Q&A: How and Why Our Church Is Committed to Being an Ally for Racial Justice

In April 2024, the congregation of Hope Church in Holland, Michigan, approved a statement as part of its commitment to racial justice. Here’s the conversation with Rev. Dr. Gordon Wiersma, Pastor of Hope Church, and Ruth Stegeman, Chair of Hope Church’s Justice and Reconciliation Ministry, on the process and how the congregation is living out the work of being an antiracist church.

Why make a statement now?

Gordon: After the murder of George Floyd, the national consciousness of systemic racism was a catalyst that opened up dialogue at Hope Church. We could lean into that more readily because of that long history of social action. This is part of our identity, and we were challenged in new ways.

I was at General Synod (the annual meeting for the denomination) in 2022, where [the Reformed Church in America] adopted an antiracism policy. As part of that, other assemblies were challenged to do something similar. I was struck: this is something we can work with. When I brought that back to Hope Church, folks resonated with that. There was intuition right away of making the antiracism policy our own.

Related: Diversity and belonging: A Revelation 7:9 vision for today and the future

What was the process for adopting a racial justice statement as a congregation?

Gordon: It has been an 18-month process to craft and approve the statement. The initial gathering was our Great Consistory Event in August 2022, which convenes anyone who has served Hope Church as an elder or deacon. (That’s the Great Consistory, which can be convened to consider issues of the church.) This initial gathering was a great social time with core people of the church getting together. People were pretty well engaged. It was helpful to us to get a read of whether or not this would be something that would be engaged more broadly in the congregation. Early on, it helped us get a sense of how to listen to the landscape—the feedback and questions, the support and concerns.

Related: What does the Bible say about racism?

Ruth: At the event, we broke into smaller sub-groups, each facilitated by a member of our Justice and Reconciliation Ministry. We showed them an early draft of our antiracism statement. And we made sure that everyone could voice their thoughts, which we documented. It was helpful to get that early, concrete feedback.

Gordon: We then wanted to bring this through the congregation. We did an adult education series about the statement in January and gathered congregational feedback. We presented at committee and ministry meetings.

Ruth: We made it clear that the racial justice statement is not just a statement from the Justice and Reconciliation Ministry, but it’s a touchstone for the church. So when we talked with the Hospitality Ministry, we talked about how a commitment to racial justice impacts how we bring food in for the church. For example, what if we seek out Black-owned businesses instead of just pizza nights? It can be a hard step to have a group that’s committed, but it’s key to ask the question of how do you integrate the commitment into the life of the congregation? The Worship Ministry decided that when we sing a spiritual, we pay “reparations”—and use that term—to organizations and ministries that train Black leaders in sacred music. We made this decision after we listened to leaders, particularly of Black communities.

Gordon: The statement needed to be formally approved by the consistory, but it was important that the congregation give advice to the consistory, too. Ruth and I wrote some pieces in our newsletter that helped explain that we thought this is a good thing, so we wanted to make the case, then listen. That’s part of what we learned in the discernment process to become a Room for All church. And there was lots of good feedback along the way. The congregational meeting was quite lovely. There was an overwhelming sense of gratitude for being part of a community putting this on paper and making a commitment like that. The statement was overwhelmingly supported.

How is the implementation beginning to roll out? How is Hope Church being an ally?

Ruth: There are some things Hope Church already does. But we developed a list of implementation ideas to address the question: are we going to do something about this? It’s more than the statement, more than just words. As outlined in Jemar Tisby’s book How to Fight Racism, implementation is an “arc”: awareness, relationships, and commitment. And those three are mutually reinforcing; you cannot do one of those alone.

Awareness involves understanding and self-reflection, asking what’s happening in our community? Relationships are lived out in allyship; what are the people of color in our community telling us we need to do? How can we step up and stand with them? Those pieces lead to commitment and taking action. That looks like showing up to a rally, or hanging a Black Lives Matter flag. Hope Church will keep up our flag until our allies tell us we don’t need to. We listen, then act. If we do things on our own, it’s just white people doing stuff.

Related: How your church can engage and support its community

Gordon: It’s being present in those spaces and the community rather than marketing our church. Another example of implementation was changing the name of our benevolence budget to a “community partners budget.” It’s not just about what Hope Church is doing for others, but it’s about connecting with others. We value prioritizing places that congregants are connected to, but also needed to broaden our partnerships. That’s part of building awareness about people and organizations that we might not have known otherwise—and they’re endorsed by a trusted group. We can do more by listening first, gathering information and perspectives. That’s how we as a predominantly white congregation learn, then act. That’s allyship.

We stated out loud early on that our main goal in this is not to get non-white people to come to Hope Church. That’s often the part of multiracial conversations. But there’s a reason there are Black, Asian, and Hispanic churches. Our main purpose is to do that “arc” of racial justice, to build awareness, relationships, and commitment. The Belhar Confession remains key for us, and maybe we should read it in reverse. First you have justice, then there can be reconciliation, then unity.

Related: Belhar Confession worship resources

Hope Church is a multicultural community in a broad sense because we’re connected to Maple Avenue Ministries down the road and part of the Reformed Church in America. It’s not just in a congregational sense, but the bigger picture of who we’re a part of. That freed some of the anxiety, so that we can be who we are as a community and be allies. It’s a shift in mindset.

Reflecting on the process, what stands out to you? Did anything surprise you?

Gordon: There’s two sides of it: people do need space to express their concerns, fears, anxieties—and to ask, what does this mean? To discuss changes they’re not sure about. To process maybe feeling hypocritical; is this more than just words? You need to provide space to do that.

But the other side of that is that I’ve also been surprised in a poignant way by people really being grateful for and longing for our congregation, for churches, to speak to issues in our world and be relevant to that. We’re doing this thing, and people are saying they are proud and grateful for that. That’s really touching. It’s been a spiritually meaningful thing.

Ruth: One of the things we did was pick out six books on racial justice. And we told the congregation, “You’re going to be interested in reading one of these.” And we had them pay $5 a book just for them to invest a little. What surprised me was the energy that came out of that. People wanted to pick a book! Then, we had small group discussions based on books that they had read. It encouraged people to talk to other members of the congregation about what they were reading. We were trying to build in a common thing that’s happening in the church. How might we have conversations and learn about each other and also from what these books are telling us? It was a lot of work, but it came together in the end. People got really engaged in that.

Gordon: Yes, there was a real energy and joy that came from that. And some people bought all six books!

Also, as I’ve connected with folks more broadly beyond Hope Church, it means a lot to them that Hope Church is doing this. I’m proud of Hope Church. This is something not a lot of congregations are doing. Hope Church has been willing to say this racial justice statement is a catalyst for doing something tangible. There is a way that you can take [the commitment of a higher assembly] and make it specific to your context and carry it out.

Ruth: I’m proud to be a member here. We did this together and we affirmed it almost unanimously. 

What is Hope Church’s history with justice work?

Gordon: Hope Church was founded in 1862 and has been engaged in social action in a broad context. Our consistory (governing board) has now affirmed four “touchstones” of reconciliation and justice woven through our shared ministry: Room for All (LGBTQ+ affirming), Accessibility, Caring for Creation, and Racial Justice. Racial reconciliation was in our consciousness more specifically in the early 2000s. The Belhar Confession was significant for us, and we have drawn on it in our worship as a statement of faith. And we participated in conversation and training with other churches around reconciliation. It wasn’t so much about racial justice, but more about diversity appreciation.

Ruth: This church is open to thinking and rethinking and asking, “How might we respond?” A few years ago, we added “Justice” to the name of our Reconciliation Ministry, making it the “Justice and Reconciliation Ministry.” That was a way of saying that justice is part of our responsibility. It’s not just reconciliation; there’s a justice part of this.

Gordon: In 2010, we became a Room for All church, welcoming and affirming LGBTQ+ people. That was a discernment process. We’re good at discerning and discussing. It takes time. People began to see that as Hope Church’s identity—that’s not common in our community. In recent years, it’s been lovely that we’ve found language to have these touchstones; it’s helped to weave all those into things we’re tending to as a congregation. There’s an intersectionality to this work.

What wisdom and encouragement do you have for other churches who want to make a similar commitment to racial justice?

Ruth: Have a process in mind. Ask: How might we listen? How might we propose and get that feedback? Where do we have those conversations?

Gordon: Don’t be afraid it’s just words. A statement does make a difference. It allows you to have some words that you can look to and be a guide and a challenge. When it comes down to the “arc” (awareness, relationships, commitment) of racial justice, anybody can work on that. We can build awareness that is challenging and inspiring. We can build relationships, even if it can take decades to bear the fruit of relationships. We can live out our commitment—just in my daily life, where can I do that?

Also, people resonate with “beloved community” [a phrase and vision popularized by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.]. And we shouldn’t assume that people know what that is. It’s important to say what it is and to bring that into prayers and liturgy. It’s a remarkable, biblical concept. Scripture speaks about jubilee: when all debts are released and relationships are restored. I hear in that “beloved community” and see a continuity in that. When you look at what Dr. King says, it’s something that holds together those things of reconciliation and justice. He saw this as a vision of all people being together in justice and in abundance, relationships—both individual and structural—that are healed and abundant and truthful. It means a lot that it’s something Dr. King embraced. It was deeply rooted in his Christian faith and theology. It is fitting and provoking in the best way for our church life, too.

Ruth: For highly educated people and churches, it’s common for people to ask, what’s the definition of that? So part of the way we can approach the concept of beloved community is to ask, “When have you experienced beloved community? What might that look like?” For me, it’s when I’m at the Holland Aquatic Center. It is racially diverse, it’s supported by tax dollars, and it’s a place where people are all committed to one thing like getting fit. There are people of every size, shape, and color. To me, that is a beloved community. That’s not a formal answer, but it’s real. Those kinds of conversations can help us to visualize this in our own lives and then to seek that out in our own lives.

Book recommendations for taking a step toward racial justice

The following are the recommended books that members of Hope Church could choose to read as part of the process to approve a racial justice statement and commit to being an antiracist church. Book descriptions courtesy of Ruth Stegeman. Further book and podcast recommendations for growing in diversity, equity, and inclusion can be found here.

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