Asian American churches face leadership gap
Pastors aren't being prepared to handle congregational conflicts over cultural and generational issues, experts say.
By K. Connie Kang, Times Staff Writer
March 3, 2007

Asian American churches are going through a "crisis of leadership" because seminaries are not preparing a new generation of pastors to work in multi-generational and multicultural settings, Asian American Christian leaders say.

The problem, the leaders say, affects churches throughout the country but is particularly pronounced in California.

At a time when Christian immigrants from Asia and Asian converts in the United States are fueling what a study calls "the most dynamic changes in American Christianity," few U.S. seminaries offer courses designed to prepare pastoral leaders for the linguistic and cultural needs of Asian American congregations. That was the view expressed by experts who gathered last month at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena for a national summit of directors of seminary-based Asian American Christian centers. the rest