Ask a fragment

All of my Bible readings today turned to the idea of God both entering and transcending cultures.¹ Every culture is a shard of a broken mirror; not a complete picture of humans, and therefore, not a complete picture of God either.

Take the way we deal with death. In Portugal, we bury our dead within a couple of days and are left with the paraphernalia of their existence: the glasses by the dresser, the notebooks on the table, shopping lists in magnets on the fridge; their gaze and gait frozen in photos. Their absence is all the more stark in the things they left behind.

In Toraja, Indonesia, they mummify their dead. They keep them in their bedrooms, in the living room, where they feed them, clean their glasses, tell them stories, let them know they’ve got visitors (another thing: they receive visitors); they may wait years to do the funeral. Torajans are mostly Christian but have managed to maintain a veil rather than a wall between them and their departed.²

This shows me that there is much that is cultural, easily confused with biblical, and that part of my errand is to discern it. I really should become salt, as the biblical imagery goes: It seasons and preserves the mind, the imagination, the heart. At the same time, it doesn’t stay on the side of the plate, but melts as it affects the flavor.

Some people may say this sounds like God is whatever we believe. Not so. “You are with another, and he is unique.”³ I won’t want to boil you a bowl of broccoli if I know you gag at the sight of the mini-trees. I must make an effort to know you—otherwise, who is it that I claim to love?

I want to be completely immersed in my culture, and at the same time I want my mind transformed and shaped and sharpened by the God who loves both me and my Torajan neighbor, both of us shards reflecting a greater another.