19 July
Dear Friends,
Recently, the United States deported five individuals originally from Laos, Vietnam, Jamaica, Cuba and Yemen to Eswatini. This followed earlier deportations in which eight migrants from various countries were sent to South Sudan, after a court lifted restrictions on removals to countries with which the individuals had no personal ties.
What surprised me was the strong language used by the US Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, Tricia McLaughlin. Writing on X this Tuesday, she said, “This flight took individuals so uniquely barbaric that their home countries refused to take them back.” She went on to describe them as “depraved monsters”.
This brought to mind a well-known sermon by John Calvin on Galatians 6, a passage we recently read in church. Calvin wrote:
“Now, when (Paul) says ‘to all people,’ it is to show us that even when others discourage us from doing them good, we must still continue as God commands us. As I have already said, we must not judge each person by who they are or by what they deserve. Rather, we must rise above that and consider that God has placed us in this world so that we might live in unity and be joined together. And since he has stamped his image on us, and we all share the same human nature, that alone should move us to help one another.
Anyone who refuses to care for their neighbour must change their nature entirely and show that they no longer intend to be human. For as long as we remain part of humanity, we cannot help but see our own face, as in a mirror, in the person who is poor and rejected, who can no longer carry their burden and lies groaning under its weight – even if that person is the most distant stranger on earth. Let a Moor or a Barbarian come among us, and because he is human, he brings with him a mirror in which we may see that he is our brother and neighbour.
We cannot undo the order of nature that God has established as unbreakable. So then, we are bound to all people without distinction, because we are all one flesh.”
Many Reformed theologians and communities have drawn deep insight from these words. Philosopher and theologian Nicholas Wolterstorff, for instance, has done beautiful work in showing how this forms part of our Reformed foundation for human dignity – the belief that God’s image is genuinely reflected in all people, even in those considered most deprived or “barbaric”. In her book Making Room: Recovering Hospitality in the Christian Tradition, Christine Pohl, too, refers to this quotation, arguing that it is a basis for recognition and respect.
May we continue to walk with the eyes of Christ in times that challenge the very truths the church has cherished for generations.
Marius Louw