First, thanks for posing your questions and being honest that you have struggled with what I wrote. In looking at your comment I see two basic questions which I will attempt to answer on my personal level rather than the larger societal one.

First idols. I do believe that many of us are quick to carelessly replace God (permanently or temporarily) in our lives with many lesser things which become idols. These idols could be anything - money, power, race, religion, education or even children. By ‘idol’ I mean anything that replaces God as first in our minds and hearts. I can not make a blanket statement about our society doing this with racial/cultural identity, but I can speak for myself and say that I have made idols of them and been confronted with my own sin. Even though our society at large would applaud the ‘idols’ I made of my AA and NA children’s racial identity I do not believe that they were pleasing to God.

Your second question is the harder one. For the general American public, I have no valid opinion regarding whether racial and ethnic identity is overrated in it’s impact. Outside of an identity and foundation in Christ, it makes perfect sense to identify ourselves by race, culture, sexual preference or whatever else we value. What I am willing to say, is that if we are sold-out followers of Christ, then our identity should be based there and anything else becomes secondary.

In our family, race and culture as well as physical and mental ability and individual talents, are all parts of the package prepared by the God who made us and areas of each individual to be wisely explored and developed in healthy ways. We are careful to let no one area become too focused, in case it should become an idol to us and bring harm rather than blessing.

I hope this clarifies where I was focusing in my blog post. I do believe that large segments of our culture seems to have an unhealthy concern over the race/ethnicity of the children we adopt and how we are going to meet some impossible imaginary standard of racial and cultural achievement for them.

The people most concerned with my children’s racial identity have never been those who demonstrate a strong commitment to Christ or an honest desire to adopt orphaned children. The discussion for them seemed to be more hypothetical and political rather than practical and personal and had nothing to do with Christ. For a more indepth discussion on this topic you might want to check out the interview that Dan Cruver did in September with Thabiti Anyabwile here.

Dorothy

I’ve struggled with what to write in response to this post, and so let me ask you some questions:

Do you think that our society has made “idols” of the concepts of racial/ethnic identity? If so, how, and what are some examples that you see?

And by “idols,” are you saying that racial/ethnic identity is overrated in its importance/impact, or do you mean something else? I just want to make sure I understand.