American Churches have grown far more ethnically diverse and more informal, according to a USA Today interpretation of a paper by Marc Chavez in Sociology of Religion.

“Informal” means drums, amens, and the use of projectors (vs. hymnals). Of course, anyone who has participated in the life of the Black Church for any period of time recognizes that noisy services are not in themselves informal; the rules are just more subtle and woven into the context.

More importantly, white churches are far more ethnically diverse than they were ten years ago, a noteworthy rate of change because, Chavez says,

"Religious traditions and organizations are widely considered to be remarkably resistant to change."

I’m going to have to read the full report; this stuff is important to me—a white member of a historically black church. Meanwhile, I take issue with the wording of one sentence in the USA Today report, which mainly focuses on black and white:

The increase in diversity is only among primarily white churches; majority black churches are as segregated as ever, Chaves says. Among primarily white congregations, the number reporting at least some blacks rose from 27% in 1998 to 36% in 2006-07 (…). (emphasis mine)

This wording, once again, puts the blame for segregation on Black people. This is important: church selection is voluntary, and almost every church in America would welcome a member from another race.

If white churches are becoming integrated, it’s because black people are crossing boundaries to join. If black churches are remaining segregated, it’s because white people are not doing the same.

This is not to discount the efforts among white churches over ten years to reach out to black people; not at all. This has been a concerted effort driven by a mixture of goodwill, religious conviction, and ambiguous feelings of guilt, but in my experience black churches have a long and deep commitment to diversity, but here and elsewhere get blamed for segregation.

[photo credit: flickr user su-chan]