One of the central claims of the feminist/egalitarian crowd is that Christ's work on the cross has obliterated all distinctions between persons. The scripture passages often cited for this view are for example, Colossians 3:11, "Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all and is in all." But more often (because it is more precisely to their point) Galatians 3:28, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for your are all one in Christ Jesus."
Now, I don't believe these passages imply all that the feminist/egalitarian people think they do. But, for now, let's just grant it for the sake of argument. It's interesting that wherever feminist/ egalitarian sentiments exist one also (almost always?) finds the teachings and practices of multiculturalism - the indignant renunciation of western, Christian, white, male hegemony and an embracing of ethnic, racial, religious and moral diversity.
This is undeniable in settings like public universities and government but is also a growing influence on the campuses of Christian colleges and seminaries as well as in a number of evangelical churches. Where one may be able to understand its existence in the former setting, it is an irony - if not a inconsistency - to find it in the latter.
Because, where the cross has created a unity which we may celebrate, this is certainly not the case with multiculturalism. Where in the former God has created "one new man" (Ephesians 2:15), the latter multiplies distinctions among people not to mention creating insuperable barriers to unity by insinuating untold numbers of injustices by people in power against those without it.
How can it be so vehemently argued that Christ's work on the cross has created such unity so as to remove all distinctions between male and female on the one hand; but, on the other to embrace also the teachings of multiculturalism and diversity so that we can no longer refer to people as "Christians" but must adopt its awkward, compound, hyphenated language which emphasizes differences?
For in secular multicultural settings we find not simply Americans but African-Americans, Latino-Americans, Asian-Americans. So also in churches that have embraced this framework we cannot simply refer to someone as a Christian but have Anglos in Christ, Latinos in Christ, etcetera. It is a strange view of unity that denies distinctions between male and female but so easily sees it between races.
