goin' fishin' - ruminations on pursuing the pearl

About a year or so I got stuck on the topic of Asian American theology for a while. I am not exactly sure why I did. I took Dr. Hanciles’ “Immigration, Religion and the American Church” class and ended up focusing my class project on generational dynamics within Chinese American churches, and then I took Dr. Dyrness’ “Theology in Global Perspective” the following quarter and participated in a group project on Asian American theology. Born out of that class, I became involved in a newly formed Asian American Theology Fellowship at Fuller, and have continued to be faithfully involved at most of their events.

All this, yet I am a white American who does not participate in an Asian American church.

At one of AATF’s events, an LA-area pastor named Ken Fong came and spoke about issues in multiethnic Asian American ministry. Fong pastors Evergreen LA, a church that transitioned from being a Japanese immigrant church to being a multiethnic church mostly made up of people from numerous Asian groups, and (perhaps most remarkably) people across generational lines. His insights were borne out of his experiences in pan-Asian ministry, but most of what he had to say has implications for anyone working in a church in a contemporary North American setting.


All this to set up: I finished reading Fong’s book Pursuing the Pearl: A Comprehensive Resource for Multi-Asian Ministry a few days ago. Fong wrote the book about a decade ago so the information does appear somewhat dated today, but the insights and implications remain quite relevant. Much of what he said in person at the AATF meeting dealt with the themes he explores in the book. In many ways it felt like Dan Kimball’s The Emerging Church: Vintage Christianity for New Generations with an Asian twist (though since Fong’s book predates Kimball’s, might The Emerging Church be Pursuing the Pearl with an Anglo twist?), as both books deal with what church looks like in changing North American cultural contexts and range from describing the culture to giving practical advice on points such as preaching, music direction, aesthetics and design, and so on.

Fong weaves an central analogy of saltwater and freshwater fish throughout the book, suggesting the acculurturation of immigrant groups resembles a freshwater river - settings that are largely homogenous for the immigrant group, such as an immigrant church - running into a saltwater sea - settings that are dominated by Anglo American norms. In Fong’s model, the first immigrant generation functions like imported bass, swimming in the new freshwater rivers of a new setting, attending church in their heart language and staying close to others of the same ethnic origin. Their children, the second generation, might be more like salmon, moving downstream from the freshwater streams and mingling in the saltwater bay, able to function in both conditions. Their children, the third and subsequent generations, live more like cod, swimming only in the saltwater, speaking only English and being unable to thrive in a “freshwater” setting. This flow can be seen in just about every immigrant group that comes to North America, but of course Fong applies this model specifically to Asians.

(compiled family portrait)
The problem comes in when freshwater churches (immigrant churches led by first generation immigrants) attempt to “dam up” their saltwater descendants (their Americanized children, grandchildren, and so on) in an effort to preserve their cultural identity and pass on their faith. While well intentioned and completely understandable, this reaction only leads to tension and hardened feelings on the part of everyone involved. Fong suggests the solution that the first generation should release the subsequent generations and bless them in their own way of experiencing and living out faith and community. This model has continually informed the ministries of Evergreen LA.

I suppose I have been stuck on Asian American theology despite by own ethnic identity in part because I think many white or multiethnic churches can learn from the thinking that many Asian Americans actively do about generational dynamics. Most long-established white churches more or less let their church ministries flow on while operating in autopilot, occasionally tempering the music or changing some offered ministry programs but never really taking into account how their younger people experience God and participate in the faith. I have seen some Anglo churches that also “dam up” their young people, making well-intentioned efforts at retaining their youth but simply driving them farther away and often hardening them against the faith altogether.

I am hesitant to simply apply Fong’s model to white Americans whose ancestors may have come to the US or Canada centuries ago (although some Asians can claim North American lineage for just as long) and blend into the "mainstream" of society, but when I heard him speak at AATF Fong himself made a comment to that effect. He cited the recent book unChristian by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons as one example (of many) of a book showing that cultural shifts mean emerging American and Canadian generations do not necessarily have any cultural connection to the Christian faith and thus have different perceptions of the faith and different ways of processing, experiencing, practicing, and interpreting spirituality and religion.

Perhaps white Americans do not have to consider generational shifts from a “foreign” culture to North American culture, but we may have been experiencing the shift happening beneath our own feet for a while now. As the first generations of North Americans grow up who do not have Christianity as an assumed cultural constant, the way that church looks and operates in society has to change. This does not mean that our values or compromised; quite the opposite, we have to learn how to be true to our values in a new type of context. This changing of the way church looks intends to maintain the integrity of the church, not to diminish it.

As I get involved with these churches in the GTA, I see a diversity of approaches - some comprised mostly of first generation immigrants, some of a mixture of generations, some made up of second and subsequent generation Canadians from various ethnic backgrounds. In the midst of this I see churches that bless each other and work together while allowing each other to maintain their own identity and sense of calling, and that encourages me. Perhaps this kind of networking will be one way that churches learn to reach out together in the years to come. I am not sure exactly how this looks or what problems and benefits this may pose, and I know that no "one size fits all" solution or approach exists, but it gives me something to look for this summer and to consider as I participate in future church ministries myself.