Religion is an intimate experience.  For you to be part of a church community, (not just showing up at church but actually participating in its life), you must share a great deal of trust and common ground with others. It is personal. It involves vulnerability. Few people would share their thoughts about life, death, and sin with strangers.  Itís much easier to share your feelings with people who you can relate to, people who understand your experiences and where you are coming from.  That is one of the key ingredients of the successful growth that ethnic churches in North America are experiencing. That is what ethnic churches are built around.  

When I started going to the Southern Asian Seventh-day Adventist Church in Silver Spring, Maryland, it was completely and totally against my will. I was 14 at the time, and my parents basically forced me to leave my multiethnic church family in Baltimore and find a new ìhomeî with a bunch of Indians.  I was completely against the change.  I did not think I could relate to "those people" who were "fresh off the boat." I didn't like the clothes, music, or food and didn't see myself as having anything in common with these people, but I went anyway. However, over that last 13 years, I have come to realize how much I would have missed out on and what a different person I would be if I hadn't grown up in an Indian church.  

What positive contribution do ethnic churches offer to the lives of their people? To truly understand, youíll have to know what it's like being a minority.  What the "American majority" doesn't realize about being a minority is that you always stand out. In school, at work, and in social settings, no matter how well I dress and how fluently I speak or articulate an argument, I will always be a little bit different. It doesn't matter how much I feel I have conformed to American culture, or how the American culture conforms to my ethnic standards of beauty, or that conformity is only skin deep.  When the conversation gets personal, my significantly different cultural background always makes me stand out.

Although sometimes it's fun to make a statement, it's no fun when everything you do is a statement. If I feel like wearing Indian clothes to work or school, I am making a statement.  At Indian church, I'm just wearing clothes.  When I speak up in an academic or religious discussion, as the only representative present from my cultural group, I'm often speaking for my country.  Imagine the burden of measuring my words so carefully, and analyzing every idea that I share, against norms for my culture.  When I am with a group of Indians in deep discussion, my opinion is just that--an opinion that doesn't speak for anyone else but me.  It's amazing how much more you can delve into a topic, when you don't have to account for cultural differences.   

The cultural divide is so deep; it penetrates even the lines of friendship.  For example, when I had conversations with some of my closest American friends, they found it hard to understand why my parents made a big deal about dating around.  They thought it was funny and rather peculiar that my grandparents don't speak English.  Growing up, they couldn't understand how the smell of curry permeated my clothes and hair.  How could food be so pungent that it left such a strong odor?  It's hard to feel comfortable with who you are and where you came from, when you are always trying to fit into a culture that is not completely yours.  

In the Indian church I found a group of people I could open up and relate to.  I realized that I am a part of "those people" who I had laughed at a few short months before.  Iím a second-generation Indian American.  My parents came to America with less than $27 in their pockets.  They eat Indian food and dress up in saris and speak with accents that are similar to "Apu" on the Simpsons.  In our church, these things are "normal." Seeing all these people with so much in common has made me appreciate the culture I didn't value.  Everything I was distancing myself from to be more American, and fit in, was embraced in this group.  In this group of people, I was part of the majority.

It was a new and different feeling. I didn't accept it right away, but as I saw crowds of people enjoying the music, food and dress, I learned to think in a different way.  At the Indian church all those things that I thought were so weird and different weren't so different after all, they were common, and they were respected.  You were different if you didn't eat Indian food or speak another language.  I no longer had to hide differences from my background to fit into a group.

Ethnic churches also offer an alternative cultural instructional setting.  To maintain their cultural identity, a group needs a place where young people are exposed to the language, social etiquette and cultural history of their parents.  Many families hope that their young people will meet and marry a spouse of their ethnicity.  Some of us did, and some of us didn't, but all of us share a true appreciation of what makes our heritage unique.  Church offers a sanctuary, a haven where families can share in the joy of culture and question important religious and social issues that are tied to our culture.

Worship is the most powerful cultural experience that you have.  It includes music appreciation, teaching style, dress, and most importantly, the people you share these experiences with.  It surrounds and envelops all of your senses.  And when you are with the people who know where you are coming from, literally and figuratively, you achieve that kind of "family" atmosphere that everyone wants from a church.

All churches have a culture, which may or may not be influenced by ethnicity.  Isn't culture the same reason we have so many denominations?  Within the Seventh-day Adventist denomination alone there are conservative churches, liberal churches, high church and celebration churches.  There is a place for everyone, according to his or her tastes. The weekly rejuvenation should be with fellow believers with whom we can feel at home.

Just as ethnic churches offer many positive contributions, there are also several challenges.  One of the most significant issues that have risen in the second generation of ethnic churchgoers is the problem of evangelism.  Ethnic churches have a remarkable ability to reach out to their own communities.  However, other ethnicities may feel marginalized in this homogenized group.  I found it very difficult to reach my American friends who would willingly visit my church, more to experience the Indian culture than to experience Christianity.  They were always either mesmerized or dazed by being surrounded by so many Indians; they couldn't get past the culture to see the religion that also ties us together.

Another challenge is the role of the ethnic church to future generations. Although it's just what I needed growing up, I don't know if I want to raise my kids strictly in an ethnic church.  Each generation has different expectations as to how "church going" should enhance their lives.  Although a culture based strictly on ethnicity was exactly what the first generation wanted, future generations have different needs.   Many first-generation immigrants define themselves as "Indian Adventist American Christians."  We may choose to place these terms in a different order, based on their importance and relevance to our lives.  

  So what will happen to our church in the future?  Will other cultures marry in and make it another multicultural church? Or will it always be a home for weary first- and second-generation immigrants who can't let go of their homeland? As long as people come to America from other countries, I think there will be ethnic churches to provide a place where cultural groups can worship freely and feel confident that those around them will understand their background and share in preserving their future.