emergent and 2 gen Asian American
1 Comments Published by Troy Bronsink on Sunday, March 25, 2007 at Sunday, March 25, 2007.
David has sent the following links to a couple post to get the ball rolling. We will meet on Buford Hwy at a resturant of his selection (more on this to come)
2 gen Asian American, is it that different?
in a recent conversation with a newly acquainted friend, we discussed the validity of the asian-american church, to which he said, “that’s not as interesting to me as the immigrant church.” when asked to elaborate, he said, “well, i don’t consider you asian-american, i just consider you american. you speak english like me, you know this american culture like i know, you don’t even have an accent, david. i mean, what makes you asian? what makes your church asian?”
my heart started to race a bit, “you think i’m american then? because i didn’t have the same experience as you did growing up, i can assure you that. and i certainly had plenty of reminders - whether it was the food i ate, the language my parents spoke, or the fact that there weren’t many other kids that looked like me growing up in Oklahoma...
read the rest of David's post here
Emerging Leadership Vacum: from March 5, L2 Foundations Blog:
This weekend, Los Angeles Times featured this article, Asian American churches face leadership gap: Pastors aren’t being prepared to handle congregational conflicts over cultural and generational issues, experts say. [registration required, ht: JoseonIllin, also mirrored at the ISAAC blog and asianamericanartistry and Step by Step and kitsapsun.com.]A few article excerpts to highlight notable references with hyperlinks added:
A 2005 Duke Divinity School study, “Asian American Religious Leadership Today,” said the “most acute tensions” in Asian American churches revolved around two issues:
- Continual clashes between the generations over cultural differences in the styles and philosophies of church leadership and control.
- Young pastors’ view that immigrant churches are “dysfunctional and hypocritical religious institutions” that demonstrate a “negative expression” of Christian spirituality for the second generation.
… only 15% of Asian American seminarians attend seminaries affiliated with mainline denominations. The overwhelming majority — 80% — choose evangelical institutions.
Serving the complex Asian American Christian communities today requires “crossing boundaries between East and West, immigrant and native-born, and between various ethnic communities,” said the Rev. Tim Tseng, president of the Institute for the Study of Asian American Christianity.
A different church with different Issues?
Here's a third interesting post in Pulpit and Pew about the challenge of Asian American congregations integrating into mainstream american churches.
More to come, location TBA. Time: This Tuesday 8pm.
anyway y'all can meet at the five guys burger joint in lindbergh city. it's right next to a marta station with plentiful free parking. i'd like to attend this discussion, but transportation is an issue.