Responses by White Christians to Recent Latino Immigration in the Rural U.S. Midwest
Journal Title: Religions - Year 2015, Vol 6, Issue 2
Abstract
Over the last twenty-five years, the rural U.S. Midwest has undergone dramatic demographic changes as the population of white people decreased in many areas and the number of Latinos surged. These shifts are especially noteworthy in areas that had stable, relatively homogeneous populations over at least the last half-century. Many Christian churches, both Protestant and Catholic, are responding by reaching out to new residents. Such efforts have sometimes led to tension as Anglo Christians seek to reconcile the moral claims of their faith communities with the prejudices and fears they have of Latino immigrants. This article describes how Anglo-majority mainline Protestant congregations and Catholic parishes are responding to these demographic changes, notes key differences between the two groups’ responses, and then sketches several possible explanations for the differences, including the underlying theology of their efforts, the prior religious affiliation of Latino newcomers, the organizational structure of church bodies, and varying impetuses for action. The paper concludes with observations about the future of Christian communities in the rural Midwest.
Authors and Affiliations
Jeremy Rehwaldt
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP25451
- DOI https://doi.org/10.3390/rel6020686
- Views 323
- Downloads 10
Go Forth and Multiply: Revisiting Religion and Fertility in the United States, 1984-2008
Many studies on the fertility differential by religion have considered both Catholics and Protestants to be equally homogenous groups. Contrary to these studies, we contend that Protestant fertility must be studied in...
The City of Man, European Émigrés, and the Genesis of Postwar Conservative Thought
This article explores the forgotten manifesto The City of Man: A Declaration on World Democracy, which was composed in 1940 by a group of prominent American and European anti-isolationist intellectuals, including Thoma...
The New Internationalists: World Vision and the Revival of American Evangelical Humanitarianism, 1950–2010
International relief and development agencies consistently rank among the largest evangelical organizations, and in recent decades, they have gained increased exposure and influence within the greater humanitarian comm...
Buying an Afterlife: Mapping the Social Impact of Religious Beliefs through Consumer Death Goods
Choosing to have a body embalmed, the choice of interment locations and type, including the selection of a particular casket, are all deeply intertwined with various understandings of the afterlife, and views of the bo...
Communicating African Spirituality through Ecology: Challenges and Prospects for the 21st Century
This review was set in the context of African spirituality and ecology. Specifically, the review addressed issues of African spirituality and the environment from a Kenyan context. Through analyses on existing literatu...