Heather L. Hart
Out of Place: Christian community in 1 Peter and James
The green outline of his face was a caricature, the name inaccurate. Yet, we didn’t think twice about our school mascot, we were the “Indians.” We cheered his image at games and emblazoned his likeness on yearbooks. It was years later before I heard an Indigenous American Christian speak about her heartbreak at this type of appropriation of tribal culture. I was left reconsidering my perspective and my assumptions.
How does our Christian community live as God’s people when we are often either blind to appropriation or heartbroken at the pervasiveness of it? We are meant to embrace our unified identity as the people of God and help bring God’s purpose and blessing to the world, yet our experience of the world vastly differs.