Differences

Worlds apart...but friends at heart...

“Differences are not intended to separate, to alienate. We are different precisely in order to realize our need of one another.” --Desmond Tutu

Something about this quote resonates within me, and has, every since I heard those words. Not only do I love the quote, but I have great admiration for the writer, Archbishop Desmond Tutu. He more that anyone else, understood what the dishonoring of differences can entail. An activist and archbishop in South Africa during apartheid. His stand, however, was not for more separation, for more power for his own group, his stand was for “we.” Desmond believed that, “if I diminish you, I diminish myself.” He was not weak, though, in his love. He was an activist for what he believed in, he stood up and he stood out, often making him a target of the hatred he longed to end.

I do not write this, though, to give a history lesson of apartheid or of Desmond Tutu himself, I write this that we may be encouraged to celebrate the differences in one another.

I have long considered myself and open minded person. I have been accepting of people from other races, cultures and backgrounds. I find myself celebrating that type of diversity in others! It was those beautiful children in Tanzania that stole my heart- my light skin against their dark- I never felt more at home.

I was thinking the other day, though, about this quote and about differences, and I realized that it is the outward differences that I find it easy to love. But gender, skin color, ethnicity (etc) are not the things that define us, though a part of use they are not really who we are- it’s the subtle things that differentiate us, and it’s those subtle things that define and delineate. It’s those subtle things that I can find to be hard. Those opinions, ideas, personalities and dreams that we can disagree with and cause us to become undone.

I was thinking about all of the people that I have the ability to influence in my life right now. Family, friends, coworkers, patients, neighbors etc. In my profession I am constantly coming in contact with all types of people, from all types of backgrounds, with all types of personalities. My new goal is to be the person that celebrates the differences in others. I want to applaud the ideas, encourage the personalities and help those dreams to flourish! After all, my Creator did not make us with these differences to separate and alienate, but to work together as one.

I do not believe that we are to be blind to differences, however. They are not to be ignored, but to be celebrated! They are beautiful, exciting and good! Each created for a purpose, each with a promise, each with a destiny to fulfill.

Thank you Desmond Tutu, for standing against apartheid, but thank you also for the many lessons you taught. Thank you especially for celebrating differences and for helping me to realize our need for one another. You probably never realized that your words would resonate with an American girl decades later, but they have! Thank you for standing up, and standing out!

Today I am thankful for each person that has been placed in my life at this time. I am thankful for all that I have to learn from those I meet.

As Desmond Tutu once said, “My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together.”



The picture above shows a team created of differences- different countries, backgrounds, ethnicities and ideas all working together for a common goal- the children at the City of Hope.