'Bethany, The House Of Song And Affliction'

"Once there was a young volunteer from Hawaii who was helping us. He asked for the most difficult child in the center, and we gave him one. In about a week, the young man had problems eating. He skipped his meals often and when confronted about it, he told me that it was just too difficult. 'The cleaning up of the messes, the caring of the child - those I can do,' said the young volunteer. 'It's just the feeding that's the biggest obstacle for me here.' He was losing his appetite from what he had encountered during the child's feeding session. And in reply I asked him if this was what he thought it was all about - that social work would always involve well bodied and physically beautiful people. He mulled over it for a few days, in self-reflection and quietness. After a while, he went back to his regular meals and in the end, he even shared his meals with the child, on one plate.

Then came a time for him to leave the centre. On that day, a resident worker of the facility told him, that one day, in heaven, when they meet again - the child and this young man - the child would no longer be in a wheel-chair; the child would be free from his disabilities. 'Simply because now, he has a twisted body, a twisted mind, a twisted speech but somewhere, deep within this covering; this shell of his - lies his soul, undistorted, immortal. He was not born with a curse; he was not born like this as a punishment; he was born like you - (made) in the image of God, and this is how you will help many later: see them for who they really are. Like the child you cared for.'

And then he came to me, telling me that they never taught him this - all the various institutions and colleges that he had ever been to, for his training. And then, he left."

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