This week I have been reading a short story for my History class. The book was about an African American family that lived in a black community in the new west during the late 1800s. The father was a preacher in this small town and put into focus the family and societal struggles this family faced because of this occupation. Although I do not always agree with some of the points that are highlighted in the book, I found it to be very interesting. With this being said, any time I came across something I did not agree with, I would look up bible verses in efforts to prove these statements and accusations wrong. When looking back on this, I saw how I was able to relate my personal beliefs and scripture in the Bible to this historical fiction short story. I was surprised as to how much I was able and motivated to relate and draw these connections through out this book. I usually just read the book because I had to, but this time I wanted and easily made these connections. Not only did this help me understand the book, but it helped with my knowledge and understanding of the scripture.
While further reflecting on this connection experience, I realized that I turn to my beliefs as a set of glasses. In other words, I discovered that I draw connections between my beliefs and others beliefs all the time. When I am reading a news article, Facebook post, text book or text, I also have a perspective, based around my beliefs, when I am interpreting the text. For example, I received a text today from a peer and they were using cuss words through out the text. I viewed that text in a negative light because of my beliefs. Then it occurred to me that maybe someone else from a different background wouldn’t see anything wrong with the use of profanity. Overall, I realized that my beliefs connect to the way I perceive things all the time.
As I think more about this post, I realized I had missed another pivotal point through this educational experience. I had gone to my professor in order to discuss the argumentative paper I was going to write. To my surprise, my professor was an atheists. So when I started slamming him with scripture and personal beliefs his statement was “is this really cold hard facts?” I remembered being so frustrated because to me they were facts, but to him it wasn’t. I think this is the moment where I realized that not only did I have to think individually, but I had to think of each class/professor individually when I complete an assignment. For example, I feel that if I wrote a paper and mentioned the Bible in writing class, you would be understanding. On the contrary, my history teacher would not feel the same way.