In Honor of Black History Month

Young male faces, soul patches, spiked hair, and all of them are white.

I got this in the mail last week. It's a brochure for a prayer conference. Admittedly, I had certain expectations as I opened it up. I expected to find experienced, seasoned men and women of prayer listed as leaders. Opening the tri-fold mailer I discovered that it looked like the last flier I got requesting my presence at a worship/church growth/upwardly mobile/market-driven conference.

Out of the nine listed personalities only 2 said anything about prayer. However, they did mention their huge church membership, grammy-nominated, Dove award winning, artist-in-residence, full time evangelistic, visionary perspective.

As a small church pastor I see no incentive to attend. The free private dinner to the first 100 pastors who sign up is interesting. I guess I'll miss out on that too. What if I was a truly "senior" pastor? (I'm getting there.) What if I was a church mom with years of prayer time experience under my belt? And, more to the point of my title, what if I were an African American pastor?

We talk so much about equality and parity but stay within our own communities. Is there no effort to invite black pastors to speak at these things because they have nothing to say? Is it because this event is happening in the South and it would be awkward to have a black speaker at the event? Of course not.

The problem is audience. Black speakers aren't on the program because this conference is advertised primarily to white churches. If it were a true convocation for prayer everybody would be invited and the leaders would reflect that. Small church pastors aren't in the line-up because small churches aren't the target audience. It's really not about prayer but yet another expensive gathering to sell the church growth propaganda to a young upwardly mobile, white audience.

To all my African American readers. Please forgive the Southern church's penchant for insulting you. Happy Black History month.

Stay strong!