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Thursday, September 5, 2013
News Charlotte pastor asks only white church goers to greet newcomers
Posted By Erin Tracy-Blackwood on Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 9:00 AM
Remember that time you visited a new church and all the greeters at the door were black so you left?
It sounds ridiculous, but Makeda Pennycooke, an African-American pastor at Freedom House Church in north Charlotte, was apparently convinced this sort of thing is common and drafted an email to church volunteers requesting only white members serve as door greeters.
"We are continuing to work to bring our racial demographic pendulum back to mid-line," Pennycooke wrote in the email.
She explained that the church expected an influx of visitors and needed to "make the best impression possible."
A church member who received the email was so disgusted by the request, she contacted a local news station with her story. Soon after, it was picked up by Huffington Post, Time and other major news outlets throughout the country. It also went viral on Facebook.
So much for making the best impression possible. The pastor managed to offend everyone with her email: African Americans, for implying they made a bad impression, and all other races, for implying they would turn and walk away from a church not staffed with white people.
A church spokesperson responded to criticism, saying Pennycooke "admitted it was a mistake to over-emphasize any specific group and sent an apology email within 24 hours of the original email going out."
- Irvin Yparrea (Flickr Creative Commons)
- We're bummed too.
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