Christianity & Religion

All People Are Capable Of Morality

A Quick Perspective From Someone Who Isn’t “Christian Enough” AKA What I Wish I Said At The Face of Xenophobia

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

This may have happened to you if you have lived in a deeply religious community. In fact, xenophobia is almost bound to happen in some form. A common thought I’ve heard expressed growing up when hearing a person* has done a bad thing in another country* is that “Well, they don’t have Christianity like we do”.

*(And typically this is a non-white person in a poorer country. This is a HUGE can of worms that requires books to unpack. In this 500+ word article, I’m only going to write in the “Christian” perspective that hits close to home without all the nuance I love. Besides there are many qualified people who tackle these topics better than I ever could.)

And that apparently explains why people do bad things.

This thought process is often used to explain many things that are complicated. “An addict rarely darkens the steps of a church” is an example.

It happened to me recently when talking about something irrelevant to religion and that line was propped up. Just as quick as the comment was said, the conversation moved on.