Saturday, May 01, 2010

Just thinking outloud

Mory is one of my Kind gardeners.
A very chatty character.
I've noticed over the school year that he's now being raised in the Muslim faith. (I don't think this was always the case but I'm not 100% sure. I mean he's 6 so you can't always figure these things out.)
Anyway the other day as we were working together we started talking about Allah (which I know is simply the Arabic word for God)and how he was angry.
"No, Mory, I don't think Allah is angry at you. I think he loves us very much."
"No! he is." he insisted. "You have to pray down like this" he showed me how he kneels down, bowing low to pray. "You have to pray everyday."
"I do pray Mory. But I don't bow like that, I just sit up."
"Yes, that's how Americans pray. But, Africans, we have to pray like this" (again, he's only 6, so he's associated America with Christianity and Africa with Islam)
"If you don't, then Allah will take you tongue like this, (putting it out) and he'll pound a nail through it. He'll crush on you. He'll pound you like 'Boom Boom'" (not really sure if this is in the Koran or if this is just what he's been told. Like how a kid might be told by his Catholic mother that he'll go to hell if he gets a tattoo. )
But Mory, being the animated character that he is, was enthusiastically pounding his fist and making God's angry face. And then it kinda dawned on him,- dawned on him what he was saying, and how that effected me. He got very somber.
It's like he realized the 'bad guy' that would be pounded, would be me.
"So you have to pray. Okay? Okay, Miss Merrill? Just sometimes... sometimes pray like that okay?"
Only the thing is, the thing that I couldn't articulate to this six year old, it that I'm not afraid of that happening, because I don't believe that's God's character.
On the way home I started wondering about people who live far from God and how they interact with Christians. I guess if the only message they ever heard of is "repent or go to hell" they would no more believe it than I did with Mory.
Several of my students are Muslim, and it's been interesting talking with them and learning about their faith. (the older ones are more articulate than a kindergartner) But sometimes I wonder what they think about me. Do they think I'm a bad person because I eat pork or because I don't cover my head when I pray. None of them have ever said anything like that, but I wonder if they judge me.
but what about my non-christian friends? Do they wonder what I think about them? Do they fear that I secretly judge them?

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