The Universal Language of Kindness

For the next 25 days, I will be living and working in Ethiopia, a land of poverty, rich soil, and distant blue mountains. For most of the trip my only companion will be Teshome Yami, an Ethiopian graduate student who is studying at OU. When we walk the streets of the village, a town about the size of Purcell, I will be very aware that I am the only one who does not speak the language (Amharic) and whose skin is not black. People will stare at me, and some will try to speak broken English to me. But we cannot have real conversations, and can only share a smile and a cup of rich black coffee. What a gift for me to live in such a place! For I will know, first hand, what it feels like to be a stranger in a foreign land. I will be alone and isolated in a sea of humanity, weak and vulnerable and powerless both to protect myself and to make my wishes known. I will depend completely on the unmerited kindnesses of others, who can either welcome me or take advantage of me. This is how every immigrant feels who comes to a new place - to live, to work, or to study. I will depend on the goodness of strangers, and the grace of God, “sufficient for me, for power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Cor. 12).  Praise God for the universal language of kindness! - - - Fr. Jim