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| Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > Ethics, etc. > Small groups and the status quo | Forum Quick Jump
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Electra
Registered Member
Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611
| Posted 7/20/2002 3:10 PM (GMT -6) |   | It has been suggested that the most appropriate context for confrontation is within small groups of people who intimately know each other. I agree with this in general, but I have several questions. Given the fact that most people tend to gather together with people who they have a lot in common with them—e.g. race, socio-economic status, neighborhood, etc.:
1. Wouldn’t members of a small group be more likely to have the same “logs” in their eyes? In my small group experience, we tend to work on our “specks” together, while the logs go unnoticed by all.
2. Isn’t this contrary to Jesus’ example? He rebuked both strangers and disciples.
3. I recently attended a seminar which challenged us to incorporate an anti-racist perspective into every aspect of our life, since people in this country are socialized into a racist culture. I was (and continue to be) blind to the ways I have been part of the problem and not the solution until I started taking the (sometimes gentle, sometimes violent) confrontations of strangers seriously.
4. Don’t we have a responsibility to address the greater public, rather than limiting our scope to a private sphere of people who are just like us? Does this principle lend itself to parochialism?
5. Probably the best respected Christians author, Flannery O’Connor writes about God-ordained confrontations that are the opposite of this—they involve strangers and violence. Because our hearts are hard, this is what grace looks like when it shows up—at least the way she portrays it in her short stories. Maybe some of you can relate? I can.
Conclusion:
I agree that the context of small groups is an important context for supporting and challenging one another as we grow. I just don’t want to limit support and challenge to that context—not that anyone is suggesting this. I just think it is a natural tendency to blow off criticism from strangers or from people who are angry and aggressive, and I want to challenge rather than reinforce that tendency. I think we should strive to have ears to hear and eyes to see in every context we find ourselves in.
Also, I think it’s interesting that Jesus’ own “small group”—the twelve disciples—represented a very diverse cross-section of ancient Palestine. I think we should strive for as much diversity as possible in our small groups. Not just for the sake of people who don’t share our privileged status, but also for our own sake—so we can heal from the logs in our own eyes.
God “reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5:18).
Electra
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Electra
Registered Member
Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611
| Posted 7/21/2002 5:39 AM (GMT -6) | | Hey folks. I reposted this thread in the Tearing Down Walls section because it’s not explicitly about Bonhoeffer. So if you want to respond, please post in that section. (o), would you mind copying your post to the new thread? Sorry about the confusion.  Electra
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