Lest we forget:
As historian AJP Taylor wryly remarked, the BBC’s first Director General [Baron John] Reith had "managed to preserve the technical independence of the BBC by suppressing news which the government did not want published. This set a pattern for the future: the vaunted independence of the #BBC was secure so long as it was NOT exercised."
Not so @BBC5Live, @BBCRadio4, @BBCNews
#Press #SocialMedia #BBC #Reith #Independence #Partiality #Bias #Scotland
#14 Everything fits perfectly.
Let's be the piece, the love, the freedom in this world.
Let's be the rectangle between the circles.
Let's love the edges!
#genuary #circle #rectangle #genart #art #mastoart #fediart #p5js #noai #genuary2026 #code #math #programming #artwork #minimalism #coding #generativeart #generative #artforsale #simplify #creativecoding #random #piece #freedom #love #prejudice #partiality #together
No Partiality [Sermon]
Some of you know I am transgender. This gives me a unique perspective on how women and men are treated.
Before my transition, when I applied for technical jobs, I might be given a test on electronics, or handed a circuit board and asked questions about it.
After transitioning to live as a woman, and without telling people I was transgender, the interviews changed. They were concerned about whether I was strong enough to lift printers, or how I would work with men.
I’ve also read commentary by transgender men who saw changes in the ways they were treated:
It’s one thing to be aware of bias, and another thing to experience it from both sides.
Let’s go to God in prayer.
God of wisdom, may the words that I speak, and the ways they are received by each of our hearts and minds, to help us to continue to grow into the people, and the church, that you have dreamed us to be.
Amen.
Jesus was Jewish. We have no photographs of Jesus, but he probably had darker skin and very curly hair. Jesus’ closest disciples were also Jews, and not high-status Jews.
Even so, there were Samaritans, Canaanites, and even Romans who were followers of Jesus. And yet, in the time immediately following the ascension, the church was a Jewish church.
Until Peter had a vision, and visited a centurion named Cornelius, and Peter learned that God shows no partiality.
And that’s the lead-up to our reading from Acts this morning.
Over time, Christianity became organized under Rome. A split occurred between Rome and the Eastern church. Later, in Germany, Switzerland, England, and elsewhere, new Protestant denominations were started. And the members – and leadership – of those denominations were mostly pale skinned.
That’s how Christianity became a white religion. It’s why modern paintings of Jesus have him with light skin, and often blond hair and blue eyes.
In 2013, a Fox News host said Santa Claus – based on a Turkish Monk named St. Nicholas – and Jesus were white.
And there are some who feel like white people are God’s chosen people.
But Jesus wasn’t white, and his first followers were not white. They looked more like modern-day Palestinians.
Some of Christianity’s most respected saints were African:
White people were late to Christianity. And now some of us think we own it. We redraw pictures of historic Christians as white, and even draw God as a white man.
And God hates the people we hate.
As author Anne Lamott said.
“You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image
when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”
The entire reason non-Jews can be followers of Jesus is because, as Peter tells us,
God shows no partiality,
35 but in every people anyone who fears him and practices righteousness is acceptable to him
Acts 10:34b-35, NRSVue
If we ignore this verse for others, we ought to ignore this verse for ourselves.
We live in a time when there are efforts to exclude people considered the other: other ethnicities, other languages, other sexualities, other genders.
We find plenty of reasons that people are not acceptable to us. When we exclude people, we may feel special. We are in the inner, acceptable group. It’s why various organizations excluded women, Jewish people, Black people, disabled people.
But we gain so much more when we include people.
Edwin Markham, former Poet Laurete of Oregon, wrote a poem entitled Outwitted:
He drew a circle that shut me out–
Heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!
We live in a land that was inhabited by many nations before Europeans “discovered” it. And now some white people are talking about how they want to “take our country back” from immigrants after the white people themselves immigrated here.
People are being detained because of language, skin color, or even occupation. And now people are being shot, and even killed, by those charged with this purification of this country.
How far have we come from the life and teachings of the Jesus, whose baptism we mark today.
I wish I could say that everyone in this sanctuary is safe. I cannot honestly say that.
We live in a time when the federal Justice Department is investigating domestic terrorism, described as those who use violence, or the threat of violence, to advance political and social agendas, including
“adherence to radical gender ideology, anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, or anti-Christianity.”
There is a “cash reward system” for “witnesses and citizen journalists.”
It might be helpful to remember that early followers of Jesus, when Christianity was not a state-sanctioned religion, remained faithful when persecuted.
It may be helpful to remember that we were baptized with the same baptism Jesus had.
I think it is helpful to know that God shows no partiality, even when human beings do.
My challenge to us this week is to remember that we were baptized with the same baptism Jesus was baptized with. We are called to the same work as Jesus.
We are called to show no partiality.
Amen.
Let’s sing CH 75 I Was There to Hear Your Borning Cry
* Scripture quotations marked NRSVue are taken from the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. https://www.friendshippress.org/pages/about-the-nrsvue
* Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James version of the Bible.
#Baptism #Immigration #partiality
The NRSV Updated Edition (NRSVue) is informed by the results of discovery and study of hundreds of ancient manuscripts, such as the Dead Sea Scrolls, in the more than thirty years since the first publication of the NRSV. The National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA (NCC) partnered with the Society of Bibli
SERRCistä osui silmiin Neil Levyn terävä analyysi Blake Roeberin 2024 kirjasta Political Humility, joka koskee poliittisen tiedon mahdollisuutta, https://social-epistemology.com/2024/10/15/enjoying-humble-pie-reflections-on-roebers-political-humility-neil-levy/
Torppaako IDC - identity-protective cognition - tosiaankin sellaisen "in our hyperpartisan world", niin että jää vain vaihtelevan sivistyneitä arvauksia jos niitäkään, vai missä Roeber erehtyy?
#serrc #politicalKnowledge #knowledge #reasoning #motivatedReasoning #bias #socialEpistemology #partisanship #mysideBias #puolueellisuus #partiality #expertKnowledge #tieto
New Testament Reading: James 2:1-17
#James warned #Christians against #partiality and #hypocrisy.
Showing #partiality means a lot more to #God than we would care to admit. We need to remember how Jesus will be judging us - and He is paying attention to how we judge others.
The Letter of #James | James 2:8-13
https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/westsidebiblestudies/episodes/The-Letter-of-James--James-28-13-e2i788v/a-ab5enlr
Showing partiality means a lot more to God than we would care to admit. We need to remember how Jesus will be judging us - and He is paying attention to how we judge others. The Letter of James | James 2:8-13 But if you fulfill the royal law as expressed in this scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. But if you show prejudice, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as violators. For the one who obeys the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” Now if you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a violator of the law. Speak and act as those who will be judged by a law that gives freedom. For judgment is merciless for the one who has shown no mercy. But mercy triumphs over judgment (James 2:8-13).
GrumpyOldFart
w4v3
sophia
Brandon Cross
Lupposofi
JBRoss
Ethan
Josh (open until closed again)
Bernardo Dainese