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“In most of the Western world, where Christianity still enjoys a significant amount of privilege, especially when practiced by middle-class, white Christians, Jesus is seen as the heroic figure, the ultimate example of godliness, holiness, mercy, compassion, and justice—as well he should! He is God-made-flesh, after all. However, given that, when we identify with Jesus in the act of foot washing where we take the role of Jesus, all too often we are unconsciously (though sometimes all too consciously) assuming those characteristics onto ourselves. In trying to be Jesus to others, we can assume a posture of spiritual superiority and/or paternalism. The recipients of our service, “the least of theseâ€�, are then seen as the needy recipients of our goodness. Again, while affirming the value in such acts of humble service, too often miss how such posturing fails to recognize the radical presence of Christ as “the least of theseâ€�.”
― Jamie Arpin-Ricci

“It is in the face of this radical revisioning of ourselves as the community of Christ that our relationship to “the least of theseâ€� is formed. They don’t represent a threat to our lives, both physically (in their demands on our resources, in the loss of safety) and existentially (in how they expose our pretense, our privilege), but they actually can be seen as Christ Himself. Not in some romantic, shallow way in which we take in the homeless beggar only to have him later throw off his rags to reveal himself as Jesus, rewarding us for our righteousness. No, we encounter Christ in them because the process we have gone through has demonstrated to us that in the other—in those most different from us—our own inadequacy is exposed, offering us the opportunity to embrace the gift of the transforming cross.”
― Jamie Arpin-Ricci, Vulnerable Faith: Missional Living in the Radical Way of St. Patrick