wfn.org | Program to strengthen black families focuses on parenting skills

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG>]

May 21, 1999 News media contact: Linda Green*(615)742-5470*Nashville, Tenn.
10-31-71B{281}
 
By Linda Green*

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (UMNS) - A pioneering program of the National Council of
Churches (NCC) aims to strengthen African-American families for the new
millennium by teaching effective parenting. 
 
Fifty consultants from across the country received training in March and in
May on how to hold seminars that will give black parents grounding from a
biblical and spiritual perspective.

The sessions drew on faith resources and on the history and strengths of the
black family. The church leaders who participated represented 10
denominations, primarily those with historic African-American churches and
significant black membership. 

The consultants' goal is to recruit at least two churches to provide at
least two parenting seminars in the next 12 months. They also want to have
100 congregations join the Black Family Ministry Project and implement an
"Effective Black Parenting" curriculum. 

"The black church has always been in the midst of community life," said
Marilyn Magee, director of black family resources at the United Methodist
Board of Discipleship in Nashville. "Targeting families as a focus for
ministries seems a natural growth of who we are and our efforts to service
those in need." 

Magee went through the training herself and is a certified instructor in
Effective Black Parenting. The United Methodist Church is one of many
denominations supporting the NCC program.

The NCC's focus on black parenting grew out of work that began in the late
1980s and in 1991-95. Funded in part by the Lilly Endowment, the project
aimed at strengthening black families in many areas of life. At that time,
consultants were trained to help congregations become more aware of  the
needs of black families and be more intentional in ministering to them.

The experiences of those participants indicated a critical need to address
faith formation in the African-American household, to provide places for
parent education in black congregations and to develop resources to support
black family ministry. Out of that project, the manual Church and Family
Together was published in 1996.

An overwhelming need exists to strengthen black families through the efforts
of effective parenting, according to Karen Bernstine, NCC black family
project coordinator. The 1999 Black Family Ministry project is about more
than teaching parenting skills, she said. It aims to promote a spiritual
foundation for parenting.

Bernstine said because of the need for a black parents to provide spiritual
base, the Lilly Endowment funded the parenting project in this first time
effort to train church leaders in helping the members of their congregations
strengthen their families.

"More and more, people are looking at ways to home in on various issues
affecting black families through using the church," she said.
 
"My parenting means nothing unless I provide a spiritual foundation for my
child," said Bernstine, the mother of a 5-month-old. 

A spiritual foundation will give children the knowledge that God and Jesus,
the Christ, are sources of strength and can be relied upon during all the
phases of life, she said.

The consultants' trainer is the Rev. Bennie Thompson of Maywood, Ill., who
is no stranger to parenting from a faith-based perspective. Thompson, pastor
of Neighborhood United Methodist Church, is commissioned by the Los
Angeles-based Center for the Improvement of Childcaring to conduct effective
parenting classes.

Thompson said his strategy offers a look at how children are raised in the
church and how that model reflects Christian values. 

The March training session was the first that he has led exclusively for
church leaders. Thompson normally works with agencies and parents who've
been ordered to take parenting classes or training by the courts. The
session also was a first for church leaders who had not experienced this
type of training before.

In the sessions, participants engaged in interactive dialogue, role playing
and presentations that reinforce what they're learning.

By participating in the training, Magee said she drew new insights into
raising children. The curriculum focused on cultural history and values from
an Afrocentric viewpoint. 

The training also provided alternatives to various child-rearing practices,
especially spanking. Thompson, she said, used the African proverb 'a
shepherd does not strike his sheep' to guide participants in correct
understandings of the term "rod."

"The way the Bible has been interpreted for us is from a slave mentality,"
Thompson said. "Spanking and name-calling to make children submissive were
things the master did in slavery."

Black parents, he said, should find ways of gaining their children's
cooperation without spanking them. They should have discussions with their
children and also have rules and guidelines, he said. 

He cited the Scriptural advice: Train a child in the way they should go, and
when they grow old, they will not depart from it.

In guiding children, he said, parents should elaborate when using words such
as "stop." They should not just say "stop this" or "stop that," but pinpoint
the behavior for a child.  "If you want a child to stop running, you don't
say 'stop,' but (you) tell the child to stop running." Parents also should
give children answers in complete sentences, he said

"For any action that a child does, have a discussion. Talk to them, and they
will talk to you."

Parents should build spirituality in their children by praying with them, he
added.

The African-American community has large numbers of young parents, single
parents and grandparents rearing children. "Our culture has changed," Magee
said. "Many changes in our society today do not support the well-being of
children and of families struggling to provide a quality life."

The Effective Black Parenting curriculum would be helpful because
departments of children and family services, along with the judicial
systems, often refer parents to parenting classes that "are not offered in
positive ways for African-American parents," Magee said.

The Effective Black Parenting program is the only culturally specific and
Christian-specific program in the country for African-Americans, Thompson
said. 

"Black parenting is different from white parenting," he said. "The way we
live is different, and white parents don't have extended families like we
have." In the African-American context, an extended family consists of
next-door neighbors and people in the church, and there are unique customs
in the black community, he said.

"White parents don't come from a slave base where we had to be kept from
white harm," he said.  Throughout those times, black children were taught to
obey authority, regardless of whether the authority figure was right or
wrong, he said. "We were taught that way, and that way took away our
creativity, motivation and our self-motivation."

"When blacks moved north," the extended family was dismantled, he said.
Often, those people who are in the church are the beneficiaries of an
extended family. 

"We need to get back to it. The church and community should share the
responsibility for family," he said. "We've left the responsibility to
others."

The foremost need is for black parents and families to recognize that they
do have strengths and that they can raise children effectively, Thompson
said. Parents also should realize that people are available to help them
when difficulties arise, he said.  

Strengthening the black family is a "three-way street" involving home,
church and school, he said. When rules are followed at home, they are
followed in church, he said. From church, a child learns morals, and those
morals will be followed in school. "If there is no three-way street, there
will be chaos."

Magee said the Black Family Ministry Project also could be beneficial to the
Strengthening the Black Church for the 21st Century initiative of the United
Methodist Church.  The $3.1 million initiative is addressing the critical
needs and offering solutions for growth in the black church The churchwide
emphasis seeks to restore, reconstruct, redeem, reconcile and revitalize the
African-American churches in the United States.

The churches involved in the initiative would find the family project an
effective outreach ministry, she said. "Congregations can be strengthened by
reaching out to families. A strong family life will yield strong
communities."

In addition to the United Methodist Church, the other denominations
participating in the black family ministry project include: the African
Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), the African Methodist Episcopal Zion
Church (AMEZ), the American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A.; the Christian
Church (Disciples of Christ), the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church
(CME), the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America; the National Baptist
Convention, U.S.A. Inc.; the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.); and the United
Church of Christ.

For more information on the program, call Bernstine at (718) 284-9234.

# # #

*Green is news director of the Nashville office of United Methodist News
Service.

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United Methodist News Service
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