A blogger named Hemant Mehta calls himself The Friendly Atheist and he recently "sold his soul" on eBay. The person who bought it asked Hemant to visit several churches and write about his experiences, which he has done now in a book.

I have not read the boook but one quote from it keeps popping up in others' blogs:

Martin Luther King Jr. is said to have oberved that eleven o'clock sunday morning was the most segregated hour in America. Based on the research I did for this book, I would say that still holds true. With very few exceptions, the churches I visited were either black congregations or white ones...You want to reach people like me? Then show me the churches where...I can see a rainbow of people in the crowd instead of a sea of whiteness or, in another neighborhood, a sea of blackness...I'd love to see Christian faith leading to an openness and equality, respect for people no matter their gender or skin color or language or culture. Think about this: atheist gateherings are often a mixture of everyone in society...Does it surprise you that secular people are leading the way in accepting others, no matter their individual differences?

Our church struggles (not sure that is the right word but it is how I view it at the moment) with being pretty much all white. Part of that is the demographics of the community we live in. We cover a wide gamut in other demographic respects but the vast majority of us are white.

I think that all involved in leadership at the church would like to see greater diversity as far as race but it seems to be a tough thing to achieve.

Perhaps out of our current visioning process we will become even more missional in this quest.

How does your church address or encourage diversity?