I’m familiar with the idea in scripture that each person is created in the image of God. As J.W. Buck notes in his book, In God’s Good Image, Genesis 1:26 quotes God as saying, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness.” However, a concept I had never pondered — which Buck describes and supports with biblical verses and stories — is that God created each person with a particular cultural identity. “The cultures we are born into are not random but rather a beautiful example of God’s design,” Buck asserts.  

He acknowledges that cultures contain harmful practices — such as unequal treatment of men and women — that need to be addressed and changed. Still, he writes from a framework that humans were created as “embedded cultural creatures.”

Buck interprets both Old and New Testament stories through a lens of God’s view of cultural identity. To honor God, Daniel and Esther acted from the perspective of a minority culture and interacted strategically with the cultures that dominated their own. Buck emphasizes that Jesus was a minority Hebrew, living in poverty under occupation by Romans. Jesus “especially dignifies minority culture,” he writes.

Buck stresses the need for people in Christian circles to honor the strengths of each person’s culture and support them to follow Jesus as an expression of their cultural identities. He emphasizes that no culture is superior to another in the kingdom of God, and church communities should reflect this truth. He names contrasts in cultures: Some are more individualistic, others more collective; some favor direct communication, others more passive ways. We should not judge people based on cultural differences but see God’s good image in people who are different from ourselves.

The book grows out of Buck’s own journey as a White American toward a consciousness that Christianity is not aligned with the dominant culture. Buck acknowledges that the evils of colonialism were carried out by White people who erroneously perceived that God favored their culture. Through interactions with people of cultures other than his own, Buck confronted his own biases. He encourages people whose culture is dominant in North America to practice cultural humility. 

He tells about how his own intercultural family didn’t fit well into a church they attended for six months. Congregants made a huge deal out of four-part harmony and seemed to believe that only quiet expressions of faith during church services were appropriate. Buck emphasizes that the way of Jesus is for everyone, and churches should work hard to be multi­cultural. 

Buck Discusses what he views as two outlooks on cultural identity: secular or sacred. With a secular outlook, people are focused on expressing themselves, and God is absent. With a sacred outlook, people reflect the image of God in the world as they express their cultural identity. 

Buck’s clear divide didn’t resonate with me. I’m not convinced it would be evident that someone was expressing their cultural identity from a sacred outlook versus a secular outlook. At the least, I wish he would have provided examples of how these different outlooks play out. 

I turned to a 1992 book, Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World, by ­Henri Nouwen, a Catholic priest (now de­ceased), who acknowledges that while he focuses a lot on the sacred within the Christian community, he is also a secular person because he interacts with the secular culture around him. In contrast to Buck’s focus on the expression of cultural identity, Nouwen’s emphasis is on how people receive culture. Nouwen writes: “And what’s wrong with good friends, good food and good clothes? I believe deeply that all the good things our world has to offer are yours to enjoy. But you can enjoy them truly only when you can ­acknowledge them as affirmations of the truth that you are the Beloved of God.” 

I can understand how a person can receive aspects of culture as sacred. I don’t understand after reading Buck’s book how it is possible to consistently express one’s cultural identity from a sacred perspective. I don’t think the expression of cultural identity can be parsed out as sacred or secular.

I do find intriguing some of the questions Buck suggests people can ask themselves (if they accept the idea that God has a purpose for everyone to have a particular cultural identity): 

“For what purpose did God bring me into this cultural location?”

“How do I better reflect God’s image from my cultural perspective?”  

Mary Ann Zehr is writing and communication program director at Eastern Mennonite University.