Community

“Colorblind” Church Wants Diversity

By Samuel Hyland

Staff writer

Since the Bible Crusade Assembly of God opened its East Village branch in the 1970s, the core of its mission has been to make sure its membership is racially diverse.

It’s still working to reach that goal.

“We don’t want this to be a black temple or a white temple,” said the Rev. Benjamin McCamery, the Bible Crusade’s youth leader. “We want it to be everybody in one because that’s the way heaven’s going to look, every race coming together.”

“Interracial Worship” is painted on the sign above the red front door of Bible Crusade, which is on East 13^th Street, near Avenue B. One Sunday in mid-July, all 15 people who turned out for worship were black.

“The Messiah wasn’t ever supposed to be described in a picture,” the preacher told parishioners. “If you really want to be blunt, they weren’t even supposed to try to portray what he looked like. But the world did that, and what happened was that it brought a lot of separation. Now, we think we’re serving a white Jesus, a black Jesus, an Asian Jesus …”

He continued, sometimes looking up from the Bible he’d placed on the lectern in front of him. “And what does that bring?” It was a rhetorical question. “Race brings separation.”

Civil Rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. famously called it a tragedy that eleven o’clock on Sunday morning was “the most segregated hour in America.” Not much has changed since King spoke those words in 1960. Answering a 2015 survey by LifeWay Research, 86 percent of churchgoers said that their congregations were comprised mainly of one ethnic group. Based on the findings of their 2014 Religious Life Study, Pew Forum concluded that 99 percent of National Baptist Convention church members were black and 85 percent of Southern Baptist Convention churches were white; those are two of the nation’s largest denominations.

Youth leader McCamery, who grew up in Alphabet City, the East Village neighborhood where his church is located, said problems related to race have existed for a long time, and not just in the church. Because he is black, he said, some of his neighbors viewed him with suspicion. He also said that the problem seemed to worsen after many of his former African-American neighbors could no longer afford to live in the neighborhood and moved out.

On that Sunday in July, McCamery ushered in worshippers with outstretched arms. His father, the Rev. Thomas McCamery, the church’s senior pastor, interceded on behalf of the worshippers. “God is colorblind,” he prayed. “God is love.”

He also prayed for the church members, its leaders and the country.

Leon McCamery, another of Thomas’s sons, played the keyboards as the congregation sang, among other gospel lyrics, “You Made A Way” by Travis Greene.

Barbara Hamilton, who lives across from the church, said its presence on the block has been a comfort. She has seen other establishments come and go during her 20 years on East 13th. “But this building,” she said, “it’s still there … And it’s still a church.”

She has visited the church just once. “I’m not really a church person,” she said.

Yet, she recognizes the significance of the church in her community: “Thank God they’re still there.”

Benjamin McCamery is confident that the church will continue its mission to serve its members.

“We’ve been here for a very long time,” he said, after that July Sunday’s service. “All we want to do is let people hear the truth.”