Structural Adaptations in Immigrant Congregations

Sociology of Religion, Summer, 2000 by Helen Rose Ebaugh, Janet Saltzman Chafetz

Helen Rose Ebaugh [*]

In this paper we show that immigrant religious institutions tend to assume many elements of a congregational structure and a community center model of functioning, characteristics usually not found in their countries of origin. Based on data from the Religion. Ethnicity, New Immigrants Research (RENIR) project in Houston, Texas, we found, however, that the two dimensions are distinct and largely unrelated to one another. While each serves as a vehicle to engender high levels of member commitment to the religious institution and serves to meet both religious and material needs of the immigrants, congregations vary in the degree to which they develop the two major elements of congregationalism.

As the bedrock of religious life in the United States, congregations have been recognized as the place where like-minded people come together to worship, to share fellowship, to make friends, and often to seek help with material needs. In fact, unlike many religious institutions in the countries from which both earlier streams and post-1965 immigrants came, in the United States congregations often become community centers, places where immigrants can socialize with fellow ethnics, reproduce ethnic values and customs, learn civic skills, and find assistance with meeting the material needs that arise in the face of resettlement (Dolan 1985; Fenton 1988; Haddad and Lummis 1987; Herberg 1960; Hurh and Kim 1990; Kashima 1977; Min 1992; Orsi 1985; Smith 1978; Warner and Wittner 1998). In fact, Ammerman (1997b; Tocqueville 1969) argues that congregations are part of the voluntaristic spirit that makes American democracy vital.

The many scholars (e.g., Ammerman 1997a; Carroll et at. 1986; Douglass and Brunner 1935; Hatch 1989; Herberg 1960; Hopewell 1987; Marty 1958; 1981; Metz 1967; Roof and McKinney 1987; Webber 1964; Wind and Lewis 1994; Wuthnow 1988) who have described American congregations, as well as the process of creating them (i.e., congregationalism), have tended, in one way or another, to include two dimensions: 1) structural characteristics (e.g., substantial lay leadership, voluntary membership, sense of ownership on the part of the laity, professional clergy, membership lists, and member financing); and 2) the development of community centers for the provision of non-religious social services to members. Moreover, in his article on the place of the congregation in contemporary America, Warner (1994) argued that de facto congregationalism characterizes many of the new immigrant congregations that are being established throughout the United States. These immigrant religious institutions approximate the congregational m odel that has existed in American Protestantism since its inception, with emphasis upon voluntary membership rather than ascription or geography, lay involvement in decision making, a professional clergy, the declining significance of denominationalism, financial support from members, the development of community centers, and the provision of social services. He predicted that in the course of building places of worship, immigrants would increasingly move in the direction of congregationalism. His contention was verified by many of the new immigrant congregational studies that were part of his New Ethnic and Immigrant Congregations Project (NEICP), as described in Gatherings in diaspora: Religious communities and the new immigration (1998).

In the thirteen immigrant congregations that we studied as part of the Religion, Ethnicity, New Immigrants Research (RENIR) project in Houston, Texas, we found widespread support for Warner's prediction of de facto congregationalism among immigrant congregations. Regardless of how their counterpart institutions abroad are structured and function, a major part of their adaptation to US society usually involves, to variable degrees, the assumption of a congregational structure and a community center model of secular service delivery to members. However, we also discovered that these two dimensions of congregationalism do not vary together. Some congregations that have strong lay involvement, choose their own clergy, and keep lists of members also have strong community centers that provide a variety of non-religious services for members and sometimes the larger community, while others have strong community centers but are very clergy-dominated in terms of authority structure. We argue that although these two co ncepts are not clearly distinguished in the literature, to be useful the construct of congregationalism must clearly differentiate the structure of congregations from their development as community centers. In this paper we analytically and empirically separate the two dimensions of congregationalism, which then allows us to examine their relationship to one another. Our approach is to define two ideal-typical constructs, one for a fully congregational structure and one for a fully community center model of functioning, in order to examine the extent to which each of our thirteen study institutions conforms to them and the extent to which these two structural dimensions overlap in the same congregations.