I'm an educator. In my first year teaching, I taught kindergarten. I was struck by how young we start believing that different people have a different assigned value.
Everyone flocked to the little girl with perfectly plaited braids and flashy accessories.
Everyone rolled their eyes at the autistic buddy who flailed during carpet time.
And so, our classroom tagline became: “Everyone is the Same Amount of Important.”
Right now, a civil war rages 6 hours north of Gulu, in South Sudan. Bodies fill the streets because one tribe does not care for the other.
Right now, racism floods the US and people are dying based on the color of their skin and the color of their uniforms.
Right now, hate spews out, "you don't belong here!"
Right now, the world does not believe “Everyone is the Same Amount of Important.”
Thank God for our sponsors, who are proving it’s true.
Right now 10 children attend school in Northern Uganda. They come from a wide variety of backgrounds: a family who fell on hard times, a single mother whose husbands have come and gone like the wind, a betrayed family whose father infected them with a terrible disease, orphans, children who live with their extended family. But every single one of them is defying the odds and is sitting at a school desk. All because a group of people who will committed to Aphoyo. They decided that these children deserve a shot at an education just like their own children, and they would forgo a few comforts for themselves to ensure they could access it.
All because a group of people around the world believe that everyone is the same amount of important.
Those kindergarteners of mine? Oh man was I proud of them. They hung out with anyone they came in contact with on the playground, they took care of the autistic friend even when he spit at them, and when they learned about Martin Luther King and what he did and why died they agreed that had only the world believed “everyone is the same amount of important” none of it would have been necessary.
I pray we leave our world to those kindergarteners and to our Aphoyo students. I pray that tribal leaders may look each other in the eye and see the image of their Maker. I pray that races in the heat of conflict may put down their weapons and realize they have the same colored blood. I pray that we would know that everyone deserves a shot. We are all the same amount of important.