Why 10% is a lofty goal for the ELCA?

Beside the fact that I’m leaving the ELCA, okay, I’m just joking about my importance, well, partial joking since I’m planning to leave the ELCA by the end of this calendar year. Okay, I’m not naive, at least not enough, to assume that another mainline denomination has no issue concerning race, gender and sexuality. They all have problems. However, the ELCA makes any major mainline denomination look diverse. Honestly, even the PCUSA looks multi-ethnical because of the ELCA. Yes, they are lots of good people in the ELCA and lots of wonderful minority ministers trying to make the ELCA more diverse. However, as long as the ELCA is a staunch defender of the gringo/a gospel, the ELCA will be gringo/a in its core. Bishop Hanson, if you ever come across this blog, I want you to know that condemning racism is wonderful, but such condemnation is hardly of any great value when the ELCA is still, after more than two decades, hovering just below the three percent mark in minority membership. It took the ELCA about two decades to move more 1.6 percent to 2.7 percent in minority membership. Bravo! Perhaps, in another two decades, the ELCA can be around 4 percent. Well, in total honesty, it will take more than learning a few cute phrases in Spanish or another foreign language to reach out. Granted that it would be a good idea for us, who don’t speak English, to learn it. I’m guilty of it. Perhaps, that would help in the area of communication, which is a good thing since forward movement begins with good communication. However, it is important to remember that having good communication means merely that there is talking going on. But, as most of us are well aware of that old saying: “Talk is cheap!” Yes, it is cheap to talk. So, please begin by really forcing the issue to the front burner. Force large and wealth congregations to see their own discrimination against minority ordained ministers as senior pastors. Honestly, I do hope the ELCA stops its own self inflicted bleeding and begins to live its own motto: “Semper Reformanda!” I do hope this is soon.