Only 'humans' welcome

I read this morning, on Facebook admittedly, that some people are planning to boycott Tesco because their Christmas advert includes pictures of Muslims. My friends response was less than helpful: “FANTASTIC!! Now we won't have to rub shoulders with quite as many ignorant Islamophobic bigots while we queue to buy our sprouts! RESULT! :-)”  Contrastingly Tesco’s campaign is entitled ‘Everyone Welcome!’

To me this raises massive questions of identity and how we define ourselves. Are we a ‘Christian’ country? Are those who object to Muslims (interestingly they seem to ignore that Sikh’s were also depicted in the ad!) regular church goer’s, and thus bastion supporters of the Christian faith? I doubt it, or more accurately I really hope not. Worshipping God should teach us of love and respect for each person whatever their beliefs and wherever they are from, as fellow citizens made with God’s image within us. Sadly I fear that too often we define ourselves by what we are not, ‘like them’ rather than who we are and what we value and love. Jesus taught that we should love our neighbour and even our enemies, as we love ourselves, he indicated that ‘the poor’ were people who would possess the kingdom of God. His rule was that we are never ‘good’ or ‘righteous’ because we are not like ‘them.’ Real goodness (dare I say Christianity) is discovered by finding ways to treat other as we would like to be treated ourselves. It can’t work if in Frampton and Coalpit Heath we define ourselves as happy simply because we don’t live in say Yate, or that we don’t want a huge new building development on our doorstep, or even dare I say that we are not from one of the ‘fairground families,’ we are not refugees, we want to be out of Europe, we are not like America, and we really really are not ‘terrorists’ or Muslims. (I place the words Muslim and terrorist close together as I wish to highlight the foolishness of thinking that these two words may be equated together.)

I am a natural optimist, and I hope I’m right in detecting that younger generations are struggling against some of these old stereotypes. I detect a healthy desire for communal solutions that include the ‘other’ with initiatives which offer hope to all.  Although this generation does not seem to be turning back to the church, I certainly believe that the church needs to learn from this development, and indeed repent of some attitudes towards those who were once seen as different. I admit I am no fan of huge corporations like Tesco, I do suspect that they have their finger on an important pulse with their slogan, ‘Everyone Welcome.’

A more careful look at the Christmas story may be helpful. Mary was almost certainly an unmarried, albeit betrothed pregnant teenager. She arrived in the wake of a huge influx into Bethlehem as practically a refugee. Does the refrain, ‘there is no room’ ring any bells when we consider the housing situation in our country, with housing accounting for vast swathes of personal wealth and yet where increasing numbers are either homeless or living in poor quality rented accommodation. As a Christian I believe this is the story of Messiah, the liberator. I cannot operate with the idea that those who are different from me are not welcome, because if that is the case, I have no room for a homeless poverty laden Jesus. Even his first guests are from the wrong side of town, night security staff who had seen visions of angels and left their post to find a baby. Can you even imagine the scorn that their HR department would have given in the disciplinary that followed!

I recently prayed for myself that I might become more righteous. (Those who know me will recognise this is a prayer long overdue for a ‘Man of the Cloth.’ Even my wife never believed I was going to be a minister when I first met her!) But then I realised what do I mean by that prayer? Do I want a righteousness that somehow thinks of myself as better than others, defined by all the things I am not! Or do I want a shining love that always draws others up seeing the potential in everyone whoever they are, whether they are Muslim or Atheist, rich or poor. Oh Lord, give me the latter and help me to rid myself of the former. And thank you that Christmas really proves that everyone is welcome.  

Stephen

PS There are of course other supmermarkets… and indeed many other Christmas Ad’s oh that there weren’t and we’d all learnt the contentment of shopping locally, with ethically sourced Fairly Traded goods…. But that’s another thought all together!