Cross-cultural Ministry – a Recap. # 192. 04/03/2025.

Out of Many, One People.

Welcome to a blog that re-visits a running theme – equipping clergy to minister in multi-ethnic parishes. So this week’s blog is mainly a re-cap, especially for the benefit of more recent subscribers, with the bulk mainly a lightly revised extract from blog # 22 from four years ago on ‘Growing into multi-ethnic ministry’, plus pointers to other sources.

Cross-cultural Ministry – a Recap.

A running concern of ‘Out of Many, One People’ is the central importance of clergy training if we are to take forward the church’s mission to see people of many ethnic backgrounds become one people in Jesus Christ. After all these years that still receives alarmingly little attention in theological college training. Further, as ethnic minorities move to a wider variety of contexts the need for training becomes even greater. But as financial issues become more constricting, fewer curates have had the benefit of immersive training in highly diverse communities. That has resulted in two problems. Parishes that have large multi-ethnic populations are increasingly finding it difficult to appoint clergy. Meanwhile at a more widespread level, more and more incumbents find themselves ministering in parishes that are starting to become ethnically diverse and yet have been barely equipped in how to respond.

Four stages in adapting to a new situation.

Learning on the job, then, has become very important. One schema for such learning that I found very apposite is that below taken some time ago from the business trainer John Maxwell on learning to adapt to new situations. Whilst intended for quite different contexts, I think it applies well to clergy wanting to learn how to minister in multi-ethnic communities.

1. Unconscious Incompetence > 2. Conscious Incompetence

4. Unconscious Competence < 3. Conscious Competence

The way the four stages work out in intercultural ministry is as follows:

Unconscious Incompetence.

‘I am colour blind’ were the fateful words of a senior church leader to a group of black clergy. He got roasted. Whilst you may feel sorry for the man, he was being unconsciously incompetent. Being aware that there are issues that need to be recognised and worked with in any inter-ethnic relationship is a necessary and basic competence. The two main issues that are covered by ‘race’ or ethnicity are, on the one hand, the historic imbalance of power and wealth that leads to assumptions and policies of superiority/inferiority; and on the other hand, the differences – which can be quite profound - between cultures. Skin colour - trivial in itself - is nonetheless a significant though unreliable guide to the presence of those issues, so that by being ‘colour blind’ we refuse to attend to differences which have most probably had a major impact on the other person’s life experience. Professing ‘colour blindness’ blinds a person to realities of racial injustice and cultural difference that inevitably distorts that person’s relationships with people for whom colour has been, unavoidably, a basic factor of their experience.

Therefore to say ‘We treat everyone alike’ may sound accepting, but raises the question of ‘Like who?’; to which the assumed answer tends to be ‘Like me’. The need for any sort of adjustment to racial or ethnic difference is denied. The result is that only to the extent that they approximate to traditional English norms may minority ethnic people find a place in churches where such a mindset prevails. In a survey of Anglican churches in Birmingham in the 1980s, Renate Wilkinson wrote: ‘Several respondents to the questionnaire made comments like, “Black or White, I treat them all the same”. . . (H)owever . .when Black and White are treated the same, the outcome is not equality but inequality.” (J Wilkinson, R Wilkinson & James H Evans Jr, in ‘Inheritors Together’ p 28 - italics mine). The bland assumption that everyone is like me distorts our ministry in multi-ethnic communities.

Rowan Williams has written ‘The liberal assumption that “treating everyone alike” is the answer rests on a view of human nature which is deeply problematic. It assumes that there is a basic ‘inner’ humanity, beyond flesh and skin pigmentation and history and conflict, which is the same for all people” (in the ‘Afterword’ to Piers McGrandle ‘Trevor Huddleston: Turbulent Priest’, p216). It is only in the recognizing, indeed valuing, of the realities of different bodies, of cultures, of history, that we are able to live confidently in a plural society and a plural world.

Mistakes that can lock us into unconscious incompetence are to think that racism is so absolutely awful that it can’t apply to me, or that cultural differences are so trivial that I have no problems with them. That combination of ignorance and laziness suffocates the ambition to learn, grow and change which is essential if we are to relate competently across ethnic groups.

Conscious Incompetence.

‘Send only those who know what they don’t know’ were the wise words of an African bishop to Kenneth Grubb, a Church Mission Society leader of an earlier generation (in his ‘Crypts of Power’, p 150). Knowing how much we don’t know need not be crippling or demotivating, rather in moving from unconscious to conscious incompetence we set ourselves on an exciting and productive journey of discovery. We face an agenda that is intellectually vast and complex, and which is emotionally challenging and humbling.

It may be that in Maxwell’s business world such a vulnerable state is not valued. In Christian ministry it is a vital resource. Writing on ‘Cultural Intelligence’ (another very helpful way in to wisdom for cross-cultural ministry – see blog # 31 ‘Becoming a ‘Culturally Intelligent’ Minister) David Livermore writes ‘CQ strategy includes accepting confusion and maintaining a willingness to not know something’ (David Livermore ‘Cultural Intelligence’, 2010, p 127.)

Several key Christian virtues come to the fore:

Humility. We need the readiness to make mistakes and look slightly gauche. One problem is that questions of race and ethnicity have become so infused with a judgemental or competitive spirit that it encourages us to adopt a façade of being aware and well-informed rather than allowing a humble and innocent readiness to learn. The syllabus that a multi-ethnic society presents us with is vast. We have seen it requires both close attention to how power relationships work out in society and church, alongside the desire to grow in understanding of the background and cultures of the people we are relating to. So, constant awareness of how much we have to learn is both realistic and vital. Friends of other backgrounds who we can talk to and learn from can be most helpful. Alongside of this goes giving ourselves permission to get things wrong.

Curiosity. Feeling free to ask questions, whilst trying to avoid patronizing assumptions in doing so; forming understanding only slowly and through experience rather than fitting people into a pre-formed grid – all these are part of the faltering steps of living with incompetence. The experience of British reserve in not asking people personal questions is easily perceived as aloof disinterest amongst many cultural groups. How much do I know about the siblings or family of someone from another culture? Or the things that are important for their place of family origin? Or their experience of life in Britain.

Vulnerability. Learning often means failing before succeeding. I wince at the memory of the clumsiness or sheer arrogance I have shown at times in cross-cultural situations. But to quote David Livermore again: ‘thankfully, our mistakes can be one of the greatest ways to grow our cultural intelligence. . . Cross cultural conflict is inevitable’ (p 35). One problem for us is that questions of race and ethnicity have become so infused with a judgemental or competitive spirit that it encourages us to adopt a façade of being aware and well-informed rather than allowing a humble and innocent readiness to learn. All the more important therefore that, as David Anderson - a black American pastor of a multi-ethnic church writes: ‘Like a child who needs protection, so many people in the maturation process of race relations also need room to struggle, grow, disagree and fail. The principle of covering people or giving them space to mature in matters of reconciliation is extremely important to the safety of their process, lest their multi-cultural growth be stunted’ (David Anderson ‘Multicultural Ministry’, 2007, p 71). My impression is that more than a few white people have retired hurt from engaging across racial and ethnic difference because of overly bruising responses to their incompetence. Rather, ‘The use of negative experience as a source of inspiration for change is evidence of high CQ’ (Livermore p194).

But our incompetence is more than a lack of knowledge. Eager as we should be to learn more, we also need to recognise, if we are white, that there are aspects of non-white people’s experience that we can never fully enter into. We have not experienced outright rejection because of our colour; nor – often more damagingly – the uncertainty of whether or not a negative remark, a harsh look, a failed application was because of our colour or not. We don’t suspect microaggessions, let alone experience outright racism. We have never been other than white, so that to assume or imply that we can enter into or share such experiences is impertinent.

Conscious competence.

‘He’s worked in a black area so he thinks he ‘gets’ me’ was someone’s unenthusiastic comment about their new boss. None of us like being ‘got’. Such knowledge diminishes us, puts us in a box, instead of affirming us in our individuality. We have all at some time felt irritated or depressed by someone implying they have ‘got’ us when they haven’t. Conscious competence, then, is tricky. Identifying with someone who feels they have been the victim of racism in some often subtle or oblique way, or talking or acting in ways that show you are aware of and comfortable with someone’s cultural background can be important. Being able to say ‘Hello’ or ‘Welcome’ in another language is a quick way of showing you take someone’s identity seriously.

But ostentatious identification can be counter-productive. Out of his wide experience of international business David Livermore comments that it can be “downright silly when outsiders try to wear native dress. Women dressing more modestly than they might at home or men dressing up or down more according to the cultural norm is appropriate. But going fully native in our dress isn’t usually the way to go” (Livermore 2010, p 156). In other cultures we are occasional guests who are privileged to be there, not members of the family with the unquestionable right to be there. The need for proper restraint against over-familiarity at Proverbs 25:17: “Let your foot be seldom in your neighbour’s house, otherwise the neighbour will become weary of you and hate you”, can well be extended from neighbour’s generally to insensitive intrusions into other cultures.

If conscious incompetence is a bracing, challenging and potentially wisdom-generating place to be, so conscious competence is a slippery place of danger. We can be too confident of what we know; too ready to think that we have another person’s situation sorted. Much as we need to learn, we need even more to know our limitations. The person who has spent a few years in Africa, lived in the inner city, or seen the appropriate films can too easily vaunt their experience more highly than it deserves. We can use particular experiences to generalise far further than our knowledge entitles us to. Zadie Smith’s novel ‘White Teeth’ mocked the well-meaning white person who thought that having read a magazine article on black young people gives them expertise.

Faced with the over-confidence of those Corinthian Christians who just ‘knew’ that they had the issue of eating food offered to idols completely sorted, Paul wrote “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know” (1 Cor 8:1b,2 NIV). The inter-religious and inter-ethnic complexities of Corinth were too subtle for their confident assertions; in particular they were failing to show proper understanding and regard for the ‘weak’ whose consciences Paul was concerned to protect. Like the Corinthians, we can use knowledge to exclude other considerations rather than become open to them. Broadly speaking, if we need to flaunt our experience and expertise to others – including such non-verbal communication as wearing ‘ethnic’ clothes or household decorations - then it hasn’t been sufficiently grounded to become authentic.

Unconscious Competence.

‘There are some things you need to know and then forget that you know them’ were the wise words of a black youth leader many years ago. Such knowing then forgetting is our goal – the place at which relationships, experiences, conversations, journeys, books, music have become so internalised that we relate to people from other backgrounds comfortable in who we are, and with them comfortable enough to be themselves with us. David Livermore writes of the goal of our learning: ‘With experience and growing levels of cultural intelligence, some of our adaptive behaviour may become so well learned that we will adapt naturally without much conscious thought. That’s the goal. We want to get to a point where this high level of thinking and action happens as naturally as the thoughts and behaviours enacted in our familiar cultural contexts’ (p 156). It is as though all we have heard, observed, read, learned becomes as it were boiled down so that it is an aroma, a flavour in our relationships, not a tangible, possibly obstructing presence. Such cultural understanding as we have becomes transparent. It is simply not noticed in the relationship. Unnecessary or intrusive display of our cosmopolitanism impede that. ‘I reflect a lot on cultural differences, but I don’t talk about this much in our church because I don’t want to highlight those differences. The gospel should generate self-forgetfulness’ are the wise words of a council estate minister, Andy Mason (quoted in Tim Chester ‘Unreached’, p75).

Those ‘known’ things will inform our understanding of others, at times providing a helpful bridge into relationships, more often providing depth, balance and context to our understanding. But they do not provide a final resting place. Periodically our ‘competence’ will be exposed as partial, over-confident or out-of-date, and we need to go back to Square 2 – the consciously incompetent learner again.

Related past blogs:

Becoming a ‘Culturally Intelligent’ Minister - # 31, 25/05/2021

Books on Leading Multi-Cultural Churches - # 36, 29/06/2021

What do Theological Students need to Learn? - # 46, 21/09/2021

‘How do I feel’ in multi-ethnic ministry - # 94, 25/10/2022

Ministerial Training for Belonging - # 140, 28/11/2023

My Booklets for Sale

‘Building Multi-Racial Churches’. Latimer Trust. 1994, revised 2020. £3.50.

‘Worship in a Multi-Ethnic Society’. Grove Books W236. 2018. £3.50

Post free, and £6.50 for the two. Please send a cheque payable to ‘John Root’ and your address to 42 Newlyn Rd, N17 6RX.

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‘The vagabond who’s rapping on your door

Is standing in the clothes that you once wore’

Bob Dylan ‘It’s all over now, baby blue’, on ‘Bringing it all Back Home’ 1965.