Jesus understood and lived in a community of diverse cultures. He never tried to bring about uniformity but all the time he emphasized unity. This is very evident in his early mission, He offered reconciliation to all cultures. Jesus did this by calling Jews and Gentiles together and offered all a place in the God’s Kingdom. Despite of Him being a Jew, He never favored the Jews at the expense of Gentiles.
Jesus
went a notch higher by teaching his own Jewish disciples to reach out with love
and acceptance to the Gentiles, who were regarded as uncivilized by many people
of the time. This acceptance and love enabled the Gentiles to be allowed in the
fellowship circles without them being converted to Judaism. Gentiles were
accepted as they were with their limitedness and weaknesses. This explicitly
teaches us that Jesus respected differences and allowed communion to prevail at
the level of diversity. Not only that but also Christs’ teachings respected all
cultures and never tolerated any stereotype to dominate His community of the
time.[1]
As
a matter of fact, after his ascension into heaven his Gospel was unceasingly
preached by the early church in their ministries, and taking care of one
another. Church must be understood as a worshiping, evangelizing, teaching
caring and disciplining community. This care and ministry is vivid in many of
the Churches today thus re-living the dominical teaching commenced by Jesus. It
is in and through the worshiping community that we bring our cultural
differences to end and already foretold in Jesus’ prayer where he prayed to his
Father that, “I pray that they may be one as you Father are in me and I in
you.”[2] The
Catholic Church for example has got a number of helping bodies which work to
help the poor and the needy without considering their cultural history. In here
they have schools that provides education for all, hospitals that provide
treatment for all, Churches in themselves are non-discriminative all come to
pray at all times, religious congregations have got rehabilitating centers,
elderly homes whose service is extended to all as humans who mirror out Gods
image. In doing so the Catholics have exhibited a high sense of empathy where
they re-echo the teachings and command of Jesus who commissioned all the
Baptized to go and make disciples of all nations. Making disciples is not
enough but they are mandated to add value to their way of life through
Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit[3]
and above all they are instructed to teach them all that Himself taught them.
This is none other than the Gospel of love.
The church today is still commissioned with fulfilling the great mission and teaching us to come together in fellowship that involves a community ignited with Loving one another with no discrimination, to develop partnership that actively promotes the Gospel and builds up its faithful and mutual sharing of insights, experiences, worship, needs and material possessions. The Church sees Christ as person who urges us to evangelize, teach and live with this very lens of love. He does not leave us orphans, rather he directs us to live a practical life other than staying in the world of theoretical attitude. To put in practice what we preach. Jesus gives us this gist summarized in two laws that is: To love God and to love others.
On the other side humans are inclined to competing with one another and most often we have disagreements. At the same time, we cannot forget that we need each other and we are created primarily as social beings that’s why under normal circumstances we exit in communities. Communities helps us to feel a sense of belongingness and accepted. Going a little deep we say that it is in and through these schools of socialization that we share guidance and healing very especially when there is spiritual, relational, financial amidst other needs. The thirst of helping others is a sign of the human dignity. At the same time, humans are easily moved by the misfortunes of others. A fresh example is the time of pandemic that we are all in; people from different parts of the Globe come in as individual, as government organizations, religious groups, families, as religions, either as Muslims, Catholics Hindus, Buddhist among others to solicit resources to help the suffering humanity without imitating or following cultural basis. All these help us to understand that human beings have the potential of rising above all the possible differences in the world having Jesus as the tower since he preached and lived the truth of not accepting discrimination.
[1]
Kibui, Agnes Waja, The Role of the Church in Enhancing Multicultural Education
for Postive Social Development in Kenya, The Catholic University of Eastern
Africa, AMECEA Gaba Publications- CUEA press, 2014, Pp. 391-392.
[2]Cf
Jn 17:21
[3]
Cf. Mt 28:19
[4]https://bible.org/seriespage/12-christ-and-cultures-multiculturalism-and-gospel-christ
retrieved on 5/12/2020.
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