4-R On Churches, Culture and Leadership

In their book, Churches, Cultures and Leadership-A Practical Theology of  Congregations and Ethnicities, Branson and Martínez discuss the issues of culture and ethnicity in the life of the church, and of leadership within the context of these issues, in a simple accessible and practical way. I will review the book with respect to three core parts as presented by the authors.

In part one of their book which delved into practical theology and multicultural initiatives, Mark Lau Branson shared that the impact the leaders’ vision can have on the quality of congregational life. They cited an example where, “in keeping with the leader’s vision, the mission quickly attracted, and for an extended period of time, it welcomed and maintained, a membership that was broadly representative of       various racial and ethnic groups: blacks, whites, Latinos, Asians, and Native Americans.

The authors’ purpose of writing engaging practical theology is to help church leaders to see differently, to gain the skills and competencies needed for multicultural contexts, and to create environments that make God’s reconciling initiatives visible and powerful. Such a church is always part of networks and part of the worldwide church, but our emphasis on a group of people who regularly, faceto-face, come together for worship, learning and caregiving, and live in their own context with concerns for witness and good works.

In discussing missional churches, the authors share about Bishop Lesslie Newbigin, who practiced key missiological priorities in India where he learned that to understand a culture, the leader must participate and engage the culture with appropriate activities and words, and partner new believers in shaping a faith community (church) that is appropriate for God’s missional presence in that environment. Now he saw that the churches in England needed those missional priorities-and he also brought that challenge to the United States.

The authors presented this topic of society, culture, and community in a way that strongly suggests that the churches are real, physical, located groups that are influenced by their countries, societies, cultures and neighborhoods, not an invisible, amorphous entity that affects history, culture, ethnicity, making the social context primary and relevant. The authors believe that whenever possible, churches should pursue cultural boundary crossing with neighbors and intercultural life within their congregations.

In part two of their book, Mark discussed sociocultural perspectives, worldviews, reality and assumptions. He posited that people who were shaped by education often resort to education to shape societies. Mark captured the case of Paulo Freire, who became the minister of education for Brazil, who was shaped by a theological grounding that included beliefs about humans and creation and God. This led him to see education as a mode for reshaping worldviews and thereby serve a culture and its people. People like Paulo are culture creators.

According to Edward Stewart and Milton Bennett, most native speakers of English in the United States, particularly those who are monolingual, have a mechanistic understanding of language. Anthropologist and linguist Benjamin Whorf addresses this issue in what is known as the Whorf hypothesis. He states: We dissect nature along lines laid down by our native languages. 

In their interaction with collectivism and individualism in cultures, they posited that all cultures address the issue of the relationship between the group and the individual. In contrast, collectivist cultures give priority to the group and underscore the “values of group harmony, cooperation, solidarity, and interdependency. In part three, the authors examine the concept of Leadership, Communication and Change.

Relate: In 250 words share a personal life story that this book triggered in your memory. 

• A personal life episode, parable, case study, or confession.
• Content based on the main points (not peripheral or tangential ideas—draw on the summary)

If I were in a position of influence in my current congregation, this would be my chief source for leading my congregation into the future, in a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic diverse setting. Coming from a rich cultural multi-tribal African heritage, and participating member of a racially mixed congregation in a city in the United States of America, I better understand how to function in a fast-changing urban society in the USA.

Branson and Martínez have written a comprehensive work that integrates biblical research and social science analysis with highly practical suggestions for application in congregations and communities facing intercultural realities. I recall that in the ICOC family of churches, one of the churches in the USA is reported to have lost most of its white members. This has happened following the hiring of an experienced African American couple to lead the church. If I had an opportunity to teach in that congregation, I would thoughtfully engage my brothers and sisters there with most of the tools the authors espoused in this book. I would offer to do the Bible study narratives with small groups using their interdisciplinary approach (i.e., Scripture, practical theology, social anthropology, cultural studies, philosophical hermeneutics, leadership theory and communication to engage them.

Reflect: In 250 words share what questions came to mind as you read the book. What bothered you about the book? If you could ask the author a question, what would it be? In essence critique the text. 

This book provoked my mind theologically, historically, practically and spiritually. Branson and Martínez do a masterful job in communicating the complexities that conjoin church, cultures and leadership.

The authors describe the Homogeneous Unit Principle (HUP) which states that    people respond most effectively to the gospel in ethnic or culturally specific churches. On the one hand this means that the gospel can be embodied in any human culture. But often it has been used as a way to reduce the gospel’s claims on us and on the ethnocentricity of cultures.

From my experience attending a variety of churches online during the Covid-19 lockdown, I observed a vast majority of churches were ethnically or cultural specific with the related values and practices. Even churches that have intentionally gathered a multiracial congregation still exhibited the dominance of one culture. Jesus did reach out to mostly the Jews, he reached out to Samaritans, met the need of a Gentile woman, and commanded an inclusive discipleship making in all nations. If I recall, his command was not culture or ethnic specific. Do churches today misunderstand or misinterpret Jesus missional charge? Are Jesus’s teachings being taught correctly in congregations with strong ethnic biases? In my opinion, the book does not give any incisive explanation and counter-measures to correcting this anomaly and bias.

How can churches correctly model gospel reconciliation and be agents of reconciliation and justice in our cities and in our nation, closely mimicking our first century congregation who followed the apostles’ doctrine and nothing else?  I believe that God’s grace calls us beyond racism, tribal affiliations, and ethnocentrism. The question is how to express the new reality of the gospel in ways that both celebrates our differences and draws us toward unity in Jesus Christ. I didn’t quite extract and distil this from the book.

 Respond: In 200 words tell me what you are going to do with this information? 

• Steps based on the book’s core points.
• Description of how the main ideas will affect your counseling.
• The personal or professional changes you will implement (and share with others).

Even though this book is not a ‘how to’, it gives profound information that facilitates movement towards the achievement of great intercultural relations and ministry. The authors provided a matrix of frameworks which can help increase the capacities of a church to cross boundaries and to become more inclusive. They posit that congregations need to explore the narratives of their own ethnic heritages and those of the surrounding cultures in order to understand their own identity and their role in the world, that, even church plants are deeply formed by the social environment the participants live in, and that shapes their context before they create a common life.

My counseling will focus on getting the first steps right, so I will seek to clarify the covenant life of the congregation as a community. By this I mean using scriptural doctrine to validate practice. I believe that correct scriptural understanding and obedience shape us much more that societal forces, and the cultural realities of our context. The first century congregation pushed against/through very strongly formed temple driven Judaic culture of the time to accept the first gospel message in Acts 2. Embracing the teachings of Jesus Christ as espoused by the apostles will naturally lead to a strong focus on the five basic community activities they too focused on namely; devotion to assembling together, to the apostles’ teaching, to fellowship, to breaking of bread, and to prayer.

My next step will be to get the congregation to sharing/telling their salvation testimonies as Paul did in Acts 22. Dr. Marunzsky’s testimony worksheet will come in handy here. This is to be done within the congregation in small groups first and then take out to the surrounding communities. These testimonies will extend to a variety of areas beyond conversion stories, to how God has responded to their prayer requests and other ways they have seen God present in their lives. These testimonies affirm the faith and commitments of those who are following Christ together.