Source: Christian Post | Lisa Sharon Harper
What do you see when you look at a picture? In essence, that is the question St. Louis Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch asked the grand jury to determine in his case against Officer Darren Wilson, who shot and killed unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown on Aug. 9 in Ferguson, Mo.
According to an early report in TIME, McCulloch made an unusual move: He did not specify a specific charge for Wilson.
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But as the church considers the events of these days, perhaps the greatest challenge we face is this: Will we allow our view of "what we see" to go unexamined? Will we "conform to the world" — giving permission to our unconscious biases to guide our thoughts and actions? Or will be transformed by the renewing of our minds, as Paul calls us to be? (Romans 12:2)
In the first church, the sacrament of baptism itself stood as a symbol of this transformation. The first followers of Jesus confronted the unconscious biases handed down to them from the Roman Empire. The empire enforced and reinforced its divisions of power: male and female, Jew and Greek, slave and free. To become a follower of Jesus was to be washed of the conscious and unconscious biases inherited by the systems and structures of empire. Women led, slaves were set free, and Jews and Gentiles were brought into one common communion — both exercising equal power with the church. The image of God in all was seen, affirmed, cultivated, protected, and served.