Copyright holder: Tyndale University, 3377 Bayview Ave., Toronto, Ontario, Canada M2M 3S4 Att.: Library Director, J. William Horsey Library Copyright: This Work has been made available by the authority of the copyright owner solely for the purpose of private study and research and may not be copied or reproduced except as permitted by the copyright laws of Canada without the written authority from the copyright owner. Copyright license: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License Citation: Williams, Stuart. “The Promise of Difference: An Intercultural Response to Racial Diversity within the Canadian Church.” Paper presented at the Annual Wesley Studies Symposium, Tyndale University, Toronto, Ontario, April 25, 2023. (MPEG-3, 33 min.) ***** Begin Content ****** Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Stu Williams. I am the senior pastor of the Skyview Community Church of the Nazarene, located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. I am originally from South Africa, born and raised in Cape Town, and moved to Canada in 1998. Um, did my studies at what is now known as Ambrose University and then at our theological college in Manchester, England, and just recently completed a doctoral program through our seminary in Kansas City. I served as the senior pastor. I am serving as the senior pastor of this church and going into my 15th year of ministry here. As the church has changed over the last five years. In particular, I discerned the importance of responding to the change and wanting to do so in a biblically and theologically informed way, and so pursued a doctoral program to help me develop both the insights and the perspectives that I hope would be helpful as I lead our church forward. Thank you for joining me, and it's my privilege to share some of my findings and research with you today. I've titled this presentation The Promise of Difference and Intercultural Response to Racial Diversity Within a Canadian Church. As our Church has changed, a significant question emerged for me over the course of the last several years, and that question is relevant given the diversity of race that we have experienced as a local church. Underlying my research is this question how can the local church embody a biblical ecclesiology that is integrative, inclusive and honoring of diverse races and cultures and serve as witness to the reconciling power of God? The impetus for this research derives from three realities. The first is that our church has changed significantly over the last five years in 2018. In the fall of 2018, we moved into our own church facility, the first one that we have built as a local church. The church has existed for 30 years prior to us actually building our own facility, and for much of its 30 year existence met in rental facilities ranging from school gymnasiums to college chapels to community centers. But when we moved and built our own facility and moved in, we grew significantly and quickly representative of the racial diversity within the community in which the building is located. A second reason why I pursued this particular question is that my observation, and I'm sure it is true for most of us listening here today, is that there seems to be a growing racial problem within Western culture and society, certainly within the United States. We can easily identify the racial challenges that is present there with the rhetoric of building a wall to keep illegal immigrants from entering the United States, to the fears and concerns surrounding movements like Black Lives Matter and the racial profiling and the challenges surrounding African Americans in the United States. But as neighbors to the north, we too have our challenges. The recent discovery of mass graves unearthing not only a history that many Canadians don't fully know well, but also showing us the ways in which the Christian church has been at times complicit in responding to diverse others in ways that are not truly reflective of our Christian confession. And so we see even today polarization affecting Canadian society as it relates to immigrants and the concerns and the fear surrounding certain people groups entering our communities even today. And then there's a third and personal reason for why this research question matters to me, and it has to do with my own upbringing in a racially segregated South Africa and a racially segregated church. The more I research, the more people I study and learn from, the more I recognize that how their lives and their theological or their academic perspectives has significantly been shaped by their lived experience and their context. Then I am no different to being shaped by my segregated upbringing, which birthed in within me a strong desire to be a part of a church that reflected a diversity and inequality of people. These three things, then, are the reasons why I pursued this particular research. And it is my hope that in the brief time together, what I have found might be of help and interest to you. Underlying my approach is what Michael Goeyan defines as the primary task of theology, which he says is to express faith in relationship to the relevant issues of the day so that the church may fully and vividly take hold of the faith. Really, the reason I include this is because when I began my research, I soon learned that some people were curious as to why I thought it necessary to devote several years of my life to answering the question. And while certain perspectives that perhaps are shaped more by fear of engaging with the issues that often are divisive within our world could keep us from engaging and responding appropriately as the church, it has been my underlying conviction, if you will, that the responsibility of pastors and communities of faith is to practice contextual theology. That is, that we need to stand within our particular traditions. I am nazarene. I am Wesleyan in my thinking that it is important for me to stand within those traditions, not in such a way as to say that our theology does not empower us to think contextually about what the church ought. To be and how the church can respond to issues such as systemic racism within our prevailing culture, but must have the posture of engaging the world with the hope of Christ and being faithful to who we are as the church. My approach is fairly simple. I first sought to analyze the demographic shifts within the surrounding communities within which our church facility is now located. This community comprises five neighborhoods known as the Northern Hill Suburbs, about 60,000 people. A community that is one of the most racially diverse communities in the greater Calgary area, containing high levels of immigrants, primarily from South Asia, but from a wide range of countries and nationalities also, our local church began to reflect this diversity. And so it was important for me to not only understand the demographic reality of the surrounding neighborhood, but to also look at our local church and to see what our constituency was as far as race and cultural diversity is concerned. I would add that as I try to get a clearer sense of who we are as a local church, it became very clear to me that as a part of our particular denomination, the church of the Nazarene, who is known for statistical recording that significantly we do not track racial demographic representation within our local churches. And I think that's a significant and telling reality because we often reveal what matters to us by what we count. And so, as I analyzed our local church and its growth, I did not have a history of statistics to go back to to look at racial change and demographic shifts and had to do a lot of that work myself based upon our time in this new community. I also was interested in analyzing the denomination configuration or constituency as far as racialized people are concerned. And so I studied what our Nazarene church on the USA Canada region has engaged in as far as cross cultural engagement and what the realities are that we can take from how our denomination has postured itself historically and presently to include racialized others. And then I engaged in a historical review of Christian engagement with racialized peoples. In particular, I was interested in learning from our own context and history here in Canada as it pertains to indigenous people and church engagement, Christian engagement with indigenous people, and also with how our church responded to the exclusion often of African Americans or American blacks in the United States. All of this are held in conversation with key biblical texts to help formulate a theological perspective on what has historically been viewed as the problem of difference. And I eventually presented as a framework an intercultural approach to the church. And it's really important to stress that while multicultural churches have become something that many denominations pursue, the research that has produced recently by Christina Edmondson and Brennan show that multicultural churches often fail to address the racial inequality that still persists not only outside the church, but within the church, and that more ought to be sought than representation. Hence the pursuit of an intercultural church in which racial diversity, cultural diversity, becomes assets to the formation and the mission of the church, and not simply the pursuit of diverse representation. Looking at our social context, then, our local church began to reflect the racial diversity of the surrounding community. Our physical location and the aesthetic of our building certainly was appealing to newcomers. We are also located on a significant bus route, and it isn't anticipated in the next ten to 15 years that the light rail transit called Sea Train here in Calgary will come right by our current church property. We grew by 85% in worship attendance in less than twelve months since we moved into the NHS, and the majority of the people that started to attend our worship services are racialized people, many immigrants, first and second generation that started to attend our church. Interestingly, as we grew, we also started to experience the loss of existing families. We recognized that it is hard to know why people truly leave, but sociological studies have shown that when neighborhoods change demographically, when they become more diverse, there is often what has been called white flight, where people from European descent who primarily have lived in these communities, move out of these communities because of the growing diversity. Church congregational studies also show that the same phenomenon takes place within local churches, that when local churches become diverse, they also experience what is called white flight. Despite the steady growth through immigration within the NHS, of the eleven registered churches present within these communities, only two identify as multicultural. Now, when we say multicultural, we generally mean that no one specific racial group constitutes more than 80% of the church or the congregation. And as I looked into the social realities as far as the demographic makeup of the churches are concerned, within the NHS, I found that three were Eurocanadian majority churches and eight were and Sorry, and seven were immigrant specific churches. And this shows that within multicultural or multicultural neighborhoods that churches don't necessarily reflect such diversity, but can still maintain fairly homogeneous gatherings, whether it be immigrant specific, language specific or cultural specific churches. Edmondson and Brennan has alerted us most recently through their study of evangelical churches in the United States that multicultural churches can often become a hindrance to churches addressing the systemic issues of racial injustice in our world. Because representation does not allow, as has been already stated so far, for addressing the social inequalities that often accompanies some of the systemic issues that racialized people deal with to this day, and hence the fact that there is a need as I did my research and listened to what has been done and read what present studies show about multicultural churches to think more integratively about culture and race within the local church. I also looked at our denomination and as I look back to when the church was first formed in the early 19 hundreds, our denomination was birthed with a holiness ethic that held personal transformation and social change together as two sides of the same coin. This happened primarily because those who formed what will become known as the Nazarene Church were drawn to the least of these in the cities, in the slums, the ministry of the early Nazarenes were to those people who others perhaps would exclude. And within the founding ethos there was a strong emphasis on salvation and coming to faith in Jesus Christ and addressing the social ills that kept people in poverty and kept people from opportunities for living full and healthy lives. Historically, we now know that as Jim Crow ended this era in which blacks were intentionally marginalized and excluded from opportunities economically and were treated as less than equal to others in the United States, that when that era ended, it led to what sociologists call the great reverse. All of a sudden, as blacks were free to travel in the United States and to move beyond the restricted areas, they often ended up in cities where they were seeking economic opportunity. And as blacks began to head to the cities, the predominantly white church, including our own denomination, began to withdraw from the cities. This withdrawal was costly. And the very tension that held together personal change with social change was bifurcated into what we now historically look at as a denomination, as producing two kinds of nazarene people those who promoted holy living, defined by personal piety and evangelism, with a suspicion to those who were socially conscious and socially engaged. At our best. Historically, the Nazarene church held these two realities together as a part of a holistic, soteriology that God did not just seek to save us for heaven, but sought to transform us so that we may live and bring heaven to earth. And these two very strong and important aspects of Christian faith were unfortunately detached as the church withdrew from the places of need and ministry. I also found that in contemporary studies, congregational studies, that white normativity, that is, that Western thinking and thought both organizationally and structurally about the church as well as in terms of its worship practices, et cetera, and so on, still operates out of the primary cultural lens of European culture as superior to all other types of cultures. When I looked at what has been done recently in the area of research, I stumbled across people like Vince Bontu, who, along with Sam Churra has painted a picture for us that historically since the era of Constantine, where christianity was made the official religion of the Western world, that it has taken captive the imagination of many. That Christianity is so much associated with European culture that it actually becomes exclusive to other cultures or other racialized people. From looking to Christianity as a viable and relevant expression of religion. Bantu says that the primary stumbling block to racialized people in the west engaging with Christian faith is not theological but racial. And this is borne out through congregational studies that show that even within churches that have a representation of racialized others, that essentially the cultural perspectives and diversity of others are often viewed as being extraordinary or viewed with suspicion. And there is no room made for diversity within these existing congregations. The two primary historical responses to cultural others has been either to seek the assimilation of people or to segregate them from the common life of the church. And in many cases, the Bible was used as justification for both these approaches to cultural others. The slave Bible that was a Bible that was stripped of all the passages and scriptures in the Old Testament and in the New that had a prophetic word or perspective on justice, on equality, was a Bible that was used by British missionaries and stripped from all these passages as a means to engage and teach African slaves the Bible without letting them see parts of the Bible that might invigorate their desires for equity, equality and justice. And while the Slave Bible historically we look at and look at it today as something that is just not something the present church would ever do. Studies show that in evangelical churches in both Canada and the United States, that matters of justice, which the Bible speaks about inequality, which the Bible addresses, is often excluded or held as less significant to other aspects of Scripture and today. Still, the Bible can be used selectively to posture communities towards non engagement with the relevant issues, in particular as a means of excluding people from the life and the community of faith. In my research there were several implications. I'll just list a few that I think are perhaps important limiting ourselves to the time we have before us. First is that who does theology sets the parameters. It is interesting to look at the historical development of the church and to look at its engagement with non Western culture. One soon realizes that those who determine the interest of theology, who it serves, often could do theology that is exclusive of others and not reflective of the dignity of cultural difference. Second, withdrawal shapes theological perspectives. When the church moved away from racialized others, it was easy to define theology that did not include and did not meet, reach out and was not required to respond to the challenges of other people groups. And with that said, the commitment to place matters. So as we as a local church moved into this community, it would be incongruent with the witness of the early church for us to think of our theology apart from our context. But we had to respond to the realities of the racial diversity within the community and various other forms of diversity also, such as socioeconomic as a local church in order to embody the Christian hope in our particular context. And a commitment to place requires that churches decide to stay and be planted and rooted within their communities, irrespective of the social changes surrounding them. For to leave is not a Christian response when it comes to viewing the opportunity and the people around us as those created in the image of God and also those whom God desires to have a personal relationship with. And then finally, as I reflected upon the place of Scripture in shaping these perspectives, I was invited to consider, through the scriptural analysis idea the significance of reading Scripture together in community. So much of the Western approach to christian church and congregation focuses on the individual. And it is very hard for us to understand that even when it comes to the way in which the Bible is read historically in the early church, and certainly within Israel's view of the Torah and Scripture, it is a practice that was done in conversation with others. And recovering the significance of a communal understanding of Scripture or approach to Scripture certainly will present us with more voices and challenges, but it can certainly also guard against myopia and selective interpretation that often leads to theologies of exclusion or ignorance. As I brought some of my implications to bear for our local church, I developed what I called an intercultural framework for ministry. Very simple practices that I think can help churches to begin to think about reflecting the diversity within our world in a way that avoids assimilationist or segregationist approaches and honors the diverse cultures representative within our neighborhoods. Diversity of race presents the local church with the opportunity to incarnate something needed, something beautiful and authentically Christian. And here's what I came up with. I don't have time to speak through all this. I think my time is almost up for the presentation. But because of the significant challenges that we still struggle with today as far as equality and inclusion of diverse people within the church, one cannot begin apart from recognizing that any significant transformation within the church, apart from God's help, apart from the Spirit's movement within communities of faith, probably will not be successful. And so prayer is a subversive action. I talk about the corporate nature of prayer. I talk about the importance of learning how to listen in prayer, not only to God, but to the other, as a significant starting point to birthing something new and needed within many of our existing congregations. I talk about the significance of cross cultural friendship. Leslie New begin, a significant theological voice for many, experienced what he called a decentring from his own perspectives that was shaped by his own British upbringing when he lived and worked amongst people in India. It is only when Leslie was in a different culture, learning and seeing and discerning what God was doing in the lives and through the lives of others, that he became aware of his own egocentrism and the need to expand his perspective of the expression of the Christian faith beyond that which he knew and understood. As our local church became more diverse, the opportunities are here. Many of our people won't leave and travel and be missionaries in different cultural contexts, as I view myself today as a South African in Canada. But with the diversity present within our neighborhood and within our local church, the opportunity to develop friendships that can broaden our perspective, confront our bias, and help us to see beyond our own preferences presents each one of us with the opportunity for reformation and transformation. The Significance of Catalyst for Change those who already embody cross cultural engagement in honoring ways within the church is an important aspect of helping the church to grow and change. Learning together and listening together, surrounding ourselves with others in the pursuit of the spiritual life becomes important in practices of prayer, in practice of scripture, in practices of listening to one another and then, of course sanctifying cultural practices as cultural practices. Non European cultural practices are often viewed with suspicion. Could it be an opportunity for us to develop a perspective of culture that is redeemable? That there are things that you need to different cultures that can be used and utilized in the service of God to enrich our prayer life and our life of corporate worship and so forth? I talked about the significant place or the significant power of the table of fellowship. Both the Eucharist, as in the ability to form us for relationship where we stand before God as equals, all in need of grace, the importance of hospitality around tables, learning to eat and receive, learning to be a guest as well as host within other communities. And I spoke about the importance of learning to speak in such a way that people understand no, not necessarily as in Acts Two or as in the instances where people are inspired with holy speech such as Glossal Alia. But the church can do the work of learning how to speak and interpret the word of God so that it would be understood amongst a diverse community of people. Here the work of Eric Law on how to communicate better and how to communicate in different ways other than through the primary way in which the western world communicates, which is language to think more creatively about the way we can communicate the message in a changing culture and in a changing church. And then finally spoke about liminal formation. Here I have in mind the way in which life often puts us in positions where things have changed, where it is difficult. The experience of loss or the experience of change that we have not sought often enables people to see others in that liminal space as equals. Those who experience loss can often become friends, can often become empathetic, can often let go of some of the ways in which difference has kept them from relationship with others in order to discern the shared humanity and to be able to reach out in ways that they would not have done before. These practices of course, have a context here within the local church. They stem from some of the things we are already doing and some of the things we are aspiring to do. But as we embrace the opportunity that diversity presents the local church, I believe that we have the opportunity as a local congregation in this wonderful city that we are privileged to live in, to incarnate diversity in a Christian way that honors the cultures and the unique differences of people while maintaining the strong bond of Christian unity and love. Thank you again for allowing me to present to you today. ***** This is the end of the e-text. This e-text was brought to you by Tyndale University, J. William Horsey Library - Tyndale Digital Collections *****