Dean Cain - formerly the star of Lois & Kent (Superman), is part Japanese. Most people don't know that. I do. I'm 12.5% Asian myself & prior to this website - I would have described myself as "Gay, mixed-race - without the anal-fetish or camp-baggage". G0Y does a much better job describing me.
My epiphany began a little while back when my car broke down outside of the town of |EDITED|. A guy in a pickup truck came along & gave me a lift into town because it was too late for wrecker service in those parts. I'd have to do it tomorrow between 9-5. He seemed to be a really nice guy & invited me to a church function that was going on & his family would attend. Since I was raised in a small town church, I accepted.
The service was very much like what I'd grown up with. Songs, hymns & responsive reading followed by a sermon on being kind to strangers (oh how poetic). In almost every way, this small town church echoed the ones I'd been raised in from childhood. After the sermon, there was a meeting in the community center across the street where a pot-luck supper was being served. I was invited to join them.
The food was really good & there was a wide selection. The cooks in this town had obvious talent. Everyone seemed kind & conversation was light-hearted. We discussed jobs, family & some people even began to discuss politics. It was overhearing the political discussions that I began to realize that the reality of the setting was far from the appearance. See, as I listened to various people interject their comments - I slowly came to realize that I was in the middle of a white supremacy gathering. The church didn't say "Arian Nations" -- but it probably could have. As I stood there with my blond hair, blue eyes & hidden 12.5% Asian ancestry, - the biggest shock was how perfect it all appeared on the surface. I'd been with these people for upwards of 4 hours & in a religious service that reminded me very much of the little church I attended in my home town -- right down to the altar call for conversion to "Christ". 4 hours later, I was beginning to see that "Christ" to these people probably the likes of a former German Chancellor named Adolph.
As I listened to the widespread political discourse & phrases interjected like "intermixing", "mongrelization", "impure" & others ... this is where my epiphany began. These people saw me as one of their "own" & doing so, treated me well. However, I knew that my background - a past that I had no control over contained Asian ancestors. By their own words ... I was one of the intermixed mongrels they so casually spoke about. I was neatly hidden behind their ideal appearance of blond/blue. Their entire concept of reality was based on what their eyes saw. As I've already said: these people were white supremacists - not racial separatists (there is a difference). So, despite the fact everyone treated me nicely; -- I knew from the manner of their conversation that if they knew me better - that they'd not be welcoming me at all. After all ... the truth was scattered in their common conversations. They were clear that they hated me. They simply didn't know it yet because their religion was based on their senses & what they thought was within a man's genealogy.
| My epiphany started upon me in
it's fullness when I remembered a quote: "He
who says that he is in the light, and has hate in his heart for his
brother, is still in the dark." -
Apostle John. My epiphany continued: "In this way it is clear who are the children of God and who are the children of the Evil One; anyone who does not do righteousness or who has no love for his brother, is not a child of God." - Apostle John. And: "Anyone who has hate for his brother is a taker of life, and you may be certain that no taker of life has eternal life in him." - Apostle John. "If a man says, I have love for God, and has hate for his brother, his words are false: for how is the man who has no love for his brother whom he has seen, able to have love for God whom he has not seen?" - Apostle John. "Who is my brother?", I asked myself & a moment later, the answer came: "But Jesus in answer said to him who gave the news, "Who is my mother and who are my brothers?". And he put out his hand to his disciples and said, "See, my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the pleasure of my Father in heaven, he is my brother, and sister, and mother." And then I contemplated: "Who does the pleasure of God?"; - And the answer came as before: "And without faith it is not possible to be well-pleasing to Him." - Hebrews 11:6 "And this is his law, that we have faith in the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love for one another, even as he said to us." - Apostle John. |
It took exposure to a group of white supremacists who claimed to be "Christian" to show me that all the warmth of community & kindness I saw in my home town church was the same atmosphere that these people generated. This was a shock. I had always imagined the likes of groups that spawned organizations like the KKK to consist of rabid, drooling lunatics; -- not the same kind of people who attended my home town church. But, here they were - in politically correct form - but with the same ideas that Saul|Paul said were not Christian: "For all those of you who were given baptism into Christ did put on Christ. There is no Jew or Greek, servant or free, male and female: because you are all one in Jesus Christ." These people were all hung up on the "Jew or Greek" issue. They think race & genealogy mattered to God. Paul said it didn't & the example he used contrasted the Jews (God's chosen for the Messiah's lineage) against Greeks - a bunch of polytheistic pagans in Jewish eyes! In comparison to that example, there could be no greater contrast; -- Yet, these "Christians" wanted to contrast being "White" against every other race! And how did they see the other races of men? As lesser than themselves. I think history is quite clear as to the lengths such people will go: Declaring human rights to be for themselves & no others. It is the ultimate form of disrespect. Yet, here I was - among a group of people who for the most part exuded the same feeling of community & "goodness" that the church from my hometown did.
Of course - my hometown church did not hype on the issue of race. However, they did preach loudly & often against the "HO-MO-SEK-SHUAL AGENDA". Suddenly, that same quote from Saul|Paul entered my mind again - this time, the part that drew my attention was the part about no "male and female in Christ Jesus. Sexual orientation - is by it's very definition, dependant on their being "male & female". If gender ceased to be a dividing line in the new Christ Creature ("if any man be in Christ he is a new creation"), then that meant that all "sex" was essentially "homo"! "Homo" by definition means "like". A light was coming on very quickly in my mind. If the 1st part of the verse meant that races were the same in Christ & that interracial marriages were a "non-issue" before God, - then the part about not being any male & female raised a similar point. Gender has become a moot issue as well!