A Korean Pep Talk for the New Year

The following paragraphs are the New Year's greeting to the readers of the Catholic Peace Weekly from the editor: saying goodbye to the year of the ox and welcoming the year of the tiger with blessings to all. The following is a summary of what he said.

Last year, although all was rather gloomy, we decided to begin with a cheerful heart. This year we are told we are recovering, but it is best not to be too optimistic. If we have, to live as not having, if we do not have, to live as having. It is necessary to begin the new year without many words and with determination.

We had problems from the outside and now are facing them also from within the country. It is like a boiled bowl of gruel, boil it too much no one eats, boil it properly and all will benefit; we must face the problems with a cool head.

Koreans when belittling ourselves compared the country to a rabbit. When our spirit returned we compared the country to a tiger. Our ancestors compared the country to a tiger. Should we not again look at ourselves as a tiger.

A tiger is a cruel wild animal, has sharp teeth and shrewed, it is easy to be fearful of the tiger; our ancestors, however, attributed to the tiger a warm tenderness: this we see in our folk tales and narratives. At the sight of persimmons the tiger fled , trying to reach some children in a tree, used a rotten rope and fell into a millet patch , smoked a pipe, and enjoyed leisure. The tiger comes across as a humorous character. A friend to us in travel, faithful, returns favors , he comes into our lives as a friend.

This is the year of the metal (white) tiger. Although we are afraid of the tiger we are in a friendly relationship with the tiger. Let us all imitate the tiger: strong, shrewed, with sharp teeth, and yet fled the persimmons, smoked the long pipe and enjoyed his leisure. Let us be like the tiger, hide the claws and be a friend to travelers.

We are too sensitive. Even with a very small commotion, we are quick to get nervous. A well bred and reserved person , who doesn't lose his cool , is considered a person with dignity. When the country is is in turmoil let us keep our presence of mind, take all in stride, learning from the tiger.

Looking over the words of the editorial it was easy to see that he is addressing a populace that understands his allusions. It was one culture; they all knew the proverbs, the folklore, and knew what resonates within their hearts. This is changing. There is a sadness in seeing this change, but it is a globalization that can't be stopped. One can see the vanishing of a way of life as the country because more multicultural with the passing of the years. A Happy New Year.

The Year of the Tiger 2010

Someone asked me how we celebrate the solar New Year in Korea. The Koreans like many others in the Orient, if Catholic celebrate the New Year on three different occasions. The Catholics start the liturgical year on the first Sunday of Advent. Then as a world citizen they celebrate the solar New Year and finally they celebrate the new year that really counts, the lunar New Year. There is no red letter day for Advent, only one red letter day for Jan. 1st but for the lunar New Year they get 3 red letter days. This year it falls on the 14 of Feb. which happens to be a Sunday.

Tomorrow we will celebrate the coming of the solar New Year with a Mass in the morning . Jan. 1st is the feast day of Mary, Mother of God and World Peace Day for the Catholics beginning the new year. The Koreans use the word 'Pok' (Blessing), very often during this time of the year and more so at the lunar New Year.

This is the year of the tiger even it doesn't start until Feb.14th, the lunar New Year. It will be the year of the white tiger or the metal tiger. In the Korean traditional Chinese calendar there is a cycle of 60 years which would be like our century. The name of each year has the name of one of the 12 animals and one of the 10 heavenly stems, in combination they give each year of the cycle a different name.

'Pok' is a word with much meaning and all good. It can be considered blessings of a material kind but also of a spiritual nature. The word that we used for blessing in our Korean New Testament in Ephesians 1:3 is 'pok': "Praised be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has bestowed on us in Christ every spiritual blessing in the heavens." We are asking as Christians to have others blessed in every way with our greetings at this time of year. The ideogram you have on the top left is the Chinese for blessing; on the left side of the character you have the heavens sending us blessings, one of our big material blessings is to have enough on our tables to eat: the right side is an open mouth and a field from which the food comes.

A Blessed New Year and many blessings during the days to come and always.

The Korean Billy Graham

Before Christmas there was an interview in the Chosun Ilbo with Rev. David Yonggi Cho who is the pastor emeritus of the largest Church in the world , the "Pure Gospel Church" known in English as the Full Gospel Church. He is known as the pastor who started with a handful of Christians and raised the number to 780 thousand . He has consistently refused to be interviewed but he did accept this invitation and spoke passionately about his work.

He mentioned his early years of poverty and also his bout with tuberculosis. When he started his ministry he mentioned he was dealing with very poor people. The interviewer asked him, outside of the help of the Holy Spirit, what did he attribute his success; Rev. Cho thought it was hope. He did not talk about heaven or hell but emphasised courage and hope in their lives. These poor people were not able to go to church with the rich but they were able to receive courage and hope which encouraged Rev. Cho.

He mention that he was not conscious of the growth of the Church in the beginning. Many of the women area leaders were the ones who brought in the numbers. He was asked about the criticism he received about his ministry of healing and speaking in tongues. He has been criticised continually for 50 years for having heretical views, now that he is retired he is no longer troubled with the criticism. He has been personally criticized for moral lapses, for his son's problems, for the way he has run the Church, money matters and for his theology.He admits it was difficult but it has not stopped the growth of the Church.

He describes his life and that of Korea as a miracle: "This has been true of me and of Korea. I was diagnosed with terminal tuberculosis and was able to do what I did, Korea itself after the Korean War was in a primitive state of poverty and today we are doing very well."

Rev Cho has had many trials but never lost hope.
The Christians were looking at him and when he was tempted to lose hope he preached to himself to have courage and try to see things positively. He says after Billy Graham he has possibly traveled to more places to preach than anyone else.

There is no question that he is a very charismatic person and has been able to bring Jesus to many here in Korea. He has been criticised by many especially among the Protestants for his understanding of Christianity. The Catholics do not seem to be as vociferous in criticism but not because they are in sympathy with the teaching. He is preaching the gospel of health and prosperity; the cross and justice issues would not be transparent in the teaching. This is an easy sell and has been very successful, but we are dealing with a history of about 50 years, so the coming years without Rev. Cho at the helm will be very telling.

The Catholic Church in Korea changes pastors at least every 5 or 6 years. This doesn't give any one a chance to become too charismatic and become bigger than the diocese. It probably is a very wise way of dealing with pastoral assignments. The workers in the vineyard are not that important, their work is to lead others to Jesus. The priest, like all those working in pastoral situations, are in the words of St. John the Baptist to become less so the one for whom they are working becomes bigger. The work should never depend on one person no matter how charismatic or talented he may be, this is especially true working as a disciple of Jesus.

A Journey of Life -Gift to Family

Read recently in the Catholic Times, where a group of grandmothers, without fail, would go daily to a large department store and meet at the tea room on the fifth floor. They would all arrive around 11:00 in the morning as if going to their place of work, eat together , drink their tea and spend the time talking until 4:00 at which time, return to their homes. They would be elegantly dressed and one would think they lived comfortable lives.

They talked about their families, daughter-in- laws, son- in- laws, the grandchildren, their dreams and other sundry topics but this eventually came to an end and the few that continued to show up would just stare intently at each other's face with no laughter or anger, in silence with nothing to say.

You would think that if they had nothing to say they would stop coming, but no they were happy just to stare at each other. The group, according to those that were familiar with the situation, started out with 7 but the numbers decreased until you only had two coming out and they would spend the time gazing at one another. The writer mentioned, in a way it was very sad, but also at the same time beautiful. They were all in their eighties and at that age it was not easy to keep active; it was probably an attempt to forget their pain.

The older one gets, it is a blessing to enjoy the company of others but for good health, it is also necessary to find some way to entertain oneself. She would recommend writing your own life story to leave with the family. It would not be important to have it well written but each page would be unique to you. It would also make the years ahead more significant and a great gift and example to the children.

In the retreats we make, on occasions, we are asked to write a 'life line' of important events that we remember from our earliest years. It would be in chronological order from the earliest memories that we have. For a religious person it is a way to see how we are being led by God. It can help to focus us on where we are now in the journey of life. To write an autobiography sounds intimidating but it would be a 'life line' with a lot of fill in, a great hobby and a wonderful gift to leave the family.

How Koreans See Themselves??

This following post is taken from the Korean Internet: how Koreans see themselves and think others see them.
_____________________________________________
A developed country that is not in the first ten and yet heaps abuses on other countries.

Death from cancer, the consummation of liquor, the import of Western liquors, traffic accidents, incidents of our young people smoking, all kinds of government debt, gets us listed in the first three places in world ranking and we can't move out.

The Korean potential for economic growth has made the Jews and the Japanese seem lazy.

The Korean students have been in the top of their classes in first class colleges of the world and have placed if not first in the World Skills Competition, 2nd or 3rd.

A country that enjoys a culture of eating hot spicy food.

Although a small country they have produced many talented people.

A country that doesn't known the names of their soccer players and yet had 700 thousand come out on to the streets.

Although we don't have the power or strength we are always ready to challenge.

A country that was able at the time of the IMF economic crisis to rebound within two years.

The offspring of nomadic people but are leading in the world of Information Technology and Communication.

The only country in the world that is divided.

One of the few countries in today's world with a monoculture.

A country that spends more money than any other country on the elements of English teaching and is the 1ooth in the ability to speak

A country that has children go to school at 7:40 am and stay to 10 pm and 11:00 pm for many years on end and can continue to do so.

A country that loves their children like no other.

The more expensive an item is the more they buy


The 88 Olympics and 2002 World Cup have made Korean known.

Those running the government cry we will be ruined , ruined, and we are not ruined thanks to the great endurance of the people.

A people who study English for 10 years and can't say a word in English to a foreigner.

A people who enjoy systematic violence in their movies

Rather than the development of cosmetics, cosmetic surgery is developed.

A dynamic country whose people feel that the next year will be better than the present year.

An egoistic people who feel they are the best.

Sexual crime cases are the worst in the world and the country does little to educate concerning sex.

A people that believes the person with the loudest voice wins.


This is not an objective sociological look at the Korean way of life and flawed in many ways. It was good for laughs, was a response. There are some facts listed but not many. I believe it was a response to an Internet question that made the rounds. The Koreans in this group at least could laugh at themselves.

Sanctification of the Family Week in Korea

Today is Holy Family Sunday; the chairman of the the bishops' committee for family life in his message for all the Catholics gave his attention to the Sacrament of Matrimony. The Korean Church has a week set aside for the sanctification of the family. It begins on Sunday the 27th and continues to Jan. 2nd.

Korea has arrived at point where we are following the rest of the Western world in areas that up to a few years ago the Korean culture was able to keep the family life strong and where Catholicism felt right at home. Today the young are delaying their marriages: they do not have the money, no steady employment, they have yet to find their place in society, and they have an easy, open way of looking at marriage. Artificial birth control puts off having children until they feel ready. There are many marriages between people of different cultures and the marriage between Catholics and non-Catholic is on the increase, sacramental marriages are decreasing.The thinking among many parents is that they want their children to decide for themselves on their religious beliefs after they grow up. Some even make this a question of human rights. Consequently, they do not feel a need to be overly concerned about their children's spiritual health.


With all these problems it is difficult to decide what to do. The editorial in the Catholic Times and Peace Weekly listed these problems. The need is to see the meaning of marriage in the Catholic context as a start in trying to find a remedy to the many problems facing family life.

What is the meaning of marriage for Catholics? Many enter marriage with no idea of what marriage means but only as a rite they have to pass through to get married. The eternal love of Christ for the Church is the symbol of the marriage covenant between husband and wife. That is why there is no divorce in Catholic thinking. It is impossible to see Christ separating from the Church and that is the same thinking that the husband and wife should have of their commitment to each other.

If the thinking now going around, in some parts of the community of believers, is to let the children decide what they want to believe, we have a sure sign that many are not fully convinced what they have is a good for the children or even of great value to themselves. Is it any wonder that those Catholics who marry are no different than the majority of the Koreans.

The bishop did make a plea to accept those who are marrying into a different culture to be kind and warm in greeting them when they come to the Church. The number of international marriages in Korea has topped the 10% line and of these over 11% end in divorce. They have their own problems to solve.

The bishop concluded: "When Christian spouses understand the proper meaning of marriage and do their duties on the basis of it, the anti-life culture which threatens the marriage and family can be overcome."

.

A Cardinal's Hobby

The Cardinal of Seoul Cheong Jin-suk has just published his new book of essays on Catholic teaching: "From the Hill of Pouring Sunshine". The Seoul Cathedral is on a hill, Myong Dong, which over looks the city of Seoul. The Cardinal, besides being the Catholic Ordinary of Seoul, is a scholar and has written and translated many books during his years of priesthood.

He wrote his first book of essays in 1969: "Shepherd's Song", this second book, after 40 years, is to remember his mother's 100th year of birth. He has over the years published his books around his Christian name day, St. Nicholas' feast day, Dec. 6th. He hopes to be of some help to the Christian's spiritual life. In the introduction to the book he writes: "We see the rough outlines of truth as in a deep fog, my heart's wish is to be a friend in words, to help those who are interested in progressing in the search for a better understanding and clarity of these truths."

To those who feel that God is not listening to them in prayer he gives the example of a radio. "If we want to hear God's whispers we have to turn on our heart's radio receiver and raise the volume and be on the right frequency with the message of love being sent."


The Cardinal has been writing and translating since 1955 and turns out one or two books every year. It is one of his hobbies, it is difficult but he finds peace and quite devoting himself to the writing. He often gets up at around 3:30 or 4:00 am and writes before his work day begins.

This year the Cardinal in his Christmas Message wants us to reflect on making material goods the center of our lives. He said: "today our society's greatest single problem is being overcome by the centrality of the material; it is making all the other values powerless. Our life should be directed to the important values of the mind and spirit." This is a message that will be made in one way or another in most parts of the West.

Cardinal Cheong is now 78 years old and his year of retirement has past. By church law one is required to submit his resignation to the Holy Father at 75 but he does not step down until it is accepted by the pope. The Ordinary of a diocese has as his first duty one of teaching and Cardinal Cheong does this not only in the administrating of the Diocese but also in the teaching through books. May he have many more years of publishing before and after retirement.