Five Church Practices That Fight Racism

Do your church’s diversity initiatives feel like they’re falling flat?  Are you having the same conversations about race over and over, and feeling like you’re just walking in circles?  Maybe you have a multiethnic potluck once a year, or preach a sermon on reconciliation around MLK Day, but deep down, you have a nagging feeling that not much is actually changing.

That feeling is incredibly discouraging.  It can make you feel like real, lasting change just isn't possible.

But what if the problem isn’t your desire for change, but your strategy?  What if our good intentions are being undermined by the very habits and routines of our church life?  There are core practices within our churches that, when we re-examine and transform them, can become powerful, consistent acts of anti-racism.  Today, we’re going to show you five of them, inspired by the groundbreaking work of pastor and author David Swanson.

For decades, a lot of well-meaning churches have approached racism as if it were simply an information problem.  The thinking goes, "If our people just knew more, they would do better."  We've tried book studies, seminars, and guest speakers.  And while those things can be helpful, they often don't lead to lasting transformation.  Why?  Because racism in the church isn't just a problem of bad ideas; it’s a problem of broken formation.  It's a discipleship problem.

In his vital book, Rediscipling the White Church, David Swanson argues that Christians are shaped not just by what we believe, but by what we do, week in and week out.  Our habits, our routines, our liturgies — all of these things are forming us into certain kinds of people.  For too long, many church practices have been unconsciously shaped by a culture of segregation, accidentally forming us for division rather than for unity.

The solution, then, isn’t just to add a "diversity program" on top of everything else.  The solution is to rethink the core discipleship practices of the church.  So, let's get practical.  Here are five church practices, inspired by Swanson's work, that can actually begin to fight racism from the inside out.

Reforming Your Liturgy

The first practice is to re-examine and reform your liturgy.  Now, when I say liturgy, I don't just mean a formal, high-church service.  I mean the entire flow of your weekly gathering — the songs you sing, the prayers you pray, the way you greet one another.  Every church has a liturgy, and that liturgy is teaching you something.  The question is, what is it teaching you about race and the family of God?

In many predominantly white churches, the liturgy — the default music style, the sermon illustrations, the cultural references — can unintentionally send the message that "normal" Christianity looks and feels like "white" Christianity.  It can create a space where people of color are welcomed, but as guests in a white space, not as equal family members in a shared home.

Fighting racism here means intentionally de-centering whiteness in your worship.  This isn't about tokenism; it's about reflecting the global, multiethnic reality of the body of Christ.  So what could this look like?  It could look like incorporating songs from the Black gospel tradition, from Latin American artists, or from Asian composers not as a "special feature," but as a regular part of your church's vocabulary.  It could look like public prayer that specifically names and laments instances of racial injustice.  It could mean choosing sermon illustrations and images for your slides that reflect a broad range of cultures and experiences.  This practice declares, week after week, that our allegiance is not to a single cultural expression of faith, but to the one King who is redeeming people from every tribe, tongue, and nation.

Truth-Telling from the Pulpit

The second practice is a commitment to consistent, truth-telling preaching.  The pulpit holds a unique power to shape a congregation's understanding of God, the world, and their place in it.  For the church to be a force for racial justice, our preaching must tell the truth about history, the reality of systemic injustice, and the sin of elevating any single culture as superior.

This goes far beyond a single sermon on racial harmony.  It means weaving the theme of God's heart for justice and reconciliation into the fabric of your preaching calendar.  When you're preaching through a book of the Bible, are you pointing out the themes of partiality, oppression, and God's defense of the vulnerable?  When you preach on sin, do you talk about it not only as individual acts, but as collective, systemic brokenness that we all participate in?

As Swanson argues, this is a crucial part of re-discipling the church.  It forms a congregation that understands that repentance from racism is not a one-time event, but an ongoing posture.  This kind of preaching can be uncomfortable.  It will challenge long-held assumptions.  But the goal of preaching isn't comfort; it's transformation.  By consistently telling the truth from the pulpit, you are forming a people who are no longer silent about injustice, but are equipped by the Gospel to seek the flourishing of all their neighbors.

Reclaiming the Lord's Table

Third, we can reclaim the practice of Communion as a powerful act of anti-racism.  For many of us, Communion has become a quiet, individualistic ritual.  We take the bread and the cup, reflect on our personal relationship with Jesus, and move on.  But the Lord's Table was meant to be so much more.  It's a meal that declares our union, our shared identity, and our radical equality in Christ.

In a world divided by race, class, and politics, the act of coming to the same table, eating the same bread, and drinking the same cup is a profound and prophetic statement.  It declares that the dividing walls of hostility have been torn down in Christ.  Swanson suggests that Communion should be taught and practiced as a sign of deep fellowship and shared belonging across all lines of difference.

So how do you apply this?  You start by teaching it.  Before you serve the elements, remind your congregation that this table unites people who would otherwise be enemies.  Remind them that in Christ, our ethnic and cultural differences no longer determine our worth or our belonging.  We are all one.  You could even change the practice itself.  Instead of passing plates down rows, perhaps you invite people to come forward, to physically move from their comfortable spot and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with people they don’t know.  This simple act of movement can symbolize the breaking down of invisible barriers.  By reclaiming the radical, unifying power of Communion, you turn a routine ritual into a regular, tangible practice of reconciliation.

Forming Children for Solidarity

The fourth, and perhaps most crucial, practice is to reform your children's ministry.  For too long, the approach to race in many white churches has been silence.  We hope that if we just don't talk about race, our children will grow up "colorblind."  But research and experience show the opposite is true.  When we are silent, our children don't learn that race doesn’t matter; they learn it’s a taboo topic, and they are left to absorb the racial biases of the world around them.

David Swanson argues that we must be just as intentional about forming our children for racial solidarity as we are about teaching them Bible stories.  An anti-racist children's ministry addresses race honestly, celebrates diversity as a reflection of God’s creativity, and helps children understand concepts of fairness and justice in age-appropriate ways.

What does this look like?  It means intentionally choosing curricula, books, and videos that feature characters from a wide range of backgrounds.  It’s about reading stories that center the experiences of Christians from different cultures.  It means having dolls and toys with different skin tones in the nursery.  It means talking openly about how God made us all different and all beautiful.  For older kids, it can mean talking about people in the Bible who were treated unfairly, and connecting that to the world today.  By starting this formation early, we can raise a generation of Christians who see loving their neighbor across racial lines not as a special project, but as a normal, central part of following Jesus.

Cultivating Genuine Relationships

The fifth and final practice is to move beyond demographics and cultivate genuine, cross-racial relationships.  Many churches measure success by the diversity they can see on a Sunday morning.  They count the different faces in the pews and call it a win.  But a multiracial crowd is not the same as a reconciled community.  True solidarity isn’t about sitting near each other for an hour a week; it's about sharing life.

Fighting racism requires us to intentionally move out of our comfort zones and build real friendships.  This is about mutual care, shared vulnerability, and bearing one another's burdens.  It’s about being in each other’s homes, sharing meals, and having our lives truly intertwine.  The church should be a place where these kinds of deep, authentic, cross-racial friendships are the norm, not the exception.

Now, this is not something that can be easily programmed.  It has to be modeled by leadership and cultivated within the culture of the church.  It might mean that small groups are more intentional about their makeup.  It could mean church leaders actively pursue friendships with pastors from different racial backgrounds, not for optics, but for genuine partnership.  It means creating a church culture where asking "How is your community being affected by this news story?" is a normal part of how we care for one another.  This is slow, messy, and deeply personal work.  It's the work of discipleship.  It’s the work of becoming the family of God.

Call To Action & Conclusion

So, to recap: reforming our liturgy, telling the truth from the pulpit, reclaiming the Lord's Table, forming our children for solidarity, and cultivating genuine relationships.

These five practices are not a checklist.  They're not a quick fix.  They are the beginning of a long, faithful journey of re-discipleship — a journey of turning from habits that have formed us for segregation and turning toward practices that form us for true solidarity in Christ.  It's about re-orienting our church life around the beautiful, multi-ethnic vision of the Kingdom of God.

This work is hard, but it is hopeful, because it's rooted in the belief that God is creating one new humanity in Christ.  Change is possible.

To go deeper, we highly recommend reading David Swanson’s book, "Rediscipling the White Church: From Cheap Diversity to True Solidarity."  It provides the theological depth and practical guidance that we've only been able to touch on today.

And we want to hear from you.  Which of these five practices stands out to you the most? Which one could your church begin to implement, even in a small way?  Let us know in the comments below.  Let's learn from each other as we seek to build churches that truly reflect the justice and love of our God.