African American History Month

This is a little more long-winded than usual... 

In Genesis, when we read about God creating humans, we hear that he created "male and female" and that he created them "after his own image." That's it. No mention whatsoever of skin color, hair color, race/ethnicity, stature, weight.... nothing. What's significant is that men and women are different from each other, and both are created in the image of God. What that should mean to us is that each human we come into contact with has intrinsic worth because he or she is created in that same image. We have absolutely no right to feel superior to another human being based on anything earthly: position, skin color, nationality, race, gender, socioeconomic status, imprisoned, ....

And yet, while it's easy to nod in affirmation of that, how many times do we attempt to teach our children this? To really model this for them? To open their eyes to the hard parts of human history where one group of humans did NOT treat another group rightly based purely on some external characteristic? We do a pretty good job of pointing fingers at the Nazis and making sure everyone studies WWII history. But, how well do we introduce children to the dark spots in our own nation's history? Depending on what side of those historical moments we fell, do we present bitterness? rancor? harshness? continued misunderstanding?