Kermit Titrud of Wycliffe Bible Translators and SIL International, and whom we at St. Gregory's have supported for over 20 years, recently emailed me:
"read your sermon - you wrote:
[quoting Graciela, a woman who worked with an Argentine mountain community to build a school]
'You know, when we first came to the village, the people would never speak their native language in front of us. They were ashamed of their native language and would only speak Spanish.'
Kermit then comments:
"Actually that was similar to my experience when I went to Caluya [Antique, Philippines]. The people were ashamed of their language. But when we had the dedication of the New Testament, an elder stood up and said, 'Before we were ashamed of our language, but now we are proud of our language, because God speaks Caluyanun.' Before they wrote and preached and even prayed in Hiligaynon [another Filipino language spoken in Antique and several other provinces]. But now they do all those things in their own language and the church has doubled, quadripled, and even more as a result."
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