In some places, skin color can make a person marginal. Level of income or education can do it in others. Worship style or theological persuasion or political party affiliation can put you at or beyond the fringe in still others. Being, thinking, looking, or acting in ways different from a majority can push you to the margins.

I appreciate the opportunity to use this space to speak up on behalf of a group of people in our churches who feel different pretty often, and therefore feel marginalized pretty often. “Reflective Christians” is one way this group gets described. Less sympathetic people call them doubters.

We of Reformed Protestant heritage recall that it was in the 16th century that the Roman Catholic Church was excited about issuing indulgences — ways of reducing people’s time in purgatory through religious actions, especially giving money to the church.

Despite the church’s enthusiasm for it, a number of people could not help but question the “indulgence program.” They doubted what the institution held with such certainty. Something about it did not make sense to these “reflective” Christians. If they remained silent, they would feel dishonest and frustrated, but if they raised their questions, they would be seen with suspicion — not “team players.”

Some, like Martin Luther, spoke up (remember his 95 Theses?) and found that reflective Christians of his sort did not have a future in the church at that time.

About a hundred years later, Galileo looked through a telescope one night and saw moons positioned like dancers orbiting Jupiter. Galileo realized the church was wrong in upholding the traditional worldview.

Unfortunately, when Galileo became a doubter of the party line, he discovered what Martin Luther had discovered: reflective Christians weren’t welcome in the church at that time.

Or, we could talk about reflective Christians like Phineas Bresee (founder of the Nazarenes), who doubted that poor people should be avoided by respectable Christians, or Menno Simons (leader among Anabaptists), who doubted that Christians should kill other Christians in Christ’s name, or Martin Luther King Jr., and Desmond Tutu, who doubted that race should be a factor in fellowship.

Many of the heroes we study in church history began as reflective Christians who doubted what everyone else took for granted and, as a result, were in almost every case marginalized.

When communities habitually marginalize or exclude their most reflective members — those who ask tough questions about things that are considered completely normative for the majority — those who are stigmatized are damaged.

But so is the community that excludes, because in so doing that community cuts off resources for growth and renewal. It builds resistance to exactly what it will soon need. All this raises an urgent question: Who are the reflective Christians in your circle of contact - and mine - who may feel they are already on thin ice at the margins, who may be close to being edged out completely? What would it take to tell “them” they are wanted, needed, respected — that their differentness isn’t a problem to be solved by pressuring “them” to conform, but that their questioning is in fact a needed resource?

My suggestion: Together, let’s learn more about listening to each other. Together, let’s try to understand the questions, frustrations, and fresh ideas offered by others. We don’t need to agree with anyone concerning anything. Could we just be more attentive, more respectful, to give to others space to be who they are, even if they think differently from the majority?

At times, you and I may even need to stand between “them” and their most vocal critics, defending “them” from the boundary maintenance and exclusion police. These forces can be brutal for reflective Christians, but a Christ-like heart and a listening ear can keep our reflective Christians within the community of faith, even if at the margins — not edged out.

If every community eventually needs renewal (and every one does), and if renewal comes from what is viewed as the margin (and often it does) — then by amputating our margins, we do what the chief priests and scribes did when a needed voice showed up at the margins of their community.

Are we listening?