Loved,
Cherished, and Accepted
Read:
UMH #560
My
sign-language teacher has experienced much discrimination and
adversity in her life. She has been deaf since birth and grew up
during a time when there were few services and little societal
knowledge regarding deaf individuals. It is obvious by her stories
that her adverse experiences with the hearing culture have deeply
affected her life. She tells stories of being accused of drunkenness
when she could not verbally respond to the police and of being unable
to communicate her symptoms when seen at a hospital emergency room.
My teacher was also placed in a classroom for hearing individuals
during her elementary school years and was made to feel “stupid”
for being unable to keep up with her classmates.
Many
of those experiences with the “hearing culture” have made her
suspicious of the hearing community and somewhat isolated. She stays
within the deaf community, has difficulty with social interaction,
and certainly carries many scars from her negative experiences.
But
in the year since I first stepped into her classroom, I’ve
witnessed a remarkable change in her. The three of us who are now
taking her 10-week ASL class for the fourth semester have always been
extremely patient and kind, even after receiving her always blunt and
sometimes negative comments. In turn, our teacher is beginning to
show us that she cares for us and values our friendship. Her face
lights up when one of us tells her a story about our life situations,
and she shows real concern when any one of us has a problem. The
patience and caring that we have shown to our teacher have helped her
to realize that she is indeed loved, cherished and accepted.
We
can bridge the gap between cultures by being true disciples of Jesus
through our words and deeds.
Jan
Versical
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