Racial reconciliation workshops

Church announces                                 
Office of Reconciliation Ministries.
Workshops, seminars will continue.

By Neil Earle

PASADENA--"Racism among Christians is one of the sad and destructive blemishes on the body of Christ," Pastor General Joseph Tkach told The Worldwide News.

"Jesus came to redeem and deliver all people everywhere, and racism conflicts with the core of the gospel message."

In an effort to stand against growing racial incidents in America and around the world, the WCG has, for the past three years, conducted racial healing weekends and seminars in association with the Center for the Healing of Racism in Houston, Texas.

Cherry Steinswender	Curtis & Jannice May		Steve Brown
Chris Beam	Carn Catherwood	Harold Jackson	Raul Ramos

Now Curtis May, regional pastor in Pasadena, will act as director of the Office of Reconciliation Ministries in Church Administration in Pasadena.

"This will build on the fruitful history of our reconciliation efforts across North America," Mr. May said.

Reconciliation workshops

Since 1996, the WCG has been host for racial healing workshops in several cities.

Mr. May and his wife, Jannice, and Mr. Albrecht regularly join host churches and pastors, Chris Beam, and Cherry Steinwender of the Center for the Healing of Racism for these weekends.

"Carolyn Forche and Pat Barnes from Houston, Texas, are also much appreciated," Mr. May said.
Indeed, these seminars and workshops offer an occasion for WCG members and ministers to let their lights shine into the darkened crevices of racial antagonism.

In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Mayor Stephen Reed proclaimed Unity Days during the August seminar and publicly praised the WCG's efforts.

According to pastor Tom Pickett, Division Street was renamed Unity Street in honor of the weekend.

In St. Petersburg, Florida, pastor Steve Brown felt compelled to apologize to an African-American grandmother whose grandson was killed by a white police officer in questionable circumstances.

"That's the first time I've ever heard a white man say `I'm sorry' to me about anything," the woman replied.

 
Chris Beam, pastor of the Houston North congregations, is a member of the center's Ally Council. "I've had the blessing of being mentored personally by Cherry [Steinwender]. What a tremendous opportunity for growth and change and learning."

Carn Catherwood, veteran WCG minister, has conducted seven racial reconciliation weekends. He welcomes this as "a wonderful opportunity for our fellowship and a part of our God-given mandate."

Mr. Catherwood continued: "The Lord Jesus Christ described the church ideally as a `house of prayer for all people.' Since our denomination is visibly multiracial, we have a wonderful opportunity to demonstrate the power of the gospel together."

Balm in Gilead

We have in our churches black brethren who stood with Martin Luther King Jr., in the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott of 1954-55, an event that effectively began the civil rights movement.

The late Harold Jackson, the first ordained African-American minister in the WCG, was acquainted with leading figures in the black community during his rich and fruitful life.

During the 1992 civil disturbances in Los Angeles, members of the racially mixed Los Angeles church were determined to meet that weekend, desiring to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

Yet the WCG's record on race is not spotless. In the past, we held a number of ideas that--intentionally or unintentionally--promoted peculiar racial ideas in our membership.

We taught British Israelism--that the United States and British nations were uniquely set apart by God. Some used this teaching to promote subtle forms of racial discrimination.

In the 1960s the WCG was slow to come to terms with public moves to desegregate society, not accepting black students to Ambassador College until 1965, for example.

Some of these teachings and policies still rankle. They left a bitter aftertaste that must be confronted, recognized and overcome.

It is not a question of racial healing workshops stirring up hurts and resentments, as some charge. In most cases the hurts and resentments are already there, simmering for decades. They need to be mollified with the ointment of God's Holy Spirit.

The WCG wants to be a safe house, where these hurts and feelings can be identified and overcome.

This is one reason for establishing the Office of Reconciliation Ministries.

"Eventually we will be dealing with more than race," Mr. May said. "We want to face gender issues, reaching out to our estranged brethren, and interdenominational reconciliation. But race is the touchstone."

Prejudice plus power

Racism goes beyond mere prejudice. Racism is the power to perpetuate and intensify prejudice and exclusivism through institutions.

This is institutional or corporate racism: the legal power to intentionally or unintentionally afflict minority groups.

According to Mr. Beam, this is the reason that the Bible calls for a form of corporate repentance.

"Many Christians have a bumper sticker mentality about reconciliation. This mentality says, `Well, it's all been covered with the blood of Christ, and since I wasn't there when the transgression happened, I bear no responsibility.' "

This is not true, Mr. Beam argues. "Throughout Scripture, sins are passed down generationally. Exodus 34:7 is a case in point: `[The Lord] does not leave the guilty unpunished; for he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation."

In Joshua 7, one man--Achan--did a "disgraceful thing in Israel," which affected all the people of Israel.

Others cite 2 Samuel 21, where King David had to learn that he and his people were responsible for a sin committed a generation earlier.

King Saul had acted treacherously against the alien Gibeonites living in Israel's midst. An atonement had to be made to cleanse the land of corporate guilt. Corporate guilt demanded corporate repentance.

The new Office of Reconciliation Ministries will also focus on identificational repentance.

Mr. Beam explained: "When we practice reconciliation toward other people groups, we are indeed recapitulating the work of Christ.

I've found that when I make confession for myself and other people's sins, it often creates a bridge that allows other people to do the same. There seems to be a living law of self-disclosure that begins to create dialogue for healing to occur."

And of course, racial healing is larger even than renewing relationships between black and white Americans, as important as that is.

In San Diego, California, Raul Ramos, a WCG Hispanic-American pastor, conducted racial reconciliation seminars for his congregation.

"I focused my sermon on one reason we are doing this--internalized racism.

"I discussed our former teaching about the racial purity of Noah and how that affected our members of color, and how it gave our Caucasian brethren a false sense of superiority, thus unwittingly hurting others.
  
"As ministers of reconciliation, we can help ease the pain if we reach out and show we care," Mr. Ramos said.

To educate and liberate

The WCG's commitment to racial healing has thus had many spinoff benefits that help get the new Office of Reconciliation Ministries off to a successful launch.

The Pasadena church, for example, is part of a group of churches planning a citywide racial reconciliation workshop for Pasadena and Los Angeles.

"We aren't trying to lay guilt trips on people," Mr. May said. "The Office of Reconciliation Ministries wants to educate and liberate. Please help us make this work. Together we can make a difference."

Neal Earle pastors the Glendora and San Bernardino, California, churches.

Copyright © Worldwide Church of God, 1998