Variety Matthew 5v9

Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children of God.

You don’t have to have anything to get started, really: just a will, which I believe is already within you, and a way. Do the work your way, with the intention of expanding the circle of human concern and creating radical belonging for others.…  

Get to work. Build. Bridge. Belong. This call for belonging is not about saving ourselves as individuals in terms of the resources that we have or the access we have been granted. Belonging is about saving our very humanity.  

If you are not thriving, then I am not thriving; if you do not have peace, then I do not have peace; if you do not belong, then I myself do not belong. There is an Nguni expression, ubuntu, which means “humanity” and “I am because we are.”… The Mayans use a term in lak’ech, which means “You are the other me.” When we truly see one another, we literally become. The challenges to belong cannot be resolved in isolation but can only be resolved when we are existing together across differences.  

We have to be willing to meet each other on the porch in peace, to make room for each other, to listen to each other. Even if, at first, we might be inclined to presume the other person or group doesn’t belong…. Welcome your neighbor. Have a conversation. Listen not with a need to agree or disagree but with an open heart and a desire to try to understand their perspective…. You never know what you might learn about this other human being. Or what you might learn about yourself. Our ability to sit with each other in that space, through our differences, is the gateway to radical belonging. It is how we learn. It is how we grow. It is how we become.   

Rev. Ben McBride