How do churches build immunity from racial and ethnic tensions that threaten to divide rather than unite congregations?
Jacqui Lewis and John Janka believe that the answer lies in the development of multiracial, multicultural communities of faith. Born of the authors’ work with The Middle Project, an institute that prepares ethical leaders for a more just society, this book is a collection of wisdom and best practices. Here you will find lessons, questions for conversation, and spaces for journaling.
Use the workbook with your planning team, board members, lay leaders, and staff. In welcoming communities of faith where everyone is accepted just as they are, we can lead the way toward racial reconciliation and dismantle the prejudices that segregate our houses of worship.
Ten essential strategies are presented to help build communities that celebrate racial/ethnic and cultural diversity:
- Embracing call and commitment
- Casting the vision
- Managing change and resistance
- Creating congregational identity
- Building capacity
- Cultivating community
- Celebrating in worship
- Understanding congregational conflict
- Communicating and organizing
- Collaborating in the public square
John Janka is the Executive Director of The Middle Project and a consultant to congregations and denominational systems on strategic planning and visioning; managing change and resistance; dealing with difference and conflict; and advancing ��cultural diversity and human relations. He has taught leadership skills in the Doctor of Ministry Program at Wesley Theological Seminary and is an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church.
Jacqueline J. Lewisis Senior Minister of Middle Collegiate Church, a dynamic nine-hundred-member multiracial, multicultural, inclusive congregation in the East Village of Manhattan. Middle Church welcomes everyone ��just as they are as they come through the door. Lewis is also the Executive Director of The Middle Project. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Lewis is a nationally recognized author, activist, speaker, and preacher on the topics of racial, economic, and gender/LGBTI justice.