When I left South Africa, I didn’t want anything to do with a Jesus who endorsed colonialism, the slaughter of Zulu people, and the whole system of apartheid. I didn’t leave the true Jesus in South Africa – just white Jesus
In Taiwan I discovered that Jesus was alive and well, especially around a table of women at the Women’s Power Breakfast. I showed up Wednesday after Wednesday to get to know this very different Jesus. The freedom I’d felt in the air on the day of the first democratic election in South Africa was also right there in downtown Taipei on a Wednesday at 7:00 a.m.
This was a liberating Jesus, a Jesus who loved all people, had joy, was brown-skinned, laughed, and turned over tables of injustice. It was a Jesus who flipped hierarchies of worth and said the last shall be first and the first shall be last. Over the months, as I began falling in love with this very different and yet authentic Jesus.
From “Recovering Racists: Dismantling White Supremacy and Reclaiming Our Humanity” by Idelette McVicker