Return to the City

Hey Jarrod,

I liked the topic you chose, primarily because I could never fully express my own quandary toward urban living versus the suburbs.

I've heard some say that during the Industrial Revolution, when the masses moved to the city to find work, what came afterwards was confusion and a desire clarify ones existence. To me that makes sense, because in the urban areas your confronted with chaos at times, making you not only reevaluate, but sometimes take on a different identity to survive and exist. If I'm living downtown, I'm surrounded by people who think, believe and behave in ways contrary to mine.

My own experience while living in Orlando was of total confusion, but I did come to Christ in the middle of all that disorder and when I look back I can't tell if I love or despise urban living. Part of my soul comes alive when living in urban areas because what mankind can create collectively is remarkable.

I agree it's so much easier to be a cookie cutter Christian if you individualize your life in the suburbs.
Pastors of suburban churches have not bought a lie, but they do have an unchallenged view of reality. Largely, because at the end of their day, they go back to the suburbs and close their gates.

I hope we the church can live in urban areas with our gates continually open.

in my 'hood this flocking to the suburbs is referred to as "white flight." it's not so much that the people in general left the urban areas, but that the white people with money left. their neighborhoods started to look unsafe, and rather than work to keep their neighborhoods from going bad, they left.
but, they mostly kept their churches in the 'hood. they're called, yep: white flight churches. thankfully, many have in recent years really started to work with the neighborhoods that their families fled from. but it's still with that white flight mentality a lot of times: we superior whites are gonna help you poor people that still have to live here. there is the occasional congregation or family that doesn't come with that mentality, but it's rare.
unfortunately, the racial tension that had a great impact in this move to suburbia is glossed over. but believe me, my neighbours in the 'hood have not forgotten why we left.

and any return to the city, especially a return of christians and churches, needs to be mindful and sensitive to those hurts that are still left from when we fled.

Holly raises an interesting point, but, as a white person, I am tired of being blamed for not living inner city in dangerous conditions. My husband's family left the inner city, not post World War II, but in the early 90's because every Friday they had to sit on the porch with shotguns to protect their vehicles from being vandalized and set on fire by the neighborhood black kids after the football game. My husband has sworn that he will never go back to the inner city after all of the negative experiences that he had. Neither my husband or I are racist: I am currently involved in trying to get our suburban church to be more racially diverse, and right now we are hosting a little boy from Haiti who has come here to get medical care. But my politically incorrect point is that while your neighbors in the 'hood may be nursing their hurts from white flight, maybe they need to look a little closer to home to figure out why their community is so unattractive.

I work in an after-school program with kids who come from the poorest neighborhood in my town. Many of the kids at the school I work at attend my home church through our bus ministry. The church that I go to is in the most affluent neighborhood in my town. Every Sunday and Wednesday we take kids who live (some with 6-7 other people) in 800 sq. ft. slum apartments out to a suburban neighborhood with brand new 4,000 sq. ft. homes surrounded by golf courses. More than half the kids that are in my after-school program are minorities. Some barely speak English. The kids that get on the bus to come to church every week make up almost the entire minority population in the church (most weeks, I make up the rest). Most of the 450 adults in our congregation seem to be completely unaware of the fact that these kids exist. They drive from their large houses in their Lexus SUVs and they walk straight into the sanctuary, never realizing that there are kids downstairs who don't eat unless they are fed at school, who sleep on floors because there are more people than beds in their homes, who move three or more times each year because their parents can't pay the rent. You can't spend more than five minutes in their neighborhood and not recognize the needs that exist there. There are only a few people in the congregation who have been willing to go to where these kids live, and even then it is under carefully-controlled circumstances.

I hope that the church (not specifically my congregation, but the church in general) can find its way back to the city. Suburbanites have needs that I will probably never understand. But, I think some of those needs could be met simply by spending some time ministering in low-income neighborhoods and getting to know their neighbors.

I worked at my local rescue mission for several years and recently have been teaching writing to vocational students - most are drop outs or somehow marginalized from our educational system.

I am struck by the isolation and conformity of the suburbs. There is a bland sameness and a fierce and vain attempt at asserting one's individuality - mostly with tatoos & piercings - that reveals a deep seated hunger for belonging and recognition.

There is the same emptiness of the suburbs expressed in the faces of my young students. The drop rate is high - as is the birth rate. The vast majority of my students are locked into a habit - and lifestyle of poverty.

And the suburbs - in a way - ensure enduring poverty in ways that the bleak inner cities never could.

At least inner city dwellers have each other - and usually access to mass transit. The suburban poor are isolated and cut off from their communities. They are also absolutely dependent on their cars.

In the long term, I fear conformity more than inner city crime...

The suburbs manifest the emptiness of the soul of America - there is no center, no heart, no community...

one question, how does a white suburbanite "work" on making their white suburban church more diverse? Are you adding drums? even white urban churches struggle to do that. you don't MAKE anybody come to your church. one Haitian doesn't make you diverse. it might introduce a different culture in to your home and for that reason, you might be selfish in your charity, but you have said nothing about what you are doing to diversify YOURSELF. your post sounds angry, and bitter and that's a bummer. you make no indication of trying to reconcile yourself to your husband's own bitterness towards his old community.

it's important to note the suburban return to the city doesn't work out all that well for urban dwellers. housing prices skyrocket, and often the lower-income minorities that lived in the area are driven out to the suburbs, something that's happening in Portland, Gresham and Hillsboro right now.

i believe a key to being able to move into the inner city areas without creating gentrification for the neighbors you were trying to help, is to be willing to keep yourself "downsized" as well. of course, if you go into a low-income neighborhood and build a high-income house, this will negatively affect the poor's tax situation. etc.
it's about solidarity, not trying to make them have the same "consumer lifestyle" that we cling to.
some brand new buildings were just built in our neighborhood, and our neighbors are Quite upset because their property Taxes went up, but not their property Values. and they also don't appreciate the fact that these new homes don't Fit with the architectural styles of the neighborhood.
if a former suburbanite is willing to live a simpler life, and join a community in solidarity, and become their neighbor rather than their saviour, it can work. if one comes in thinking they want to "fix the neighborhood" and tries to do that with financial plans, nope, you're right jordan it won't work. will do harm more than anything else.

i want to second jordan's post. this epidemic of gentrification is spreading throughout cities nationwide, and has been for a while now. it is definitely happening in austin. there is a growing need for the church to not only be a positive presence within poorer neighborhoods, but to be wholisticly invested in the lives, relationships, and needs of those overlooked by our society. that means being in the neighborhoods, talking with the people about what they need, and coming along side them to help them make the change for themselves. this type of empowerment goes a lot longer of a way than just handing out food every now and then. someone recently told me that you can't just go love people in poor neighborhoods, you have to be allowed to love. and that comes from building these bonds that are genuine and not just some project. a lot of what is going on is somewhat new to me so i am trying to figure it out myself. i would encourage you to check out www.ccda.org. they have been doing christian community development for a while now and have really changed my perspective on how to minister to the needy within our cities. my wife and i are now looking to relocate within an impoverished neighborhood and begin helping from the inside and being invested in change because we are living in the neighborhood itself. then we can begin racial reconciliation and redistribution, two of the three key points to ccda's ministry. don't have all the answers, just thought i'd chime in. sorry so long winded. loved the article. peace.

@ Brian and Jordan

I could not agree more. Gentrification can be extremely harmful. The number of families driven from their homes in the name of hip, young money, condo developments is tough to swallow.

However, I really do feel that it is a unique opportunity for the church. Perhaps I could write more about this in article form, but I believe gentrification actually invites the church to engage four issues it has run from. I believe if a church engages gentrification they will have a voice and a presence in conversations of aesthetics, poverty, development, and diversity. These are the conversations the church must be a part of if its going to be relevant to urban centers.

I am late to the conversation, but wanted to offer a third layer. Before I begin, I want to say that I do not live in the place where I grew up. I have been here for sixteen years and am considered "not from here". My view may be different from one who grew up in a place such as the one I am about to describe.
I live in a small town in the mid-west. We are currently celebrating our bicentennial. We are not new to the map, nor did we get here as the result of sprawl. The nearest city of recognizable size is 65 miles away and suburbia is nearly as far. We are home to 5,000 people.
The people who live here depend on one another much like a city. Walking and biking are major modes of transportation. We do not live off of an interstate. We are home to a large construction company and much organic farming. Wealthy and poor live side by side and friendships span income gaps.
A friend and I were commenting on our own closer group of friends at a party - noting who we represented: doctor, microbiologist, stay-at home-mom, drug rep, independently wealthy couple, potter, unemployed, prison nurse, customer service rep. We took it a step further: Christian, atheist, humanist. We laughed and said we could pat ourselves on the back for our diversity and challenging world view. Or state the facts...we just don't have that many options in a small town. Friends are made on a personal level. It is far too difficult to look into a "class system" when you find someone whose company you really enjoy.
My church looks much like a mini-city church. We met in a school for eight years and just built a building that is more function than form. We are our people. We try to live Jesus and His gospel and take care of one another and creation.
When the Church does that, the natural extension of itself is to overflow into other areas because it is already properly cared for. Our church started a daughter church in another small town and partnered with a hurting church in urban Poland. It was an organic step to move into these areas and the people willing to go were ready and equipped.

I do not say any of this to present an ideal, just a third way of life.

To anon: You are absolutely right: taking care of a Haitian boy does little to make my congregation more racially diverse. (One note: instead of suburban, I should have said it is closer to rural). I am not sure how it makes me selfish, but okay. Adding drums? No, did that a long time ago. As for MAKING anybody come, we don't use shotguns -- even in the sticks. I am sorry that my post came off sounding bitter and angry, but I was trying to give an honest answer to the question: Why did we leave? There is no doubt that systemic racism and injustice left people in the inner city poor and stranded. But there is also no question that these communities have extremely high crime rates and are very dangerous. But Jarrod's answer seems to be "if the rich white people move back, it will all get better," which seems to suggest that the urban poor NEED us to help them. I am simply suggesting, not unlike Bill Cosby, that deep, radical change cannot occur until this community starts to take responsibility for itself.