When I was 11, my school teacher asked me to teach the class about Mormons.
There was a three paragraph blip about my religious and familial ancestors in our history book. I'm not even sure how my teacher knew that I was a member of the LDS church, but she asked me if I'd like to teach the class.
We lived in the Bible Belt. My brother and I were the only Mormons in the school. Most of my peers had no idea what a Mormon was. There was a boy in my class named Hezekiah. This is what I was up against and I was pretty nervous.
Since the actual piece in the textbook was pretty short, my 'lesson' was also pretty short. I summarized how the early members of the church were driven across the west and ended up in Utah. I talked about how difficult and rough their journey had been and how lots of people had died. I emphasized the injustice of the religious persecution that they had faced.
That's pretty much it. Then I asked if there were any questions.
Complete blank stares.
Which, I thought, was much better than the alternative. You know, having tomatoes thrown at me.
I sat down and the teacher thanked me for the lesson. And that was it. I never heard anything more about it. But, I did feel proud of myself for conquering my fears. For at least standing up and letting everyone know that I was a Mormon.
3 comments:
Brave girl. I still get the same reaction sometimes when teaching grown adults about the church!
That is so brave! I was rather overenthusiastic (read: judgmental and preachy) when I joined the church, and I sang "I Know That My Redeemer Lives" in Spanish for a class project once, but it was HARD to talk about the church in our high school. The local Christian megachurch in our town that EVERY religious kid went to was pastured by an excommunicated Mormon who had a serious issue with the church, and he made life very uncomfortable for us. Plus, it was the Northwest--not always the most friendly place for a conservative religion to thrive! I can imagine middle school being a bit more friendly--I knew several Mormon girls then, and wile I knew almost nothing about the church, I never heard anything bad about it from my peers.
That would be "pastored." I'm turning off autocorrect on this awful, awful iPad RIGHT NOW.
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