Three days after I arrived in Uganda in 2010, I headed to a nearby hotel with friends to play soccer. Since it was going to be a long afternoon, I brought along a container of fruit to share.
As I reached the gate, the security guard stopped me. “You can’t bring that in,” she said firmly. “You need to leave it here at the gate.”
Obligingly, I handed over the fruit. When she asked for my name, I told her, “Missy.” She wrote down exactly what she heard: Messy.
Missy Ward Angalla
A few hours later, I returned to collect my container. A different guard went inside and brought it out, and there it was — the slip of paper identifying the owner. The first guard hadn’t just written my name; she had added a few descriptive words. The paper read: “Messy White Lady.”
Sixteen years later, I still smile when I think about that moment. There was no offense intended or taken; they were simply writing what they heard and saw. I would soon learn that in Uganda, there is no “Missy.” In all my years here, I’ve never met another one — except for a few precious babies named in my honor.
But as time passed, I realized “Messy” actually describes me quite well. I am messy in the sense that I don’t fit into neat boxes. My identity is a complex tapestry: it’s been shaped by a healing journey from trauma and being neurodivergent; by attending a women’s college; by 13 years living as an American expat married to a Ugandan; and by being a minister of faith who didn’t grow up in the church. I am a Floridian who didn’t grow up in the “South,” now ministering alongside refugee communities in Kampala.
All these layers have had a profound impact on who I am. Reflecting on that “Messy White Lady” story recently, I began to think about what it truly means to belong. One of the greatest gifts in life is the experience of being seen and heard in all these complexities — not being forced into a box. I don’t “fit in,” but the reality is, I don’t want to. I want to belong.
“I believe the world needs more belonging and far less ‘fitting in.’”
As Brené Brown beautifully puts it: “Fitting in is the opposite of belonging. Fitting in is about assessing the situation and becoming who you need to be accepted. Belonging, on the other hand, doesn’t require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are.”
I believe the world needs more belonging and far less “fitting in.”
Each time I return to the U.S., I sense my home culture becoming increasingly polarized. We are disconnected from our neighbors by “dividing lines” — political, religious and socioeconomic. We have become a society overly interested in which “boxes” people check, rather than who they actually are, which has been shaped by the complex tapestry of their family of origin, life experience, culture and personality.
Beneath these lines of division lies a powerful, often irrational emotion: Fear.
We fear “the other” — the person who believes differently or looks different. But deeper still are personal fears rooted in trauma, life experience and economic survival. Fear is not rational; it is perceived. When the brain’s amygdala is activated, it initiates a “fight, flight or freeze” response, prioritizing immediate survival over rational thought and suppressing the prefrontal cortex.
Over the last year, I have often found myself asking, “How can this be happening? How can people support this?” The conclusion I keep reaching is fear.
So how do we as Christians respond to those with whom we fundamentally disagree? The most potent antidote to fear is presence. It is the act of seeing someone, holding space for them and hearing them. It is looking beneath the surface to ask, “Why does this person believe this?” with the same curiosity and compassion we hope others would extend to us.
In college, my religious studies professor taught us to view other faiths through a phenomenological lens. This framework focuses on the “lived experience” of individuals, seeking to uncover the essential meaning of how people perceive and interpret their world. It asks us to understand the experience rather than just measuring the cause. This lens was really challenging but ultimately a gift; it pushed me out of my comfort zone and empowered me to be more present with people’s differences.
When we stop trying to make people “fit” into our political, cultural or theological boxes, we create space to see the Imago Dei in them — the unique way God created them. Belonging begins when we realize God doesn’t ask us to fit a mold or check a box; God invites us to a table, a table of difference.
The other thing fear does is prevent us from seeing the full picture. As I was finishing this article this morning, my husband asked me to look out the window. The sunrise was exceptionally beautiful, a reminder that when we refuse to look, we miss the beauty of the fuller picture of who someone actually is.
Adopting a phenomenological lens — seeking to understand the “lived experience” of another — is not an act of agreement or condoning; it is an act of love. It is the choice to prioritize love and presence over prejudice or disagreement. In a world fueled by the amygdala’s “fight or flight” response, the most radical thing a person of faith can do is stay. To stay curious. To stay uncomfortable. To stay present. To stay “messy.”
Sixteen years after a security guard wrote “Messy White Lady,” I’ve realized the note wasn’t a mistake but an invitation. It was an invitation to live outside the lines and to find belonging in the beautiful, complex and often contradictory stories of the people around me.
If we can find belonging across borders, languages and cultures in Kampala, surely we can find it across our own streets. We don’t need more people who fit in; we need more people who are brave enough to provide spaces to belong.
Missy Ward Angalla is an ordained Baptist minister. She is co-founder and co-executive director of Amani Sasa, a ministry providing holistic, integrated care to vulnerable refugee and Ugandan families in Kampala, Uganda.