Thread by @KaitlinCurtice

I was asked if being part of my Potawatomi culture and "putting it before my Christian faith" is practicing idolatry.

I'd like to break down why this is a really offensive and ridiculous question in a thread:

In the faith tradition I grew up in (SBC) we REALLY liked to talk about idolatry. "Resist the culture of our day! Put God first!" Those kinds of things.

Oddly enough, we were never considering our OWN idolatry of American Christianity.

American Evangelical Christianity really likes to point OUT THERE and make sweeping statements about people, places, cultures, etc., hence our whole missions attitude of going out into the "dark world" to "save the lost."

Christians are supposed to save ppl from their idols.

So you can easily imagine how this becomes colonization and assimilation.
"Just be like us! Just say this prayer! Just stop being so backward and you'll learn to put down those idols and follow the TRUE God."

So for Indigenous people who are also Christians, white Christians are confused.
"Are you a Christian or not? Why would you put worship of trees before worship of God?"

Because the church cannot seem to admit that American Christianity is in itself a CULTURE, how can it possibly understand that there are many cultures in the world that relate to Jesus through a particular lens?

This question really comes down to threat.

Indigenous cultures around the world are seen as something "other" to the Christians who wish to colonize them, so these questions pop up out of that discomfort.

And for us to say, "Oh hey, that's colonization" get us labeled as "idolaters" because naming things is difficult, and it reveals how complicit so many of us are.

So how about instead of asking Native peoples if we are worshipping our own cultures (which have survived genocide and colonization, actual idols, by the way) you ask, "How can I learn from your ways of seeing the world? It matters that I understand these things as a Christian."

And really, let's learn to do this with all cultures.
The high horse just isn't going to cut it anymore.

It's Hanukkah. Learn from your Jewish friends, read books, listen, celebrate that the world is full of people who are different from one another.

But this whole, "What comes first, Jesus or Potawatomi-ness?"

I won't give you the answer you're looking for.
I'll just tell you to read some books.