Promise Keepers focusing on racial reconciliation

c. 1996 Religion News Service ATLANTA (RNS)-For five years, the evangelical Christian movement known as Promise Keepers has preached a gospel of contrition and reconciliation, urging men to become better husbands and fathers and more committed members of their churches. Now the movement, which has drawn hundreds of thousands of men to stadiums and convention […]

c. 1996 Religion News Service

ATLANTA (RNS)-For five years, the evangelical Christian movement known as Promise Keepers has preached a gospel of contrition and reconciliation, urging men to become better husbands and fathers and more committed members of their churches.

Now the movement, which has drawn hundreds of thousands of men to stadiums and convention centers for emotional revival-style hugfests, is turning its attention to a new issue: racial divisiveness.


At a meeting here this week of some 39,000 clergy, Promise Keepers leaders announced that upcoming rallies around the country will focus on bringing men of various racial and ethnic backgrounds together. The group chose as its 1996 motto the phrase “Breaking Down the Walls.”

“Racism is an insidious monster,” Bill McCartney, founder of Promise Keepers and a former football coach at the University of Colorado, said in the meeting’s opening session. “You can’t say you love God and not love your brother.”

The meeting itself, held in the Georgia Dome, was something of a metaphor for the Promise Keepers’ new agenda.

Each session featured at least one speaker who was a person of color, including a Mohawk Indian adorned with a white-feathered headdress. In the audience, men sang and prayed in two languages-Spanish and English. And although the crowd was predominantly white, the audience included a diverse sprinkling of blacks, Hispanics, Asians and American Indians.

Some observers noted the contrast between the meeting’s ethnic and racial mix and past Promise Keepers stadium rallies, where most participants were white.

“It is diverse,” Elder Jim Offutt, an African-American pastor at Reba Place Church in Evanston, Ill., said of this week’s clergy gathering. “Not as diverse as it could be and not as diverse as it’s going to be, but at least it ain’t what it used to be.”

Promise Keepers leaders have been taking aggressive steps to increase minority participation at upcoming stadium events.


Before this year’s rallies were officially announced, Promise Keepers leaders alerted minority pastors, giving them a jump on signing up men who want to attend. In addition, Christian leaders from various minority groups were flown into Promise Keepers’ Denver headquarters to advise the leadership on how to further integrate the movement. Scholarships have been offered to help those who cannot afford the $60 fee for stadium events.

McCartney recounted how he has traveled to inner cities across the country trying to convince minority pastors that the men’s movement he started is “not a white thing.”

Speaking directly to the white men in the Georgia Dome, McCartney recalled the struggles of the inner-city ministers with whom he met.

“It seems like no matter what, they have to fall under the control of the Anglo,” said McCartney. “Can you imagine the oppression? I’m telling you we have a whole nation of minority people who live under that oppression. It’s stifling.”

When McCartney asked the clergy to embrace the concept in the Book of Ruth that says “Where you go, I will go. … Your people shall be my people and your God, my God,” men applauded and some gave him a standing ovation.

At a session Thursday (Feb. 15), men of color were asked to gather in front of the Georgia Dome’s stage to be honored by others in the audience. They received a long standing ovation and were greeted by cheers of “We love you.”


At the conclusion of the clergy conference, the leaders of Promise Keepers signed an”Atlanta Covenant”that encourages pastors to seek out ministers of other denominations and races and develop relationships with them.

Observers give Promise Keepers credit for its efforts to include people of color on its speaker platforms and increase the diversity of its staff. About 27 percent of the more than 300 employees at Promise Keepers headquarters are racial or ethnic minorities.

“They’re doing better than an awful lot of evangelical ministries,” said Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen, a gender specialist at Eastern College in St. Davids, Pa. “They are really bending over backwards.”

At a time when churches often are segregated, she said, McCartney is challenging Christians to change their ways.

But Van Leeuwen said the “real test” will be whether the group’s goals are realized at the grassroots level. The sixth of seven promises men are asked to keep is to be “committed to reaching beyond any racial and denominational barriers to demonstrate the power of biblical unity.”

Some pastors at this week’s meeting seemed ready to carry that promise home.

“We have to look at each other not as far as color but as Christ looks at us,” said the Rev. Bill Sibley, a white pastor from Stroudsburg, Pa. “When it gets back into the churches, I think the fire will be set.”


But others questioned the emphasis on race relations.

“Personally, I think we’re trying too hard,” said the Rev. Neal Kellam, a white pastor from Arenzville, Ill. “As a whole, especially in the Christian community, I don’t think there’s that much of a division. … If we didn’t give it so much attention, I think it would die of its own accord.”

Randall Bailey, a professor at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta who has led Bible studies on race, class and gender, thinks Promise Keepers is not dealing with the deepest challenges to overcoming racism. Included in those challenges, he said, should be acts of restitution-making tangible changes in systems that have been racist-and dismantling institutions that support racism.

“Until there is that type of dialogue,” Bailey said, “then their quest seems to be as helpful as the Southern Baptists saying they’re sorry.” At the Southern Baptist Convention’s 150th meeting last year, delegates overwhelmingly passed a resolution apologizing for the denomination’s past defense of slavery and acknowledging continuing racism.

Bailey said leaders of another large gathering of men, the Million Man March in Washington last October, have been more committed to “systemic dismantling” of racism.

Promise Keepers plans to bring one million men to Washington in 1997 to pray for the nation. Unlike the Million Man March, which drew black men from across the country, Promise Keepers leaders hope for a crowd that reflects the nation’s diversity.

“To me, you can’t be about reconciliation when you’re assembling people together but you’re only assembling people of one color,” said the Rev. Raleigh Washington, Promise Keepers’ acting vice president for reconciliation. “If you’re about reconciliation, then you’ve got to be about demonstrating a practice of which you preach.”


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