September 2023 Monthly Letter

Dear Reconcilers, 

This month our guest writer is Dr. Mike Feazell. Mike is a long-time friend and the author of Liberation of the Worldwide Church of God (Zondervan: 2001).

Vive la Difference!

Have you ever noticed that we humans seem to be automatically fearful and distrustful of anyone who is different from us? We usually know very little about them, really, but what we do know, or think we know, is enough to make us know we don’t like them.

And it isn’t just people from a different country or a different region of our own country. It can be people from a different city or town in our own region. Or from a different part of our own town. It can even be those from a different side of the street. It doesn’t really take much for us to despise another family or person.

And that’s not to mention differences in social status, different shades of skin, or people with disabilities. For humans, any of these can become a source of ridicule, anger or hatred, even cruelty. We are afraid of what we don’t understand.

It’s so much easier to like people who are like us, isn’t it? The fewer differences between us and others, the fewer obstacles there seem to be in having a positive relationship with them. Maybe that’s because we tend to better understand people who are like us. We tend not to understand those whom we believe are not like us. But we still do a pretty good job of hating people who are like us too, don’t we?

The philosopher Plato observed that, “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.” Ignorance and fear are easy. But they paralyze us. They keep us from growing, keep us from flourishing, and keep us from becoming our better selves. We don’t have to do anything to be ignorant and afraid.

Love requires a little effort. Love moves us to care enough about others to learn about them so that we can better understand and appreciate them. Love doesn’t fear differences. Love frees us to celebrate and enjoy our differences.

J. Michael Feazell