Crossing the Ethnic Divide The Multiethnic Church on a Mission

While religious communities often stress the universal nature of their beliefs, it remains true that people choose to worship alongside those they identify with most easily. Multiethnic churches are rare in the United States, but as American attitudes toward diversity change, so too does the appeal of a church that offers diversity. Joining such a community, however, is uncomfortable-worshippers must literally cross the barriers of ethnic difference by entering the religious space of the ethnically "other." Through the story of one multiethnic congregation in Southern California, Kathleen Garces-Foley examines what it means to confront the challenges in forming a religious community across ethnic divisions and attracting a more varied membership.

Kathleen Garces-Foley is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Marymount University specializing in contemporary American religious life. In addition to research on the growth of multiethnic churches, she studies immigrant religious communities and American death practices and is the editor of Death and Religion in a Changing World.