That's a big fear, right, and when I talk with black pastors, the same thing: If we try to have this move towards interracial congregations, whites will just dominate then. There are so many more of them, and they're used to being in the position of power. So they'll just take over, and we'll lose the one thing we do have.
Michael EmersonI've been blessed by doing classic plays on Broadway, which was one of my great dreams forever.
Michael EmersonI liked the scenes with the baby, but the baby steals all the scenes that you're in. So that would get old after a while, because the baby is too perfect. I liked being high on ecstasy.
Michael EmersonThat's a big fear, right, and when I talk with black pastors, the same thing: If we try to have this move towards interracial congregations, whites will just dominate then. There are so many more of them, and they're used to being in the position of power. So they'll just take over, and we'll lose the one thing we do have.
Michael EmersonI think whites are used to being in power, so when whites think we ought to have integrated churches they think, "People ought to come to our church. What can we do to get them to come?"
Michael EmersonDownsides, yeah, and when there are more downsides when churches first start - they go through stages of transforming to becoming multiracial. So in the beginning stages there's often a lot of pain, a lot of confusion, a lot of people leave.
Michael EmersonI certainly think so, and I argue so, and I give talks on that. Are there risks by putting people together? Absolutely. Is there value in the black church? Absolutely. Is there value in having immigrant churches? Absolutely. But if we don't have congregations gathering with people of different races, what we're doing is we are redefining racial division, a racial inequality.
Michael Emerson