Humble Whispers - Life in a Leprosy Village

Forced to leave their families, friends and community many of those found to be suffering from leprosy in this particular area of East Asia are taken to live in remote villages often far from home. Here, lives become faint whispers framed in the wilderness of disease, isolation, and stigma.

The twenty or so outcasts in the humble village we visited receive a minimum amount of medical care, and, despite their old age and disabilities, work in fields under the glare of an intense mid-day sun. As we joined local volunteers in working the fields with them, dressed their wounds and helped clean their small dark houses, we began to catch a glimpse beyond the broken exteriors and into the beauty within.

I started to draw a portrait of a man with whom a particular friendship emerged. This man had an infectious joy that seemed to confront his isolation, disability and obvious poverty. Curious, I asked Him how he could still carry such joy. Simply, he answered, ‘Because I’m known by my heavenly Father’.

His statement hit me like a freight train. This man’s faith, lived in the hard press of some of life’s harshest realities, enabled him to live with a freedom that inspires me deeply.

I knew this man’s profound story needed to reach beyond this hidden village and find it’s home in the hearts of others on a journey seeking greater freedom in their lives. I started by creating a large portrait of my new friend and told his story with it at a university we had been working in. Here, students, moved, gave money for more medical support and a couple of medical students offered their skills to join a local nurse in visiting and offering practical help to our new friends.

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