Hope you all are doing well! Today we had the opportunity to do a little sightseeing here in Cluj. We visited the botanical gardens with two woman who attend the deaf church. One of them told us some really exciting news! In December 2006, the university in Cluj officially recognized Romanian sign language as a foreign language. Students are required to take a second language like French or English, & then sign language can count as an optional third foreign language. The university said they are willing to make Romanian sign language available as an option for the second language requirements, but right now they cannot. This is due to the fact that as a second language, you need to take 10 or 12 credit hours of that language. The university is blessed with two deaf professors who can teach Romanian sign language, but that only provides students with six credit hours right now. When more Deaf people can be trained & hired as professors, more classes can be added & it will be available to be offered as a second language. This is encouraging, especially for the woman who was sharing with us. She just returned from a international interpreter conference in Spain where she was really inspired to continue advocating for deaf people’s rights. She explained that since Romania is part of the EU now, Romania is now under the law that deaf people have the right to interpreter services. Please pray that a team can be established to form a program to effectively train qualified interpreters.
After that, we prepared for the evening worship service, which was once again, fantastic! The deaf people are captivated by the dramas, because that brings life to Bible stories & Biblical principles. Tonight we focused on the theme that Jesus is Lord of our life. Among the dramas we did tonight, one that really stood out to me was Jesus calming the storm in Luke 8:22-25. After we acted this out, Pastor Noah pointed out that just as Jesus was in the boat during the storm, He is in our lives during our hardships. Instead of being frightened & upset by the problems in our lives, we can look to Jesus, because He is right there.
After the service, something truly valuable always occurs: we fellowship with everyone! We’ve heard several theories from deaf people regarding the causes of their deafness. Some of them know their cause of deafness is from a childhood sickness. Some of them, though, believe that they are deaf for superstititious reasons. One woman we talked with in Moldova believes the cause of her deafness is due to the fact that while she was still in her mother’s womb, her mom saw a black cat, got scared, and so this woman we talked with became deaf from then on. Another man told us that when his mom was pregnant with him, she was frightened by a person with a horrible skin disease, so he became deaf while still in the womb. It is sad that these people feel so abnormal to the extreme degree that they still blame deafness on superstitition. Pray that God can transform their thinking so that they no longer see themselves as misfits in society. Instead of viewing themselves as products of scary encounters, pray we can help them see themselves as a beautiful masterpiece of God’s creation, for that is what they truly are.
Pray for God to give us wisdom as we purchase supplies tomorrow to give out at our last worship service tomorrow at 5pm our time. Pray that deaf people in Cluj will come to the services & find solace in God.
God bless, The Romanian Team – Isaiah 43:1-2
