(with Melissa A. Jackson)

Sophia is a community of inclusion.

“God created humankind in God’s image…” Genesis 1:27

Advent season invites us to consider the meaning of the fact that God chose to speak God’s best word to humankind in the person of a human being, Jesus of Nazareth. Among other things, the Incarnation reminds us that, we too reflect God’s presence in the world somehow.

The term “somehow” is key. The idea of being like God can and has motivated people to try to attain some level of perfection and to judge themselves for failing. What a silly idea! What would a human being perfectly reflecting God’s image look like? Male or female? Tall enough to center a professional basketball team or small enough to jockey a horse? Blue-eyed or brown-eyed? What talents or particular abilities would such a person have?  Would they sing soprano or bass? Obviously, the very idea of a god-like human perfection constitutes a perverse and egocentric idolatry.

A better approach may involve noting the collective noun in Gen 1:27.  God created humankind, not human individuals, in God’s image.  The text even goes on to specify that bearing God’s image requires both male and female, at the same time.  It could have gone on to say both right- and left-handed, both strong and sensitive, both bold and cautious….

One could read this important text as saying that even approaching a reflection of the vast and wondrous image of God requires the totality of humankind – all those who ever lived and ever will, collectively. In this Advent season, if an image is meant to give an idea of the original, let’s look not only to the baby in Bethlehem but to the humankind all around us, worth so much to God that God came to us to tell us so.

At Sophia, precisely because it takes all of humankind throughout the ages to approach imaging  forth the personhood of God, we do not put bounds on inclusion.  We refrain from identifying specific categories of people whom we welcome into our community because, by doing so, we may inadvertently omit someone or imply that we welcome the persons listed but not others.  In fact, history teaches that as society evolves new ‘out-groups’ continually arise. Any ‘list’ of the included risks becoming outdated.  So, at Sophia we insist on honoring the biblical assertion that all are created in the image of God—without exception. All means all. Each life bears an imprint of the divine in an endless diversity. At Sophia, your uniqueness is a gift to be celebrated in a community ready to receive that gift and be transformed by it.