements for pastors and their teams to be able to work effectively is the ability to communicate and work with cultures across the whole world. Very few priests have the advantage of being assigned that has one cultural community, and the aspect of working with a multicultural community is what makes them be able to thrive in this diversity. Likewise, there is a poor job in the well-known US Catholic population whereby, despite being against materialistic and individualistic cultural tendencies, they pull away from the traditional forms of religion. However, in the US Catholic Church, it is becoming difficult to pass information and bring the younger generation to church, especially the Latino heritage.
In Tracy E. Ore’s book, the social construction of difference and inequality, she outlines a theory, social construction theory, which is based on the social interactions between human beings and the interaction with the environment in which they exist. For one to understand the entire process, they need to be engaged with the society to wound them. There are three main stages which make up the community, which is internalization, objectification, and externalization (Ore, 2009). The externalization aspect deals with how the society affects an individual, for instance, boys wear blue and girls wear pink which is an expectation in the community. Most people depend on expectations because they are well known to the people around us. Objectification is a mind control form whereby one can be too much into the society's expectations such that they forget their expectations. Finally, is the internalization aspect which deals with socializing. Indeed, this is whereby people are assigned specific duties and responsibilities in the community. They will go ahead and perform these duties even when they are not willing, just because they do not want to be outcasts.
According to Ehrenreich in his book, nickel and dimed she examines her overall performance as an employee in the low wage category whereby she suggests that all jobs are skilled. She also notes that the housing market is not a field that the poor and the rich can compete. In her final chapter, she concludes that the low wage life is impractical and unfair and that low wage workers cannot tolerate the conditions anymore (Ehrenreich, 2011). Most of the Americans work full time the whole year for wages which do little to end the poverty in the country. In conclusion, there is the need for diversity and inclusion in every community and should be celebrated for five reasons. One of the reasons is people often feel safe and free to share their problems and ideas with people whom they have shared values, beliefs, attitudes, views, and race. According to research, people of different cultural groups feel quite uncomfortable to share their experiences for fear of being misunderstood and judged.
Additionally, to people who do not meet different cultural groups, there is a lot they can do to achieve a diverse life. For instance, maintaining a balance when employing people whereby you pick people of different backgrounds. Another way for a mother who does not experience cultural diversity is through allowing her kids to play and mingle with different cultures. One measure to ensure that there is diversity is through the creation of more inclusive societies by creating campaigns and awareness programs that educate on the essence of diversity.
References
Banks, J. A. (2015). Cultural diversity and education. Routledge.
Ehrenreich, B. (2011). Nickel and Dimed (2011 Version). Huffington Post.
Ore, T. E. (2009). The social construction of difference and inequality in race, class, gender, and sexuality (No. 305.0973 O7).
