"What do you do when you encounter someone who isn't like you? How do you feel? What goes on inside you? How do you relate to him or her? ... Few things are more basic to life than expressing love and respect for people who look, think, believe, act, and see differently than we do. We want to adapt to the barrage of cultures around us while still remaining true to ourselves. We want to let the world change us so that we can be part of changing the world. And we want to move from the desire to love across the chasm of cultural difference to the ability to express our love for people of difference. Relating lovingly to our fellow human beings is central to what it means to be human..."
"The billions of us sharing planet Earth together have so much in common. We're all born. We all die. We're all created in the image of God. We eat, sleep, persevere, and care for our young. We long for meaning and purpose, and we develop societies with those around us."
"But the way we go about the many things we have in common is deeply rooted in our unique personalities and cultures. So although we have so much in common, we have as much or more about us that's different. Asian. European. Tattooed. Clean-cut. Male. Female. Old. Young. Pentecostal. Emergent. Republican. Democrat. Suburban. Rural. Urban. These points of difference are where we find both our greatest challenges and our greatest discoveries. And as the world becomes increasingly more connected and accessible, the number of encounters we have with those who are culturally different are growing daily. Most of us are more comfortable with people like ourselves. But seeking out and loving people of difference is a far greater challenge. Therefore, learning how to reach across the chasm of cultural difference with love and respect is becoming an essential competency for today's ministry leader."
David Livermore, Cultural Intelligence: Improving Your CQ to Engage Our Multicultural World
The world is shrinking. Even areas of the world which were traditionally "homogeneous," with little diversity of any kind and little contact with "foreigners," have changed and are changing. Diversity is everywhere. When I grew up in white, middle class, suburban Minnesota, I experienced very little diversity (cultural, racial, ethnic, religious). Now, several decades later, when I visit Minnesota I encounter people who are different than "my people" on every hand - Lebanese at the grocery store; Arab, Indian, Vietnamese and many other restaurants and delis; a Tunisian woman working in the coffee shop of the university I attended; a second hand shop we frequent, in which I now hear Spanish more than English; Jordanians, Lebanese, Indians, and more, in my brother's suburban neighborhood; Somali and Ethiopian taxi and shuttle drivers; and more.
As Livermore points out, we have a sense of sharing much in common with other people; but the similarity is clothed in some deep cultural difference, which tends to make us uncomfortable. I remember Tom Brewster, who taught language learning and cultural adaptation, saying "people like to hang out with people of their own ethnicity." And so the question becomes, how will we respond to the difference around us, which is increasing "bumping into" us? Will we seek to run and hide from it, or will we learn to engage "different" people in constructive ways?
I like Livermore's emphasis on love. For those who have Jesus as a model and guide in life, love is the great imperative (and remember, the example Jesus gave to illustrate his command to "love our neighbor as ourselves," was the despised religiously and ethnically/racially different Samaritan, people that the Jews of Jesus's day would avoid at all costs).
Indeed, as Livermore concludes, "learning how to reach across the chasm of cultural difference with love and respect is becoming an essential competency" - for all of us.
