We are actually quite familiar with church #3, although we have only attended the main branch/campus of this church. Today, we checked out a newer, smaller branch of this church in West Seattle. It’s a quite popular, well-known church, known for great preaching, fast growth, and loud music, so for you Seattleites reading this, it will probably be obvious which church I’m talking about.

As much as I enjoy the preaching at this church, I’m always a little wary when I attend this church. When we first moved here, we attended the main campus for several months. We took Melanie there and told her we liked it for the diversity. For some reason, when I looked around at first, I saw people of many ages and thought I saw people of different cultures and walks of life. But when Melanie attended, she said, “You guys said it was diverse, but I only saw young, white, trendy yuppies.” Hhmm…ever since then, that’s all I’ve been able to see, too.

Today was no exception. I walked into the church, hoping for more diversity since I know West Seattle has a fairly large (I think) Hispanic population. But when we sat down, I whispered to Matt, “There’s not much diversity going on here.” He looked around and responded, “There’s one guy two rows up, and one woman behind us.” “Two?” I said. “That doesn’t make the congregation diverse.”

And, again, without exception, my critical antenna was fully extended when the pastor began speaking. He made an announcement about how two new campuses were being planned–one in downtown Seattle and another on the Eastside. I wonder why they’re building one in downtown, when Ballard and West Seattle aren’t *that* far from downtown…and wouldn’t real estate be more expensive there than, say, south Seattle? Plus, you have more residents in the south Seattle area–Rainier Valley, Rainier Beach, Renton, Kent, Tukwila. That’s where all the diversity is…but I realized that’s where all the money ISN’T. I told Matt my theory and he dismissed it, saying that downtown is more central. But still.

The pastor also mentioned how Jesus was born in an unpopular city of that time, Bethlehem, which was like White Center (an area of Seattle considered to be very dangerous). I thought, well, if church #3 keeps announcing that its purpose is to reach the people of Seattle, why not go to the heart of the area that needs it most? Why are new campuses being built in such well-off areas? (OK, Jesus loves rich people, too…)

I mentioned to Matt that as much as I like the preaching of the pastor, I don’t want to raise our kids with all these middle- to upper-class people who (and this is me being wrongfully critical and stereotypical) care so much about materialistic needs. I want to raise my kids among people of all cultures, of all income levels, so that they don’t end up thinking they should live like the upper-class population in the church. Now, I know rich people love Jesus and are generous with their time and money, but, it’s my personal preference to surround my family with the “common people,” for lack of better words. I want my church family to reflect what our neighborhood looks like–meaning culturally diverse and a mixture of different income levels and lifestyles.

In LA and here, we’ve lived in areas that were known for its low-income population, not necessarily because we did that intentionally, but also because we wanted to stay within our financial means. But I’d rather be there anyday than in a gated community in Porter Ranch or the safe neighborhoods of Seattle’s Eastside. (Not that I’m faulting people who DO live in those neighborhoods. Just understand I can be a bit of a reverse snob at times, meaning I look down on those more wealthy or try to live among those who are…and I’m not saying that’s a healthy attitude, but that’s just how I am.)

But again, what’s the priority? This church has many people our age (including some of our co-workers) and great teaching, but not the social environment that we’d really like. So what do we do?