Between Saturday evening and Sunday night, people from a myriad of cultures speaking many languages gather for worship on the campus of Clarkston United Methodist Church. In 1990, the city of Clarkston, Georgia was selected by the federal government to be one of the few places in America where legal refugees were to be resettled and start their new lives after leaving a refugee camp. In just a few short years, the community went from having an active chapter of Ku Klux Klan, to being what is considered by many as the most diverse square mile in the country. 
Every person who has been relocated to Clarkston has a unique story, but they all share a kindred struggle to find opportunity and safety in new land. Most people who resettle in the United States though refugee programs spend an average of seventeen years waiting to be granted asylum in a refugee camp. Many people marry and have children in the camp while undergoing the vetting process performed by United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) and approval from the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS). After they are approved, they must pay their own way or borrow money to travel to their new home where they are hopefully connected to a resettlement agency that helps them learn the culture and set up their new home. Friends of Refugees in one such organization that helps with the resettlement process. In the course of their work, they have resettled people from over 100 different ethnic backgrounds.
Many people who come seeking asylum are doctors, engineers, and working professionals, but when they arrive in the US most refugees find work in outlying chicken factories. They travel to and from the factories each day, but on Sunday many of those factory workers commute to a place of worship in which they can experience a few hours celebrating in their native culture. They can be authentically themselves and authentically human.
C
larkston United Methodist Church is microcosm of the diversity and complexity that characterizes this little town. In 2014 the congregation was approached, by a Burundian Pentecostal group asking if they could rent space. Before this congregation moved out, they were approached by five other congregations requesting space.
For a Candler assignment, I have researched a few of these worshiping communities. I’ve deiced to also post this research here on this blog in order to give my friends what the head pastor calls, “a glimpse of heaven.”
To be continued in another post…
Kena Hawkins Newkirk 