The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;

    fools despise wisdom and instruction. (Proverbs 1:7)

 Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, commits sin. (James 4:17)

God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son.  That whosoever believes in Him shall not die, but have eternal life (John 3: 16)

 

This week has been a tough week to watch unfolding in front of us, eh.  The increased social action in Los Angeles, with the unexpected and kind of horrifying order to have the military go in and ‘bring order’ to a demonstration that at this point was not as ‘out of control’ as the January 6 Insurrection has been shocking and upsetting.  Its not lost on me that the protests were in response to the increased action of ICE in the U.S.; increased action on mostly brown skinned undocumented immigrants who have been law-abiding and contributing to American society for quite some time.  There are several points that I need to make:

 

• Its not a felony in the U.S. to be undocumented. It’s a misdemeanor.  So if you hear people being referred to as ‘illegal immigrants’ its simply not true.  They aren’t criminals.  This is a civil dispute.  That’s it.
• Los Angeles is considered a ‘Sanctuary City’. This ordered military response to the demonstration is in violation of their declaration; the issue that the Governor of California came into conflict with, with the President of the United States.
• Most people who are undocumented in the U.S. have simply overstayed a tourist or student visa.
• There are plenty of white people, particularly from South Africa, who are undocumented, but they are not being persecuted by ICE. (This information all from CBC.ca.  I encourage all of you to go online and read everything you can about ICE and Los Angeles).

So.  The bottom line is that people once again are being persecuted, incarcerated and deported unlawfully, because of the colour of their skin.  Not only that, but there is continued rhetoric that demonizes people; saying that they’re drug dealers and criminals at best. 

 

Why?  Honestly, I don’t get it.  Honestly, this ‘othering’ of people is beyond me.  Except that maybe, its totally a power and control thing, right?  Its easy to feel superior and powerful when you demonize others.

 

And before we all heave a sigh of relief and say “thank God I’m Canadian”, I need to gently remind all of us (me included) that our racism is equally just as awful.  I have seen how many people who are refugees are treated in Canada because they have different cultures and ways of being in this world than the prevalent Colonizing society.  I know you’ve all heard the rhetoric around “we should give OUR money and healthcare to THOSE people who don’t even have jobs or speak English”.  Or, even worse, they have a different faith than the predominant Western European Christianity and express their faith in a different way than us.  I had a friend who wore her hair covered as an expression of her devotion to God, have her clothing pulled off of her in the grocery store, and was told to “go home”.  She’s a Canadian citizen.    She immigrated to Canada with her parents about the same time I did.  I have never been assaulted or had my clothing pulled off.

 

I think Jesus, that beautiful Palestinian man that we name as our Saviour, is in heaven weeping.

 

And honestly, we know better.  We Christians KNOW that we’re called to a way of life that’s vastly different.  We are called to a way of life where all of humanity is regarded equally as God’s child and fully deserving of Life and Life abundantly.  We are called to a way that considers Equity and Diversity FIRST in all of our living – where we deliberately go looking for the one person that is ‘lost’ and not part of our community, and then return them to a place of welcome and joy.  And this is not tokenism, right?  This is not the kind of tokenism that looks around our rooms and decides that there’s not enough diversity so you sub in a person of colour, or a person with a disability at the last minute.  This is not the kind of tokenism where you fly a rainbow flag one Sunday a year, but then say thing like “I’m uncomfortable with that couple holding hands in public; because you know, they’re (slight whisper) gay!” We are called to full on embracing of everyone.

 

Everyone.  No exceptions.  All of the ‘whosoevers’.

 

So this week, my dear Bethel Friends,  I’m calling all of us out.  We know better, so we need to do better.  We need to be people who are Followers of Jesus in all aspects of our life, and that includes when we talk about people who appear differently from us or who may have a different culture.  We need to be a people who call out systems that perpetuate oppression AND TOKENISM (because that is the most insidious kind of oppression).  Not only do we need to be these people, but our sacred story tells us that if we aren’t, then we are acting out of sin.

 

God loves the WORLD, not just white, able-bodied cis-gendered people.  All of us are the ‘whosoevers’.  We need to listen, learn and walk with Jesus into this way.

 

Blessings today, my ‘whosoevers’.  You are Loved.

~Rev. Lynne