Well, I tried to post this earlier and lost the internet connection, so here I go again.
I have read that St. Francis of Assisi said, "Preach the gospel everyday and if necessary, use words." I find myself wondering if Francis thought words made presenting the gospel easier. I don't.
My daughter has been teaching refugees english, math and life skills to help them integrate into the world of Atlanta and the United States. Part of the life skills class curriculum teaches them to look their supervisors in the eye when talking to them to let the supervisor know they are listening. In the culture they come from, looking a superior in the eye is a form of disrespect and they told B that they could not do that. My daughter did not feel she could continue teaching this because it was making the kids ignore who they were, where they had come from. Some refugee teens had said that after being here for a while, they felt as if they had lost their "soul" because they could not BE themselves and live out their cultural experience here in the states. B did not want to add to this undoing of these kids. She had respect for them and their culture.
It is so easy for us to take into account who people are, their culture and background, when they come from another country. It is even easy to take into consideration the fact that someone may be very young and may not have had the life experiences or education we have had.
It can be very difficult, however, to accept the fact that someone who is older than us, someone who seemingly lives the same life we have lived, may come from a different "place." We expect people who live in America, who eat what we eat, who talk like we do, who attend the same church we do, who have been around longer than we have to be able to understand things we say just because.
What we forget is that people who grew up say 50 years or more ago, grew up with a different perspective than those of us who were born more recently. Life experiences and the attitudes and teachings of those around us have a great influence on our own beliefs and priorities. Living and learning with people who lived and learned themselves from a different age has a major effect on our thought and belief processes.
Scripture shows that Jesus taught and preached through parables using examples from things that those listening could relate to. He spoke in terms of where the people were, not necessarily where he was. This is how people understand the messages we are to preach and teach. It does no good to use examples from quantum physics as examples when talking to me because I would have absolutely no idea what you were talking about. If, however, you spoke in terms of radiology, child rearing, maybe even insurance (on a very limited level), then I could relate and what you were saying would actually mean something to me.
Jesus respected the people he taught and it showed through his speaking. Yes, his messages may have been very difficult for them to swallow, but at least they understood and could relate.
If B can respect the refugee teens and understand that their cultural experience is a valid thing to be taken into consideration when speaking to them, then why do we find it so hard to do the same with people we know and love? No one is the same, no one comes from the same place, has the same life experience, education or beliefs. It makes no difference what the message is or how evident it may seem to you or I. If we don't take into consideration the person we are talking to, the message won't get across and can ultimately make that person feel demeaned, condemed or less of a person.
I am not sure if any of this makes much sense, but I guess that is what a blog is for - just to get things out. If you are reading this, I hope that you take into consideration that these words are mine and come from my life experiences and the culture I was raised in and the culture I currently live in. I hope that you will not reject them as the rantings of an uneducated mother of 2, but instead, let them provoke you to think and hopefully be more considerate of others when you preach and teach.
Peace.
