It may be changing, but still it's the one place, that total control of an institution, that African Americans have. So sometimes, you know, you'll hear the statement of African Americans saying, "I have to work with whites.
Michael EmersonThen of course there are bigger things that matter, like who do I see up there in the congregation? Do I see myself up there? Well, I don't.
Michael EmersonIt happens a little bit more in the West, where there's more fluid - where everybody's originally from somewhere else. So they have a little bit more permission to do it. It happens the least, at the individual level at least, in the South, because the South has very strong, you know, set up black churches and white churches and a long history of that, and so it's a bigger social cost.
Michael EmersonWe go where our family goes. We go where our friends are, and because our social networks are so segregated by race, we end up with what we have. We also find that, you know, if you're immigrants, you're not part of that history.
Michael EmersonI mean, so if I've talked to whites in City of Refuge, sometimes they'll wonder, "Why do we do things a certain way, and why do we make a big deal out of events?" And what's happening is they're falling back on their understanding of the way that church should work. It's not always working exactly like that, and they feel frustration or confusion. Sometimes people leave. That's certainly common in mixed churches.
Michael Emerson