DITTO DITO
I was recently in a group activity where the topic was praying away racism in the church. Being the opinionated person that I am (haha), I said racism may be a major problem in other parts of the world, but here where we are, the gap between the poor and rich takes center stage. In fact, we are more skin shade-ists, status-ists, age-ists, and physical-ists.
Filipinos discriminate against each other by their skin shade. The kayumanggi does not stand a chance against the fairest of them all.
We bend over backwards to people belonging to society's higher strata or act like they belong there with their designer clothes (albeit utang or ukay-ukay).
We are age-ists chasing after the eternal fountain of youth, thinking those over a quarter of a century old are irrelevant.
We are physical-ists idolizing those with perfect (or perfectly sculpted under the knife) bodies and make fun of other people's flaws.
Without taking away the racism situation in the west, we should not think that we have the same problem here on the same scale. Yes, racism exists here but poverty, hunger, corruption, and access to basic necessities are holding back those in the fringes of our society. (Some friends with whom I shared my thoughts with remarked how our group must be of an elite exclusive nature if we think racism is on top of the list. As we only meet online with just profile pictures being shown, I cannot determine the socio-economic profile.)
As Christians, let us, as Jesus said, be as shrewd as a serpent (Mt. 10:16). Let us use the wisdom that God freely bestows upon us when we ask (James 1:5) to discern what are our immediate needs, instead of doing a ditto, and fail to minister those who need our love and care the most.
I was recently in a group activity where the topic was praying away racism in the church. Being the opinionated person that I am (haha), I said racism may be a major problem in other parts of the world, but here where we are, the gap between the poor and rich takes center stage. In fact, we are more skin shade-ists, status-ists, age-ists, and physical-ists.
Filipinos discriminate against each other by their skin shade. The kayumanggi does not stand a chance against the fairest of them all.
We bend over backwards to people belonging to society's higher strata or act like they belong there with their designer clothes (albeit utang or ukay-ukay).
We are age-ists chasing after the eternal fountain of youth, thinking those over a quarter of a century old are irrelevant.
We are physical-ists idolizing those with perfect (or perfectly sculpted under the knife) bodies and make fun of other people's flaws.
Without taking away the racism situation in the west, we should not think that we have the same problem here on the same scale. Yes, racism exists here but poverty, hunger, corruption, and access to basic necessities are holding back those in the fringes of our society. (Some friends with whom I shared my thoughts with remarked how our group must be of an elite exclusive nature if we think racism is on top of the list. As we only meet online with just profile pictures being shown, I cannot determine the socio-economic profile.)
As Christians, let us, as Jesus said, be as shrewd as a serpent (Mt. 10:16). Let us use the wisdom that God freely bestows upon us when we ask (James 1:5) to discern what are our immediate needs, instead of doing a ditto, and fail to minister those who need our love and care the most.