Regional Synod of Canada - Reformed Church in America

Pioneer Christian Monthly

Date - Feb/78

Contributor - Peter J. Yff

Title - Editorial

Topic - Editorial

Were I to ask you, "Who said, 'Am I my brother's keeper?' " it is almost certain that everyone would recall Cain's question, and at least the broad outline of the story of Cain and Abel in the Bible.

The question goes well beyond the story, however. Responsibility for one's brother man is regarded as essential to Christian thought and living. It certainly is related to the commandment Jesus said is like the great and first commandment: "You shall love your neighbour as yourself."

If we are to sincerely approach human brotherhood, and realize anything of its strength and reality, we will need to, on the positive side, develop a concern for, in fact, a love for, all mankind. On the negative side, we will need to eliminate racism. Stories about racism are commonplace today - they crop up in one city and then in another. A child beats up another because he is white and the other is black. One child calls nasty names after another youngster, because one is Gentile and the other Hebrew. And so it goes, on and on. It isn't new, yet it remains as ugly today as when the first instance was reported.

If human brotherhood means anything, it should require of us that we avoid all expressions of racism. The child who insults another because he is of a different race probably learned something about this from his home. (At least, this is the most common source.) One race is not superior to other races - all men are created in God's image, and God cares for each one.

A Toronto policeman observed the other day that the courts were taking too light a view of racially motivated crime. He has a point. Yet, many of us are guilty in our private world of thought, and in our homes. Do our children learn respect for every human being from us, or do our attitudes indicate that it goes like this, "God loves them, but . . . . "

From time to time I think of the young man from India, who on his way home from university was set upon and beaten. He asked, through bloodied lips and loosened teeth, "Why?" He knew really - it was because he looked "different", and people of lesser quality than he decided they would teach him a lesson.

Am I my brother's keeper ? My brother of slanted eye or darker skin ? In the sense that I must care about him, that I must respect him and speak out when he is abused, yes, indeed. Being our brother's keeper does not mean we are responsible for all his actions or manners, or even that we approve all his mannerisms and ways. It does require, however, that we respect him as a person, are fair towards him, and provide him the same opportunities for employment, or peaceful, protected living, or instruction, that we want for ourselves.

Unless the mails improve to an unexpected degree, Lent will have begun by the time this issue reaches you. February 8 marks the beginning of this season of the church-year. So-me folk will have gone to special services marking Ash Wednesday, others will observe the period in their own way. Some will ignore it altogether.

It has always seemed, to me, ironic, and ridiculous, really, that for some people fun and revelry stop at the stroke of the midnight before Ash Wednesday. That solemnity and meditation are proper for Lent no one would deny; but since when is the spirit of "anything goes" proper before, or at any other time?

If Lent is to have meaning, the suffering and sacrifice of Jesus for us must be understood in personal terms. We will then truly deny ourselves - not this personal luxury or that practice - but we will deny ourselves in far more important ways: living no more for self but for

Him, living no more by the world's values and ways.

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