The dictionary defines the other as a group or member of a group that is perceived as different, foreign or strange.
It is an accepted idea that prejudice and its symptoms stem from a fear of this 'other'.
So I'll begin with a story.
I'm sure you'll be familiar with it. There was a man, and he was born into poverty to a young mother, from his birth he was persecuted, his family fleeing and thus becoming refugees
He grew up to be very wise, and felt a strong calling on his life, he had a close knit group of friends, composed of misfits and outsiders, and along with these confidants he set out to right the wrongs in his community. He fought for freedom, he taught others, he helped the poor and the lowly, ever looking back on his beginnings, and remembering the faces of his family and the place from which he came when he spoke with the marginalised, with the oppressed and with their oppressors.
The authorities at the time didn't like him, they didn't like his message and neither did much of the public. One day they finally caught him, betrayed by one of his own and arrested on a weak charge. Not long after that he was tried, persecuted and killed - leaving behind his group of misfits, mourning, frightened, in danger, but still empowered by his message.
You've heard this story a thousand times right? You know who this man was?
Of course you do, this man was the man we worship, the man called Jesus.
You see, Jesus was an 'other'. I'm sure if he walked into a white majority church in modern times he'd stand out like a sore thumb. If you placed pictures of him in a church full of conservatives and asked the people what they thought they'd make snap judgements, as would we. I'm sure if you asked our politicians whether he should be allowed shelter or food in this country as homeless and jobless immigrant, they wouldn't see his charity, his mission and his love, they'd see his appearance, the pigment of his skin and say, well, we need to train people in this country to do that job, he should really have come here legally.
Our messed up theology has for too long come from.this place of fearing the 'other' because we've failed to see that the man we worship was the 'other' that He put on pedestals others who were seen as the misfits, the people on the edges- he showed us that our glory as the church should be putting aside our so-called respectability, and gathering together the outcasts.
Christ does not come in the form of a well to do white man singing praises for violence and policing women's bodies. No, Christ comes in the form of the homeless man, the refugee, the pregnant teenager, the hate crime victim, the suicidal young adult. The Holy Spirit is found whenever we take the true story of Jesus, the true person of Christ and see that He doesn't endorse a church that hurts people, He endorses a church "which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security".
