Preaching styles and people being slain in the spirit and things like that. Now it doesn't happen in all black churches, and it happens sometimes in white churches, right? But on average they're quite a bit different.
Michael EmersonIt was an all-white church. It was starting to decline. They had to hire a new pastor, and they hired him. But he came under the condition that "I want and I'm called to make this a multiethnic church." So they knew. He's interesting because he's part-Asian, part-white. He's married to a Hispanic woman, so that's their family and that's their vision.
Michael EmersonWhat's happening is that Asian and Latino and other groups without that history are more likely to end up in either black churches or white churches and then make them multiracial churches. I talk about that in the US we have two cultures.
Michael EmersonThere's a lot of terminology, like "washes whiter than snow," and these things which when they're said in a uniracial congregation, they just go fine. But when they're said in a mixed congregation, some people will get offended and wonder, "Why are you saying that? What are you saying?"
Michael EmersonIt worries me a little bit the reach and power of TV. More people saw me in The Practice than will ever see me in all the stage plays I ever do. Which is sort of humbling. Or troubling. Or both.
Michael EmersonWe've done a lot of studies to see when they do happen, why, and I mean there's a variety of reasons. But one, it starts with a commitment where they decide this is going to be who we are. Maybe it's out of their faith, a new way of looking at their faith, that we must be integrated across race.
Michael Emerson