EAUK.org
Share
RSS Feeds
Did you like this FNT?
Make a gift - help spread the word.
Don't Be A Stranger! - PDF
Other FNT's you may be interested in
| ||||
Topic(s) for this FNT
Data Protection Act 1998: By providing your personal details you agree to allow the Evangelical Alliance to contact you by mail, email, telephone or SMS text message in connection with its charitable purposes. The Evangelical Alliance does not make personal data available to external individuals or organisations.
Don't Be A Stranger!
26 June 2009
How ironic that in the week a survey revealed Belfast to be the UK's most neighbourly city it made far more headlines for the racial abuse and intimidation handed out to a group of Romanian families. Hot on the heels of those developments came results of another survey showing that over 50% in Northern Ireland would mind having a member of the travelling community as an in-law or a neighbour and a quarter of us feel the same way about migrant workers.
But Belfast isn't the only place under the microscope in the debate. Comments from workers at the Lindsey refinery have included the colour of people's skin and ethnic heritage, the newly elected Mayor of Doncaster has vowed to stop translation services for immigrants, and all of this on the back of the BNP's success in recent European and council elections.
Maybe money, or the lack of it, tends to bring out the worst in us. When times are tough, and many of us are under financial pressures we haven't known for a while, we are prone to look for someone to blame, preferably an easy target. Hasn't world history taught us that the most evil of dictators have come to power on the back of economic pressures and managed to turn whole nations against a minority community whom they make the scapegoat?
I came across an article from Seattle in the USA where the attitude is very different. Seattle has become a multi-cultural city. The percentage of foreign-born residents has increased significantly in the last three decades. In 1980, the foreign-born population constituted about 11 percent of Seattle's population. In 2000, it was almost 17 percent. By 2010, it could be almost 20 percent. As the face of Seattle changes, City government has also changed to embrace the city's newest residents, promoting the full and active participation of immigrant and refugee communities in Seattle's civic, economic and cultural life. 'We all benefit when we're all included,' is one of their strap lines.
New York even has an official, annual celebration of Immigrant Heritage Week in April; a unique celebration of the vibrant immigrant cultures, heritage, and communities found in every corner of the City.
That all seems a far cry from what we are witnessing in parts of the UK just now; and it's also a far cry from the heart of a God who from his earliest dealing with people charged them to pay particular attention to the widow, the orphan and the foreigner living amongst them. Then there's Jesus who identified with the stranger, the outsider, and who told us we would often find him there; who reminded us that serving the needy and deserted was actually serving him. And in case we think it's all about charity, let's remember that it's not just about what we can do for others; it's also what they bring to us. Perhaps our own 'Don't be a stranger' campaign has never been more relevant.
Stephen Cave, Northern Ireland National Director, Evangelical Alliance
Latest comments
:
(The views below are the authors', and not necessarily those of the Evangelical Alliance.)
| Written by David Young on 01 July 2009 at 04.23 |
| Jesus of Nazareth was not exactly a model of non-racist behaviour. Just look at the way he spoke to a certain Canaanite woman. Still, travelling-Roma culture could not be described as non-racist, non-sexist, non-homophobic, respectful of international rights to children's education or respectful of communities in which they live. The phrase 'What goes around comes around' springs to mind. |
| Written by Alan Chilver on 29 June 2009 at 11.21 |
| While fully concurring with the concerns raised in Sephen Cave's FNT about latent racism in our country and the need for a more truly biblically-based understanding and approach in the issue, I suggest we need to develop a richer and full-orbed means of enabling immigrants and asylum seekers genuinely to INTEGRATE into our society, and to seek ways of avoiding GHETTOISM aswe strive for a more fully multi-cultural society. |
| Written by Rob Haskell on 26 June 2009 at 18.44 |
| Hi Stephen - I thought I would comment, since I live just north of Seattle. It's true that our "northwest culture" here is probably more accepting and certainly more liberal than other areas of the US. On the other hand, we do still see a lot of "circle the wagons" (pardon the Western metaphor) attitude where outsiders are not welcome because they are seen as evil, invaders, lazy, system abusers, etc. In my mind a better example of a multicultural society is Vancouver BC, just across the border. Of course, Canada is much more explicitly multi-cultural than the US. More concerning to me in this region (the US Northwest) is a common confusion among Christians where a fundamentalist rejection of the world becomes a political/social stance of rejection of outsiders. They are seen to be the same kind of threat to society as "the world" is supposed to be to the church. (It makes me wonder which came first, the political/social stance or the theological one.) We have many churches which accept that kind of thinking uncritically. It's one of our challenges. |
There is 1 additional comment for this page.
Comments for this article are now closed
Subscribe to 
for those comments!
Subject: Migration | Community cohesion | Evangelism | Politics
Author: Cave, Stephen
© Evangelical Alliance
