Chaplain's Corner

Almost everywhere we turn these days we find the concepts of “inclusion for all” and “respect for diversity”. In almost every social organization you will find these idea included in Mission Statements and Values Statements.

Discrimination is after all unlawful in Canada except in a few very clearly defined situations. Canada is known around the world as a country built on respect for people of every culture, race, language, sexual identity and orientation, religion and anything else that may be distinct about who a person or people might be.

This is the nature of a multi-cultural, pluralistic nation that exists predominantly because wave after wave of immigration have been welcomed over its 150 year history. Sadly, many times in our history immigrants have failed to be included and respected. These values of inclusion for all and respect for diversity are not easy to uphold. We bring from our origins deep seated prejudice which result in our be judgmental and suspicious of other immigrant groups from different places and the First Nation’s people who inhabited this land long before we came to it.

As sad as these realities are they are not uncommon. Human nature, being what it is has a “built in” suspicion and fear of others who are different. Bigotry is innate and acceptance and respect are hard learned and difficult to maintain. If each of us are honest with ourselves there is bigotry buried deep within each of us that must constantly be checked and its expression monitored.

Presently our nation is opening its arms to a sizable immigration from Syria and other Middle Eastern countries being torn apart by conflict. As these folks come into our communities it is important for us to understand that the very reason they are refugee immigrants is that they have lived in a climate of exclusion and disrespect for diversity. This makes it all the more important that we greet these new neighbors with the open hearted willingness to include them in our lives, in our social circles, in our institutions of learning and health care. This makes it necessary that we work all the harder to respect our new neighbors and the differences they embody and bring to our lives and communities.

Although social heterogeneity is comfortable, there are very few places where such still exists. But even in these rare heterogeneous communities exclusion and disrespect can flourish because regardless of the nature of the differences we see in each other, we find them. If it isn’t language or color or religion or political persuasion; it is personality, temperament or giftedness.

At times various efforts are made to address our human tendency to exclude and disrespect our differences. One such attempt has been an effort to artificially eradicate the difference that exist between us: to pretend that the differences are actually not differences at all. This often happens in “closed communities” where there are efforts to get everyone to dress the same and to speak the same and to believe and value the same things. What occurs is a semblance of alikeness, but beneath that semblance the real distinctions continue to exist.

Maybe instead of excluding and disrespecting or pretending that the differences don’t exist or that they are insignificant we should celebrate our differences. God loves difference – God who is the creator and sustainer of all that exists built into His creation difference, amazing variety, at every level of his grand design. The differences are not cosmetic, they are essential. It seems to me that if we are to love God, we need to love the differences he created in us and between us. Although rebellion introduced differences that are twisted and destructive. Our fight against sin ought not cause us to fight against the inherent creative differences that make each of us unique and special and worth of love.