Spring 2012 Visit to North Korea

 A partial report of Father Gerard E Hammond's  visit to North Korea is printed below with his account of the Holy Mass for the Foreign Community in Pyongyang DPR of Korea.

As has been my usual custom for more  than ten years, this spring I traveled to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea with the Eugene Bell Foundation. Other members of the delegation included Dr. Stephen Linton and his wife Hyuna Linton, Dr. K Justin Seung from Harvard University, Professor Teresa Moriss-Suzuki from Australia National University, and Father Berard Christophe of the Paris Foreign Mission.

This spring's visit was scheduled for April 16th through May 1st but a Maryknoll Asia Regional conference in Hong Kong meant I had to leave North Korea on April 26th. Gratefully, I was able to celebrate Holy Mass at the Polish embassy for the foreign community in Pyongyang as usual.

North Korean authorities limit the number of delegations permitted per year as well as the number of days a delegation can stay in their country. Consequently, much must be accomplished in a relatively short period of time. On most days our delegation leaves the hotel no later than 6:30 am and returns long after dark. Because multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis is such a dangerously contagious disease, most of our work takes place outside. For this reason, our visits are scheduled for the spring and fall; when the  weather is most agreeable. Despite these precautions, however, we sometimes have to spend wet, cold days out of doors, and this spring was no exception.

Occasional discomforts notwithstanding, I really enjoy these trips and this spring was not exception. As each group is different, usually two or three members on our delegations are complete strangers. I serve as the official delegation chaplain. Despite our busy schedule, the absence of cell phones, internet connections and other engagements provides many opportunities  to discuss issues related to faith, particularly around the supper table on days we do not make site visits. For some who are not used to seeing so much suffering, these visits can trigger a spiritual re-awakening. Those who have a Catholic background often attend their first Mass in years in North Korea....

For the past few years, it has become a tradition for the Polish Embassy in Pyongyang to invite the foreign community to a celebration of the Holy Mass when I visit North Korea. This  spring the Mass took place on April 22nd.

Celebrating Mass for Pyongyang's foreign community by visiting priests has now become an accepted custom. While it is still too early to expect that North Korean authorities will permit regular visits by priests, they have  no objection to my ministering to foreigners when I am there to engage in humanitarian work with the Eugene Bell Foundation.

On Sunday April 22nd, Ambassador Edward Pietrzyk opened his  mission and home to  Pyongyang's foreign community and sent First Secretary Michaal Skotnicki to our hotel to conduct us to the Polish Embassy for the Mass. During the service, I was assisted by Father Berard Christophe of the Paris Foreign Mission. Approximately, fifty people attended from more than a dozen nations.

After, we were invited to a dinner prepared by Madame Anna Pietrzyk. I was deeply moved when the Ambassador and his dear wife got up from the table and served us themselves. On this and other occasions, by word and action, Ambassador Pietrsyk gives  amble evidence of his deep reverence for the Church and the priesthood. My prayer is that God will expand this small beginning into a regular Mass for Pyongyang's foreign community.

Father Gerard E. Hammond

Media Literacy and Sex

"The distorted understanding of sex the culture portrays is a massacre of life. We have to make efforts to redesign the environment of this erroneous culture." These are the words of a researcher of culture writing in the Catholic Times. He continues: "Culture is a strong tool that subtly internalizes the prevailing values of a society, which then becomes, unconsciously for most of us, the foundation for our actions."

Our children and teenagers are being bombarded with sexual stimulants, giving them a distorted understanding of sex, crammed indiscriminately into the heads of our children by the culture we have made. An example: the 'literary youth' is now referred to as the 'erotic youth'; our culture is internalizing sex to the point where sexual relations have reached the threshold of normal behavior for the young. Even though they understand, he says, how wrong this emphasis on sex is, unconsciously they tolerate it.

As a professor in a university who heard stories of students who had abortions, he decided to devote full time to the study of the culture of life. These students were not juvenile delinquents or raised in families with problems, so why, he wondered, was it so easy for them to talk about their abortions?

To answer the question, he gave up his professorship, and without  permanent job security decided to devote himself to this work, researching and lecturing. Listening to his lectures enthusiastically, he noted, were mostly those in their 20s and 30s, who were having their eyes opened to another facet of sex that was being ignored by society and unfamiliar to many of them.

The professor does not talk only about the preciousness of life and what should be our attitude about life, but he wants his listeners to see what the media is doing by fantasizing sex and how this approach inculcates the culture of death.

He urges us to become media literate and be able to see what this unhealthy approach is doing to our society. We have to learn to see how cleverly and systematically the media has influenced the popular culture by using sex to sensationalize the way we see life.  Our efforts have to be directed to show, he says, the results of this sex culture on our society. One way of resisting this dangerous trend, he suggests, is by creating programs in the schools and churches that focus on improving our media literacy and raising our maturity in judging more effectively.

Hope in the New National Assembly

Korea had a recent election for the National Assembly. 246 members where elected and 54 members were allocated by proportional representation. Guest columnist writing in the Catholic Times is hoping for a change  in the 19th National Assembly from that of the 18th.

He lists the many problems the 18th National Assembly had with scandals, violence, dereliction of duty, failure to agree on the national budget. They have squandered the hard earned money the citizens have paid in taxes. They failed to take into account the living conditions of the citizens but rather the needs and tactics of their political parties.  It goes into history as one of the worst and hopes the next assembly will be different.

The legislative measures brought before them only 43 percent were passed.Those that had to do with systematic change and the needs of the citizens were abandoned. This will now mean the 19th assembly will have the task to  bring these before the floor with much time and money involved. The 18th assembly have left an embarrassing record.

The citizens with their one vote were expressing their desire for the future in electing the new assembly, but the columnist seeing the talk after the election wonders if this hope can realistically be entertained. Regulations for the assembly state that the new session of the National Assembly should meet before June 5th but each party fighting for its turf it doesn't appear this will happen. The 18th was 42 days late.  Since at the end of the year we  have the national elections for the president the prospects are not bright.

Of the 300 members of the assembly 74 are Catholics.  The columnist is hoping that this will make a difference but the last assembly had even more Catholics. He wonders if this trust on  the Catholic members  is not too naive. They know they should  put the needs of the people ahead of the needs of their respective parties.

He prays that the persons of faith in their work as legislators will remember their Gospel mission  and be true to their calling and serve the people as parliamentarians.  He hopes  we will see a change from the politics of an underdeveloped country and for the members of faith to be an example.            

Happy Buddha's Birthday

Both Catholic papers had editorials on Buddha's  birthday, celebrated on May 28th this year. Cardinal Nicholas Cheong Jin-suk  delivered a congratulatory message to all the Buddhists: "May the  mercy of Buddha spread to all the world, especially the poor and suffering. For those that can't find meaning in life, we hope that Buddha's teachings will enable them to find true joy and happiness."

This is the 2556 year of the Buddha's appearance on the world stage, 500 years before Christ. Buddhism has been in Korea 1400 years before Christianity came to the country. For most Koreans, Buddhism is more than just a religion, it is part of their religious culture. For them, Buddha's birthday is what Christmas is to Christians.

The relationship between Buddhists and Catholics has been close. In addition to the congratulatory message from the Vatican, many churches have a placard over the entrance to the church grounds celebrating his birthday.  


Because relations among religions have not always been peaceful, there is a greater need to try to achieve it in the present. The world has come closer together, which often accentuates our differences but fortunately also our similarities; respect for each other' differences in a world increasingly polarized is becoming more necessary than ever before. Without this respect, we will all suffer the consequences. 

If one simply takes the numbers of religious adherents in Korea, they would be greater than the total population of the country. In this "museum of religions," as the editorial described it, how open are we to the different religions, the editorial wondered, and will we be able to hand on this understanding to the younger generation?

Christianity and Buddhism have two world views and two different  starting points; they are two very different religions. It is an impossibility to see them united in doctrine, but in the understanding of mercy and love and going out to the poor and alienated, we are of the same mind. The world is ardently in search of peace and love. The editorial, expressing what all Christians should hope for, wishes to see Buddha's peace and mercy spread throughout the world.
           

Pentecost

In the readings for the  liturgy of the Mass in  preparation for Pentecost, we are at the table talk at the last supper. As the Father sent Jesus, Jesus sends us. Just as God loves Jesus, Jesus loves us. And just as Jesus is one with the Father, he wants us to be one with him; by sharing this love and oneness we are sharing in his joy. Jesus prays for us and leaves us with a message of love and unity, the Eucharistic Mission.

This is clearly the message of John's Gospel. It is easy to relegate it to the literary form of poetry and to forget it. The message of Pentecost is: yes impossible, but God can make it possible with the  message of this feast.

The word liturgy comes from a  word meaning 'public work'. In Korea, during the years of economic difficulty, the government would require citizens to lend a hand in building roads, helping in flood relief and doing whatever else was necessary for the  public good. This is the origin of the word in Greek: 'public doing'. In the same manner, at each Mass liturgy we are being sent out to do the public work Jesus has given us.

During this week of preparation for the feast of Pentecost, the Mass leaflet the Catholics use at Mass has a meditation on one of the readings that tells the tale of the frog in the pot of hot water. The frog can't stand heat, but the water is heated gradually over a long period of time so the frog doesn't realize the change in temperature, gets accustomed to the heat, but finally dies because of the heat.

In the readings at the last supper,  we are told that the world we are in is not going to be happy with the message we have received, and we will not be liked because of it. The meditation tells us  we should not get accustomed to what is happening in the society that makes us  forget the message we have received from Jesus.

Jesus calls us to his public work at each Sunday Mass.  He gives us our orders and message, sending us into the world to spread his message, armed with his promise of help.    

The Power of Blessings

In the  seminary during vacation time, we went to different areas of the country for on-the-spot mission experience. During that time one of the priests we worked with urged parents to bless their children and one another with the laying on of hands, a practice we were all familiar with. To bless is a way of sharing in a loving way with another, and we should probably be receiving and giving blessings more than we are accustomed to do. A priest-columnist of the Catholic Times recounts his experience in receiving  a blessing. 

When blessing, we have the  opportunity to humble ourselves, to trust and to rid ourselves of negativity, believing that we can be better than we are, a conduit of God's many gifts, and thankful for the opportunity to receive what we are about to bestow.           

On entering his favorite coffee shop recently, the columnist saw the owner on his knees before a woman who was giving him a blessing. He was interested in what was going on and asked the owner, who he knows well, what prompted the blessing.  It was a blessing for purification, the owner said, and introduced the woman, a Catholic, who told him she wanted to impart to the owner her feelings of sincerity and desired by her blessing to unleash the same feelings that were now hidden within the owner.

Moved by what she said, the columnist asked for a similar blessing.  The woman felt that the priest was not in need of such purification and courteously refused, but with the continual importuning of the columnist, telling her of his difficult personality, which made life difficult for those he lived with, she gave her blessing. From that day on, he felt changed and gave several examples.  

He took time from his work schedule to clean the corridors of the monastery where he lives. At the request of one of his fellow priests, without a word of displeasure, he went into the kitchen to prepare noodles and later, while washing the dishes, was aware that he washed them differently than he would have before the time of the blessing; it was, he felt, a small step toward holiness.

Striving for sincerity in all his actions had triggered a purification that affected how he behaved with others. There were fewer concerns about himself and more about the needs of others.  He urges his readers, and hopefully all of us, to bless and be blessed.

Growing in Spirituality

Spirituality is approached in a variety of ways and thus can be defined in a number of ways. For those who believe in God, it can be defined as maturity of life, the reason for existence, and the goal of life. Jesus is the model of how we should approach this goal. The columnist writing on spirituality for the Catholic Times delves into the hidden dimensions of the self to reveal what must be uncovered to attain spiritual maturity.

He uses the example of bricks used in construction work. Though all are all well made, in themselves they have little meaning. It is their relationship with other bricks  that gives them meaning.  A church building built with bricks is not just a gathering and piling up of bricks every which way, but its construction follows certain rules, especially at the corners; a skilled hand working with those bricks and following a plan can construct a beautiful building.

This is also true in life. We all have a multitude of memories, experiences, life fragments that can help us build our own internal temple. We have had many experiences in life from the time of infancy: failures, scars, joys and successes, and in the midst of all this there is the seed of God's grace, which is there to help us grow. Even when we do something wrong, the grace of God wants to move us to a new life. Unfortunately, we often forget this seed that is in us, opening our eyes to another reality.

Israel's history is an example of how difficult it is to discover this seed within us. The exodus from Egypt was not seen as freedom by the Jews. During the  later history of exile, slavery, the division of the country they sensed the presence of God but went back to their old ways.

Jesus came to teach us the harmony that exists between heaven and earth and to discover the hidden seed within that will enable us to live this harmony, while still dealing with the many fragments that have to find their rightful place in our lives. In doing so, we are building the internal temple, the home of the Holy Spirit.This spiritual life is not  destroyed by external misfortunes.  Even though we are weak human beings, we can be strengthened by looking for and finding the hidden seed within that will light our troubled ways. That seed does not bloom all at once but requires our constant care to nourish it.