When Strangers come to Church
Eigenheim Mennonite, ca. 1950 The article on which our Adult Sunday School focused, and which was first printed in the Canadian Mennonite, was logically questionable. It posed the argument that our “traditional” churches put up barriers to entry by members of other cultures, and that that explains the lack of cultural diversity in our pews. That might be a factor in some cases, but the explanation for a lack of cross-cultural presence in Mennonite churches is way more complicated than that. People who visit our churches—whether they’re culturally different or not—come again if their experience was satisfying; they don’t if it wasn’t. That choice likely depends more on their own expectations than it does on the welcome they receive. The churches with which I’m familiar go out of their way to greet and engage with strangers, but to even suggest that altering the style and content of worship so that others have their expectations met—and so they will return—would simply be at cos...