‘Listening and learning’: Evangelical churches plan forum on race

The Rev. Josh Black, lead pastor of First Evangelical Free Church, points toward a frequently quoted phrase from the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.: King called 11 a.m. on a Sunday “the most segregated hour of Christian America.”

The theology of the gospel says Christians are one in Christ, Black said, but most Christians’ experiences are still divided along racial lines.

“If the cross of Christ is the thing that unites us and the cross of Christ is the thing that we are so intent to proclaim, why do we continue to knock our head up against this wall of not being able to see sustained reconciliation?” Black asked. “I need to do more thinking about this, and I want my people that are in our church to do the same.”

On March 12, Black is asking his predominantly white church — along with churches across Wichita — to think about those questions, listening to African-American leaders.

The City Forum: A Dialogue on Race will be hosted by First Evangelical Free and City Life, predominantly white churches.

The speakers are black: the Rev. Don Davis, executive director of World Impact’s Urban Ministry Institute, and the Rev. Brandon Redic, pastor of the Bridge Church.

“I’m hoping that those in attendance will think from a biblical perspective about race, rather than a cultural perspective about race,” said Redic, whose church is multiethnic. “I’m hoping to challenge those in attendance to see their identity in Christ, rather than their identity politically or from a nationalistic perspective.”

It’s not the first such event the churches have held. A similar one was held for pastors and church leaders in October. That event lasted from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and included hearing from Mark McCormick, executive director of the Kansas African American Museum, and representatives of the Wichita Black Lives Matter movement.

Paul Hill, lead pastor of Wheatland Mission Church, attended in October. He and others like him never set out to be pastors of predominantly white churches, he said, they just turned around one day and “realized that was the case.”

“One thing that has contributed to the problem is just our ignorance and maybe even lack of fellowship,” Hill said. “Hopefully listening and learning we can love our brothers and sisters better. I don’t think we really have much to say.”

There is a critique of white evangelical churches that Casey Casamento, lead pastor of City Life Church, acknowledges: that white evangelical churches don’t do enough to address issues of race.

“I do think that the critique on white evangelicals, I think it’s fair,” Casamento said. “Where I would love to see growth in me as well as in my church is simply in this: just greater sensitivity to someone else’s experience and acknowledging their experience is valid.”

This forum won’t be the end-all and be-all, the pastors agreed, but is one step among many.

Casamento pointed out that this event hasn’t been scheduled to follow a tragedy. He thinks that timing is important.

“This is at a time where the temptation for everyone is to settle back into normal life,” Casamento said. “We are saying, ‘No.’ We desire a new reality, to experience a new reality that is really the fruit of the gospel.”

The City Forum Dialogue on Race is 6-8 p.m. March 12 at City Life Church, 216 E. Second St. It is open to the public.

This story was originally published March 4, 2017 at 4:36 PM with the headline "‘Listening and learning’: Evangelical churches plan forum on race."