Ascension : News From The Grotto - Thought For The Week
Submitted by The Islander (Shari Parkhill) 22.10.2009 (Article Archived on 05.11.2009)

This week I’ll have to be forgiven for getting on a soapbox. There was a story in the media this week that has disturbed me, and made me wonder about the state of the world.

The story is about the Justice of the Peace in Louisiana who refused to issue a marriage license to an “interracial” couple.  Dear heavens, it’s almost 2010.  Although it is equally appalling that up until 1967 it was illegal for people of “different races” to marry in many American states, it is disturbing to see that a government employee would abuse his office in this way, and get away with it for so many years.

Perhaps the saddest part of this story is the Justice’s reasons for denying the issuance of the license.  He claims that he believes that most “interracial” marriages fail, and he is concerned for the children of such unions.  He claims that they are not accepted in either white or black society.  Does he forget who the President of the United States is, a man of “mixed” parentage?

The most disturbing fact is that this Justice claims and truly believes that he is not a racist.  He states that he just doesn’t believe in the mixing of the races and does not feel that he needs to apologize for what he feels in his heart is right.  Except that he is bound by his profession to follow the laws of the government paying his salary.

I have been delving even more deeply into my own genealogy lately, and found an ancestor in Nova Scotia whose lineage can be traced back to the nobility of England and then to most of the royal houses of Europe.  My family has been amused to discover the people we can trace our lineage to, ancient Celtic royalty, Vikings, the Swedish, French, Italian, Russian and German (anyone heard of Swabia before?  I hadn’t!) royal lines, and individuals as diverse as Lady Godiva (yes, that Lady Godiva!) and Attila the Hun.  From there, these royal lines can be traced back to the ancient Romans, Egyptian pharaohs and biblical families.  I’m sure if almost everyone of European descent was able to trace their history they would find the same.  But, as my aunt likes to say, our family can now prove it.

All very fun, but it proves a few important points.  There is no such thing as a “pure” race, or any descendants of such a fallacy.  If our ancient ancestors came from as diverse areas as Rome, Greece, Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Eastern Europe, then we are all people of “mixed” race.  So what if along the way most of our ancestors settled in one place, and over the years environmental factors and breeding combined to create certain skin tones, facial features and hair texture?  We still are a product of mixed backgrounds.  St. Helena is a wonderful, and more modern, example of this wonderful mixing of cultures, and ethnicities.

Another point that I take issue with is the word “race” to describe different ethnicities.  We all belong to the “human” race, a single entity.  As proven by my own family tree, if we all started in the same places, how and when did we become different “races”?  We are simply all members of the human race, with different ethnic backgrounds.

If you ever watch children at play, as I did at the après hash on Saturday, they see no differences between people based on ethnicity.  They are accepting and only see skin colour as something that distinguishes one friend from another, like their eye or hair colour.  Children are not born prejudiced, they learn it from the adults in their lives.

I truly believe that when God sees the state of the modern world, and the hatred and disdain that people feel for one another based on ethnic backgrounds, he must be extremely sad, and disappointed in the people that he created.  How did we get so far away from His teachings?  How did people start twisting His messages of love and respect as a way to put themselves above people who looked different from them?  How do they justify wars based on ethnic cleansing? 

Prejudice is unfortunately still alive and well in our world.  We all need to examine our hearts and see if our beliefs and actions make God sad.  We need to pray for those whose lives are tainted with this failing.  We need to forgive them.  But their actions should not be tolerated and allowed to continue.  The human race will never move forward if it does. 

May God bless each and every one of us, in all our glorious diversity.