From Classism to Community ─ A Challenge for the Church

A study of classism within the church is more than a discussion about prejudice. Prejudice may be a byproduct of classism, but classism is any kind of system of inequality based on socioeconomic status. A church that consciously or unconsciously excludes persons who are deemed lower class than the church members practices classism. In this new book, author and minister Rev. Dr. Jini Kilgore Cockroft urges the church to exercise its power to restore, empower, and include the poor and forgotten by prayerfully finding ways to deemphasize social class distinctions while learning instead to affirm and embrace the concept of the imago dei, the belief that all humans have been made in the image of God.

Jini Kilgore Cockroft, M.Div., D.Min, has partnered with her husband since 2008 in an urban mission—Highway Ministries in South Los Angeles—that offers spiritual and practical nurture, including food, clothing, and affordable housing, to people with low income. Rev. Jini is a noted Bible study teacher, seminar leader, preacher, devoted mother and grandmother.