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wait 20 questions with United Methodist clergy and laity focusing on the 50 years after merger and how it has affected African American congregations and their communities. Mining is Vincent Harris, your host for this podcast on. We will explore over the year conversations on yesterday's perspective on race, today's context of race, United Methodist churches and also visions for tomorrow we will have guests from all walks of life, and we hope that you will be able to join us in these conversations. Way we are here today, welcoming my friend the love that good Dr Shiran Patterson and we are still talking about racism, churches, unfinished business, one of the issues that we don't talk about a lot today in the church. But here we are really kind of trying to make sure that we get the word out that we still have work to do. Try to get the obvious question out first. You know, you believe that racism still remains the most challenging issue for church and society.
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The answer is, of course, and I want it back up to your initial statement, but we don't talk about it. We do talk about it a lot at my church traveled in part. We talked about it a lot, and back in September, we had a month off discussion on racial healing. I wouldn't come together. We invited Anglo member Anglo Persons to come to the church and talk to us. I preached on it. So this topic stays front and center. Because in our society, Vincent has been torn to shreds right now, over racing from the schoolhouse to the courthouse everywhere race is an issue, and it is painful.
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It is. And I know this denomination has tried to work toward a better over the last 50 years. Its merger. If you're gonna rate United Methodist work waterways, relations between one that still
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comparing them to the other denominations.
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Yeah, have you want to do
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I give him a nine and 1/2? Okay. They have worked hard. Methodism has worked hard. I'm born and raised Methodist, and I know all the years of the commissions and the work and the conversation. Methodism has put his best foot forward to show the world how to do it. Our problem is relation. Fresh relations. Okay. We'll talk about what we do. Okay. Way have been too silent. We put our head in the sand and we should be advertising our good works.
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Okay. Okay. So if you were gonna do that advertising because you have a communication, how would you propose that? We get that word out in a better way?
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Press releases, press conference, commercial, social media Twitter, Facebook instagram showing our good works. Now we are perfect, but competitive. The nominations wear golden.
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Okay, Okay. Okay. So in this accident, do you think that it helped our hinder? The potential for black Methodist churches and leaders over over these years is 50 years. Have we been helped? I have been hindered by this.
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You said the merger. You mean with the Central Conference
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with the merger with United Methodist Church merger in 1968 with all those bodies coming together since that time from this introduced diction to the United Methodist Church. Since that time has has this merger help or hinder our potential as congregations and leaders
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hasn't hindered black people. That's right. That's right. Well, one hand, you could say it helped because we got more education and Maur integration into mainstream society and access to good development skills. The only downside is one that many black people like to chew on and talk about is what we'll be better off in segregation. Okay, I don't have an answer for that. I don't know. I didn't praise God. I
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think that we have many people have different ideas about whether it helped some people say it help, and there was there were both there. But in the meantime, though, as we had looked at these years, most of our churches have declined. Our closing are closed over the over these last 15 years and after church is what do you think? What do you propose? That could really help turn the tide Now, as we look at this decline in closing closed kind of environment, especially in the general churches there, but in particularly in Africa,
spk_1: 5:21
well, let's let's look at why some of those churches closed. One of our biggest flaws, Vincent, is that we refuse to be relevant. We think it's going to be attractive to bring in a new member and tell them all about your history. A new member does not care, but Mother Jones started this church with a fish for, and they won't know what are you doing now? And we refused to let go of tradition. Too. Many of our churches worship at the feet of tradition, and they wonder why they're dying. Too many churches are weak. We become very middle class and ineffective and will not go out to our neighborhoods and get to know them and embrace them. We just snooty bunch that were driving on Sunday and drive out. So I love that stuff. We did what? We just let our own throats,
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okay? And that's one of the questions I have. What obstacles That way that happened for not only as a church within relationship with
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yeah, been thio to stupidity. To go out and talk to the gangbangers, the homeless, the poor. We have a very awful track record with low income for okay or relationship.
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Do you think that's because we feel like wait? You know that the whole middle class black kind of environment and so way remind
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exactly way. And we don't want those people in our churches that kind of think strangle a congregation, and that's why so many of them that don't want him in the church and then another biggie is style of worship in the church style of worship in the church used reflects what the loudest voices or the most money givers can put in. Those are usually older people, and they often time on a very staid service that appeals to them as there are 70 80 and 90 that stage service appeals to them and no one else. So people in the neighborhood who might want to come in they don't want that state stale, dry service
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on. And I think one thing now that way, how worship is. It turns off other generations, really that these little girls and the ones who have become highly millennials and the one before these extra Why. So what do you think will help us to have more authentic relationships in order to gain some knows some at least Avenue toward this, this younger group of people who in the world today, but not in church.
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We have an image problem, I think, in the fifties, when you drove around and saw that cross the flame that meant, Oh, that's a good church to go to Now. When you see it good, they go. We know not to go in there when I have my first church, I was passed over church called Crest More King. We were hiring a musician, the one that had was 90 and just about to fall asleep on the organ. So I said, Let me hire somebody Young Ah, young woman came in 25. I said, Can you play a song for me? And she played the slowest, most dismal Ah, song on the piano Major wanted just cry. It was so sad. I said, Why you play that? She said, That's the kind of music you know, like in it. Yeah. So the word on the street was a like, a dry and well, wow.
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So you know, one of the things that way pride ourselves on United Methodist was being part of the civil rights. In part, people who were out in the community who were living up to this issue of social and racial justice and the energy from the civil rights movement seemed to actually catapult the church into a place where it had more respect. People really did say, Oh, this is a place that's doing something out for themselves, but for what is that thing today that could help us kind of regain that energy of the movement time at this point history. Is there anything that you could think of that we can work within the context of the church and society that really were kind of spark, a different kind of look at the church.
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We need to return to our John Wesley roots. And he was somebody in the streets taking on current crises. Every black church can look in their community and see what the problem is and then band together with other activists. We don't have to reinvent the wheel. For example, in Dallas, we already have a group called Faith Forward. Their clergy of all different groups who come in and stage protest. Or we'll do some type of city in a walking and a comment Get involved with what's already going on rather than just sitting back. We are so comfortable. We just sit back. We can't We can't wait on that. We just need to lead ourselves. My book is called Lead Yourself Now and this about propelling yourself to make a difference in the world. Now,
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if you look at the climate of General Church way, a lot of issues that are being weighs, one in particular on human sexuality. And I'm thinking that the black church doesn't seem to have a lot of engagement in this conversation. Should we does this conversation on human sexuality impact the black church at all?
spk_1: 11:02
The black churches put his head in the sand on this topic. Homosexuality has been in our midst from the beginning, but we have suppressed it or try to ignore it or downplay it. I think a conversation would help us to just talk about the elephant in the room, and I think it would. I think we need to do a wholehearted embrace of the LGBTQ community because they are. They are us. They're us.
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The B M c R, I guess plan our proposal objectors now. But do you believe that from what are exceptional, way recalled people with gadflies way agitating. That's right. Have we lost that? We somehow I just decided team to be silent on some of these issues.
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The word Dad fly does not describe us. We are very silent, stationary in sex. If we go be it and say we're not bothering anybody, wear insect over there, enjoying some good food quietly hoping nobody will even call out names. We have got to get back to agitating, to standing up to making a difference to being fearless. That will bring people to our churches. And that will make us relevant again. We are irrelevant.
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Yeah, we're relevant for a number of reasons inside with my mother and for other reasons on the outside, Correct with people that are gods. Yes, uh, whole development, their lives spiritually, economically, physically, really is dependent on a really strong church because the community benefits from the resource right that So I think that's something we have to look at as well. I don't know if there any other questions I can answer. I just want to know if there's some things that you would like to offer in this conversation that I didn't ask, but kind of someone how you feel about this issue of racism and the church is finished
spk_1: 13:11
regarding racism. I want the church to continue to have difficult conversations. I want us to not be afraid to use the R word racism. I don't want people to accuse us of. If you say racism, then that means you are using the race card. I want to be able to talk about things and put him on the table. I served on the board of trustees of a predominately white school in Dallas, and it's really important for me to keep the issues and concerns of the students of color on the table and sometimes those those those issues get pushed to the side. And once they got pushed to the side, they saw an eruption of the students demanding attention. Yet, and still I have been telling the president of the school for years. Let's deal with this. Let's deal with this and he chose not to. So UMC has to just deal with some things. You deal with it.
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I'm grateful for your time for the conversation on Happy to See You after a long time, and hopefully, at some point in time, I'll get you to come back. We'll talk about it. What?
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Vince, and I'm very proud of what you're doing. Keep it up