Extract
An Affinity for difference: a theology of power.
Introduction
Difference. Difference bothers us. It troubles us if we have a "difference of opinion" with others. We might be uncomfortable if we are in settings where practices and beliefs are different from ours. Public leaders place a high value on the ways they are different from others, trying to make constituents uncomfortable with the differences between them and their political rivals. Difference has a bad rap. We don't like it. We try to avoid it. However, according to Genesis I, difference is the heart of creation. (1) It is, in fact, what constitutes creation, for without difference, according to Genesis, there was "a formless void." Although difference is the gift and the heart of creation itself, we humans use power both to create further difference and to abuse difference. Such creations and abuses are manifest as systems of oppression that are based upon the control, objectification, exclusion, and condemnation of others through and because of difference. (2) For instance, we use power to create differences among ourselves, such as through the construction of race and the economy of class. Similarly, we create power disparities based upon difference, whether that difference is constructed or real. For example, we create economic power based on constructed differences of race, and we create differences in social power based on biological differences, such as the differences in muscle mass across the sexes. The church, made of humans as it is, exists within the tensions and problems humanity has created around difference. What is our way through the abuses of power that we have inherited and created around difference? In this paper I propose two means of resistance to and transformations of abuses of power. The first is nonviolent resistance, for which I depend upon various examples of transformative power within the Gospel of Mark. The second is a practice of hospitality of the other, for the sake of the neighbor, from the state of being simultaneous...See the full content of this document
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