This week I'm attending a conference for preachers in Nashville, Tennessee. It began on Monday evening with worship and concerts in its principal venue, the First Baptist Church of Nashville. That evening, and into Tuesday, I looked around at my fellow participants: one thousand to twelve hundred of us filling up the massive sanctuary. Of this vast number of pastors and ministers, only a handful--that is, to be counted on two hands--are people of color. Take away the presenters who are people of color, folks who receive some sort of honorarium to be here, and the number may be countable on one hand. That is, about half a percent of us have non-white skin tone.
During a break yesterday I was chewing the fat with a couple of colleagues, and made my observation aloud.
"Hey, did y'all notice that we're all white?"
One of them nodded. "Oh, yeah. This event is the liberals' event."
That wasn't quite what I asked. "You mean all liberals are white?"
"Yep," he said, without missing a beat.
Funny: the conference organizers didn't put this on their website.
~emrys
1 comment:
I spoke at the Religious Communicators Congress and it was very diverse racially and among different Christian movements. I don't think it was the "conservative" event by any means.
Enjoy Nashville!
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