We Belong to the City: African America, Urban Sprawl & the Church
Long since verging on personal insolvency, I have toyed with the idea of moving out of New York City knowing full well that its heart, however, loveless has been beckoning me since I was a tween in suburban Seattle. And even if professional opportunity should draw me from my Brooklyn haunt, I can't ever imagine myself living outside of somebody's metropolis. I can't operate outside of that vibrancy and vitality even when I don't do anything but observe.
African America has had an evolving relationship with the city. Most of our ancestors were imported or born rural with most of them moving north into cities in the early twentieth century. Coming up, city life the quintessential Black experience, which is why I so wanted to get up out of private school and the suburbs years ago. I'm in Seattle now enjoying family and friends but wondering how in God's name my people out here do it.
Not that there aren't concentrated pockets of African American culture in the Northwest beacon. We have been here for sometime. In fact, the church I grew up in dates back to 1890. Still, ain't much color to the the Evergeen state or the Emerald City. And much less than yesterday, according to a recent report by Christianity Today.
It seems that as many African American have abandoned the once undesirable inner city for depending on their respective stations, the affordability or sprawling luxury of the burbs, their churches have gone with them causing great harm to what remains.
Urban blacks have been following the pattern of so-called "white flight" for the past several decades, leaving the city for the suburbs as they reach the middle class. Now their churches are beginning to follow, church leaders and observers say."Traditionally, African Americans were driving back to the home church in the central city," said Michael Emerson, founding director of the Center on Race, Religion, and Urban Life at Rice University. "But as you get into the second generation, they don't want to drive back to where they aren't from. That trend is only going to continue as you leave poverty behind."
I can't say this is altogether new to me but it's nonetheless disconcerting with so many African American institutions kaput or in peril. I love returning to Seattle's First Hill and daydreaming through a sermon from the pews that warmed my behind as a child.
Click here to read the full article.
Tags: Black Middle Class, Christianity, Church
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Comments
1.
MyOpinion says:
I tend to find your articles interesting however did you need to point out that you went to private school and lived in the luxurious suburbs?
Anyway at least we understand where some of your ideas stem from - you are rebelling against your natural middle class leanings to rough it with the rest of us in the inner cities because that is the real 'Black experience' you were missing as a child.
Maybe those leaving just want a taste of what you left behind in Seattle.
01/01/2009 at 3:36 PM