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Unique Life of Fr Cyril Axelrod

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Lovin Sai Hearts

Personally I met Fr Cyril Axelrod when he came to Australia on his mission years

ago. Have your hanky ready with you.

Namaste

Betty

THE REMARKABLE STORY OF A DEAF BLIND PRIEST

 

Father Cyril Axelrod's life story was broadcast on BBC See Hear program in

England. It is worthwhile for his Australian friends to read this story.

 

In May 2001, Redemptorist missionary, Cyril Axelrod received an honorary

doctorate in law from Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., the only

university in the world specificity founded for deaf persons. The citation

recognition recognised his service to deaf people in his native South Africa

and in Southeast Asia. Father Axelrod later described this moving experience.

This purple collar with yellow stripes was placed on my shoulders and the

certificate and the citation were presented to me. Then the president took my

left hand and raised it up to a great ovation from the audience, given by

stamping on the floor instead of waving or clapping their hands. I felt very

moved by the great vibration of happiness and joy that I felt through the

floor. My poor eyes could not see significantly, but my heart heard their

shouts of support and joy.

Few in the audience knew that Father Axelrod had just passed through a personal

crisis. A progressive eye diseased called retinitis pigmentosa had recently

plunged him into near darkness. At age of fifty eight years old, he had been

forced to resign from his job, leave his friends and his community, and move to

an unfamiliar country. "It was the starting point of going through my identity

crisis," he said, "From my childhood, I grew up in the deaf community and

enjoyed fulfilling my potential as a sighted deaf person. As I neared sixty

years of age, I found it unspeakably hard to think of going into another

community, the deaf-blind community. It was just like the end of the road in my

life."

But with the support of his spiritual counsellor, new friends, and deaf-blind

UK which offers support to deaf-blind adults. Father Alexrod has made a fresh

start. He walks by faith, encouraging others who are faltering in the face of

loss or disability to trust God. In an interview with Liguorian, interpreted by

Simon Chan, of Hong Kong, he installed joy and warmth as he spoke of his

spiritual and physical journey. "I have great hope and courage to go through

this most important next step, to gain a sense of fulfilment, and to act as a

model for deaf-blind people." Father Alexrod said, "God used my deafness to

bring His Love to people. Maybe He can use my blindness, too."

 

Early life, conversion

Cyril Bernhard Alexrod was born profoundly deaf in Johannesburg, South Africa,

on February 24, 1942, he only child of an Orthodox Jewish couple. His father

died as a young age, but Cyril and his widowed mother were nurtured by a

close-knit extended family. From age to nineteen he attended St Vincent School

for the Deaf, staffed by German Dominican nuns, where he moved and formed

lasting bonds with teachers and classmates. His social life revolved around

school, synagogue, and the Jewish Deaf Social Club in Johannesburg. After

graduation he accepted a position as an accounting clerk for a local business

and enrolled in a book-keeping certificate program. Quite unexpectedly, Cyril

began to entertain thoughts of converting to the Catholic Faith. This was not,

as some suspected, because the Dominican Sisters had proselytized him. On the

contrary, they initially discouraged him because they knew his conversion would

divide his family and devaluate his mother.

After a wrenching spiritual journey, the young orthodox Jew who had once dreamt

of becoming a rabbi resolved instead to become a Catholic and a priest. He was

baptized on August 14, 1965, at age of twenty three years old a former

schoolmate stood beside him as his godparent. The absence of family members at

this important ceremony made for a bittersweet memory, but Cyril was eager to

begin his new journey, "I felt God was calling me to bring His Love to deaf

people, to give them spiritual help." Father Axelrod explained, "There were no

deaf priests in South Africa at that time, and the deaf community was very

fragmented because of the spiritual regime, so the need was great."

To prepare for the priesthood, Cyril studied philosophy and psychology in the

United States at Gallaudet University and the Catholic University of America,

then returned to South Africa for four years of theology studies at St John

Vianney Seminary. His ordination on November 28, 1970, was memorable for

several reasons. Long time friend and fellow Redemptorist Larry Kaufmann

recalls, "At the time Cyril was the only deaf born person n the world to be

ordained. But most remarkable was that Cyril's mother attended the event. Most

of us would take that for granted. But as a strict Orthodox Jewess, Cyril's

mother had decided that she could not be present at the Christian ordination of

her only child, having struggled enough as it was to accept his conversion from

Judaism, Cyril did not expect to see her sitting in the front pew as the

procession entered the sanctuary."

Father Axelrod remembers, "It was most specular and emotional when my mother

took courage to walk up with me to the altar, where the bishop sat. He received

me and thanked my mother for presenting me to the altar. Then he spoke about

Hannah offering her only son, Samuel, to the temple. While listening to his

sermon, my mother beamed with a gentle smile. She felt honoured to be like

Hannah, offering her only son, Cyril to the temple."

 

Ministry in South Africa

Father Axelrod's first mission field was the vast and chaotic territory of South

Africa during apartheid. Repressive laws ensured the domination of the white

minority, while Blacks, Indians and so-called "Coloureds," or people of mixed

race, were systemically isolated, marginalized, and humiliated. "I travelled

the tarred and sandy rods all over the country and visited the deaf people in

scattered areas." He said, "Because of apartheid, these groups were prevented

from meeting together or sharing a common language. My ministry was to build

bridges of communication and to stand for solidarity with them in their

plight."

Father Axelrod's days were brutal, and the road was often lonely. After five

years as a diocesan priest, he realised that he needed spiritual companionship

and joined the Redemptorist congregation, an international community of priests

and Brothers whose mission is to preach the gospel to the abandoned poor.

Encouraged by his confreres, he began preaching mission and giving retreats to

deaf persons in Europe, Asia, Australia and the United States, but South Africa

remained his priority.

Two years after joining the Redemptorists, Father Alexrod founded the first

South African day school for the deaf. "It was the first school for the deaf

that accepted English as a medium for instruction," He said. "This greatly

increased their appointments for employment and communication with others.

Normally the government did not allow non-white children to be educated in

English." The little classroom in North Sowero grew into a large complex of

educational and technical schools. Today it has more than five hundred

students.

The day school was followed by the construction of a home just outside Pretoria

for black working deaf adults and the foundation of a faith community for deaf

people in Cape Town. The first was significant because it directly challenged

apartheid's "influx control policy," a regulation that prevented non-resident

blacks from working in white townships. The second was revolutionary because it

enabled South Africans of all races to socialise and to work together as our

community. "It was a liberating experience for deaf people of al different

ethnic groups," Father Axelrod explained. The community now has more than one

thousand members and is self-sufficient, governed and supported entirely by all

members.

 

Father Axelrod's vision deteriorates

Immersed in his ministry, Father Alexrod was not prepared for the chilling

moment in 1990 when he experienced a disturbing change in his vision. "I was in

the U.S. giving a preached mission to deaf people. One morning I stepped down

the stairs and stumbled to the bottom. I looked up and noticed something like

curtains of both sides of a panoramic window, but the curtains were not

actually there. An uncomfortable feeling stirred my heart, and I took a deep

breath." The next day the ophthalmologist who examined Father Axelrod diagnosed

his disease and explained that his vision would deteriorate until he was

completely blind. "Inside, it was like an explosion." He recalls.

With a heavy heart, Father Alexrod returned to South Africa, where he began

making lifestyle adjustments. The most difficult he says, was giving up

driving, which he had done extensively to make pastoral visits. His confidence

wavered and his patience was tried by the inconvenience of public

transportation, but he was determined to stay active in ministry. Friends and

confreres who witnessed his struggle were awed by his spirit. "Cyril is an

extraordinary man," writes Father Larry Kaufmann. "I have known him for thirty

years and he has been one of the greatest inspirations in my life."

 

Ministry in China

In 1988, the superior General of the Redemptorist congregation visited Father

Axelrod's community in South Africa and spoke about a new mission in China.

Afterward, he approached Father Axelrod personally and invited him to go to

China to minister to the deaf. Father Alexrod protested that he could not go

because of the problem with his eyes. The superior general replied evenly,

"That is not your problem, it is God's problem." A few months later Father

Axelrod was on his way to Hong Kong to study Cantonese, and the following year

he moved to Macau, a densely populated city near Hong Kong where he ministered

for twelve years.

According to Father Axelrod, social and educational services for deaf people

were practically nonexistent when he arrived in Macau. Parents of deaf

children, taught by society to be ashamed of their "defective" offspring, would

typically hide them indoors, where they had no social contact of formal

education. As adults, these abandoned individuals were considered fortunate if

they found jobs as street sweepers, window washers, or "human fans," waving

palm leaves over the rich,.

Father Axelrod founded an association in Macau that eventually provided an

array of services for deaf people outreach for young children isolated in their

homes, vocational-training programs and sports programs for youth, speech

classes and social services, and a day centre for elderly people who are deaf.

He also helped to develop Chinese tactile sign language for the deaf blind

community. Father Axelrod's vision deteriorated steadily, but not as quickly,

as the doctors had first predicated, allowing him to adjust to new methods of

communication and mobility. "Thank goodness for my red and white cane, as it

managed to open the way for me to walk through the dense crowd without bumping

into people. Many friends who came to visit me in Macau enjoyed walking quite

comfortably behind me, like the people following Moses triumphantly through the

Red Sea." Father Axelrod said, "Incidentally" - he added merrily - "the deaf

blind person led the sighted people to the places of interest."

 

Total blindness, move to England

By March 2000, Father Axelrod's vision had deteriorated to the point that he

had to make dramatic changes in his life. He resigned "with a distraught heart"

from his position as Executive Director of the Macau Association for the Deaf.

Then he moved to Peterborough, England, to immerse himself in a training

program offered by Deaf Blind U.K. He studied Braille and switched from British

and American Sign Language to hands on sign language and manual finger spelling.

He also learnt how to use a computer for the blind and was trained in

independent living skills. "I faced a tremendous struggle of adapting to the

life and culture." He confessed.

Part of Father Axelrod's new mission is to increase public awareness and

understanding of deaf-blindness. He quotes the American deaf-blind author Helen

Keller. "The blind are cut off from things and the deaf are cut off from

people." Few nondisabled people realise that 95 percent of their information

about the world comes to them through two sense hearing and sight. But for th4e

deaf-blind, touch is the primary gateway to the world.

"Deaf-Blind people live in a small world," Father Axelrod explained. "It is

difficult to imagine this world if you have not experienced it. When I preach

to deaf-blind people, I do not stand in front of a group. One by one, I sign a

homely into an outstretched hand. They cannot see or hear, but they feel God's

Love through touch. At the moment of connection, I guide their hands to the

chalice and host to help them know and feel God's Love signing into their

hands, "This is the life of God."

Today Father Axelrod's life revolves around Deaf/Blind UK, where he serves as

pastoral support coordinator, "My role is to develop a wide range of contacts

in Christian and non-Christian organisations in order to promote awareness of

deaf-blindness and to offer our service to the deaf-blind." He is about to

launch a new training program for personal professionals that will teach them

how to guide and communicate with the deaf-blind so that they will be able to

participate fully in religious services.

It has not been an easy transition but Father Axelrod is upbeat. "I found it

very difficult when I lost my vision I felt cut off from God but I go to a

counsellor, a Catholic woman and she has helped me to be positive. She has

helped me to see my blindness as a gift of God's Hand, reminding me that God

can see me to bring His Love to a new people - the deaf-blind. I believe this.

I believe that God will use me. My blindness is for them, so I can tell them,

God is here."

 

Alicia von Stamwic is a writer and author on the staff of Liguorium article

reprinted from the Liguorim magazine.

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