@#$%!

There's a certain four-letter word that I've using far too much since we moved to Honduras. I use it in traffic. I use it when shopping. I use it when I have to deal with paperwork. I use it on behalf of other people when they run into cultural conflicts. I even use it when I talk about life here with friends and family in the US.
I excuse my use of it because, hey, a lot of the Americans down here use it. Some of them use it a lot more than I do. Then I remember that I'm a pastor and I'm supposed to be an example or something.
Okay. I'm going to tell you what it is. I'm gonna write it out leaving out no letters. Sheild the children's eyes.
Here it is: "they." Sometimes I even say "them."
Yep. They. What's the problem with "they?" "Them?"
There are a couple of problems with these words. Much of the time it is not followed by anything complimentary. It is not as though most of us are saying, "They are so friendly down here" or "They really know how to do x well here." No, we say things like, "They don't know how to drive here!" And, "They have no sense of customer service here!" Sure, I recognize positive cultural features occasionally, but far more often I'm painting Hondurans with a broad and distinctly uncharitable brush.
Even if what I followed "they" with was nice, I think it could still be problematic. "They" divides us into US and THEM. (And far to often that US is us as in U.S. which further complicates the issue.) How can I hope to live, love and serve a people that I regularly categorize as something other than myself?
It seems to me that a significant part of Jesus's ministry and a fair bit of Paul's ink were spent trying to drive home to us that there is no US and THEM, not in the church ("No Jew and Gentile") and not even outside of it ("and such were some of you...").
Do you suppose I'd learn this lesson if I wash my mouth out with soap?