Benedictine Monks

Recently a secular paper headlined an article about a Benedictine monastery: "Pray and Work, and Desire Like a Leaf Will Drop..."  The article started with the monastery's schedule: reading and meditation(04:30)-prayer(04:50)- meditation(05:30)-Mass (06:00)-meal (07:00)-prayer (8:00)-work (08:15)-prayer (11:45)-meal (12:00)- prayer (13:30)-work (13:45)- prayer (17:30)- meditation (18:00)-meal (18:30)-prayer (19:40...

The monastery, a red brick building,  is surrounded by high trees at the foot of a mountain where the monks take care of a pear orchard of 1200 trees. The  day begins at 4:30 in the morning and goes to 7:40 in the evening with prayer and work. The monks work in the orchard accompanied by the smell of the earth and the sweat from their work. By working, they realize their poverty and limits, and are disciplined in humility. Not hampered by possessions, they become disciplined in detachment.

The article introduces us to a book written by the head monk Fr. Francis Lee: There is no Other Road Besides Love. It recalls the joys and difficulties of 30 years in the monastery. He spent eight years as a  grammar school teacher and entered the monastery in 1982 at the age of 33. The book is based on his sermons for morning Mass during the last  22 years.  The book is his way of saying thanks for "the now, for here, and for his present work in life."

Monks do not grow old, he says, like the paulownia tree by the front  gate that receives its happiness from its surroundings but by a happiness that  flows from the existence of  life itself. He tells us about a German monk who, having gone through the Japanese occupation and a communist imprisonment, spent his last years taking care of those suffering from Hansen's disease.  In his sick bed, he was asked by a monk, "Father, heaven is such a great place, don't you want to get there as quickly as possible?" Laughing, he tells the monk, "You go." Another monk asked, "The saints all lived with a desire for heaven, don't you want to go?" Again laughing, he said, "Let us go together." Fr. Lee very quickly learned that the holier a person is the more human he becomes. 

There are many Catholics who go to monasteries for retreats, looking for silence and time to meditate away from their daily life. During face-to-face confession, many who have lived with frustration, trials, and mental pain--and finally ridding themselves of this unpleasantness with confession--have asked the confessor to hug them.

The Benedictines in Korea have six  monasteries with 140 monks. In  the world they have about 300 independent monasteries with about 8,000 monks. He concludes his remarks by telling us that when a tree is filled with leaves it is difficult to see the heavens during the daytime or the stars at night. Similarly, when we have desires, fantasies, and are overcome with emotions, we have difficulties seeing with the eyes of the soul. With the detachment and poverty of the winter trees, it is possible to see God and more of our true self. The more we empty ourselves the more God can fill us. This is the life of true happiness.                                                                                                                                                                          



                                                

How Should We See Our Farms?

A guest columnist  in the Catholic Times mentions that in his years of attending Mass and hearing numerous sermons, only recently has he heard a pastor asking for volunteers to help the orchard farmers. Many of the farmers are getting older and leaving the farms, and few are taking their place. But perhaps the most important issue is the lack of concern for the  plight of the farmers by the rest of society. The pastor asking  the parishioners to volunteer their services moved the columnist to write about the problem, no doubt because he is  a professor of horticulture.

This farming problem is not a recent phenomenon but goes back many years, and is getting more serious with the passage of time. Today, one of three workers on the farms is over 65 years old. If this continues, he says, in 10 years it will be a mortal blow to farming. Getting the government to be concerned is important, but the writer feels that getting our citizens concerned about the problem is more important.

The columnist has lived outside the country for many years, associating with many who teach horticulture and meeting many farmers. They all found  satisfaction in what they were doing. He mentions the beautiful scenes we see on calendars, depicting idyllic farms at the base of the alps. These farmers have a great love for their mountains and streams and pride in what they are doing.

Farming is an industry whose core ethic, of course, is the sustenance of life. And yet the mass media whenever it speaks of the farming community almost invariably sees the negative aspects: the anxiety of the farmers facing foreign imports, the foot and mouth disease, the dismay of  livestock farmers, the sharp drop of farm prices, farmers  refusing  to harvest their cabbage crop, the polluting of our rivers, among many other troubling issues. Though this is not all that can be said about our farms, this negativity is what is  left with the public.

The government has made efforts to help Korea compete with the rest of the world because of the Uruguay Round Agreement. These efforts, he says, have failed despite the money that was invested. The Free Trade Agreement will also be a problem for the Korean farmers in not acknowledging the  decrease of the farming population and the aging of the farmers.

Japan passed through this predicament a few years ago. Looking at  satellite pictures of the Japanese farm lands, one can readily see the cultivated land overrun with bamboo and other trees. In its place big business has acquired land overseas that is 40 times what Korea has acquired and three times their own cultivated land. As a result, the Japanese increased the amount of food they could  produce. In Korea, we are only able to produce 25 percent of the grains needed.

God has given us our farming areas as our vegetable gardens, the professor says, and this should be uppermost in our thoughts. Measures to preserve and develop them, he counsels, should be our concern and duty.

The Catholic Church of Korea is remembering the first seminarian and  second priest on the 150th anniversary  of his death. Fr. Thomas Choi died in 1861 from overwork and typhoid fever. The first  in any sequence is easily remembered; the second usually remains hidden in history but Choi Yang-eop (Thomas) was an extraordinary person and will be taking his rightful place beside Kim Taegon (Andrew)--the first Korean priest--as a model for the Korean Church. He is on the list of 125 sent to  Rome, and this time his mother's name was added.

His father was St. Choi Kyong-hwan (Francis), and his mother was Lee Seong-yea (Maria). The mother briefly put aside her faith because of the pressures of raising five children after she had her oldest son Thomas. The difficulty of combining these two interests was eventually overcome and she died a martyr. The thinking at that time was such  that even this brief lapse would not be understood by the Catholics, so her name did not appear with her husband's on the list sent to Rome.  Times have changed and she will be with her son, the only one on the list not a martyr.

The editorial in the Catholic Times reports the different events in some of the dioceses in remembrance of his death. He is called the "martyr of sweat." During his years of pastoral work the Church was still being persecuted, and he would be visiting  127 different areas where the Catholics were located to baptize, hear confessions and instruct. Since this was  during the years of persecution his encounters with death were not a few. 
 
He was a man with many talents, and although we speak a great deal about Kim Andrew, Choi Thomas was no less an influence on the early Church. He was ordained in 1849, worked  for only 12 years, and died at the age of 40, but he left us much by which he is remembered.

As the editorial said, Thomas worked hard to give the early Church an inner spiritual life, which was an important  part of the foundations of  early Catholicism. He was talented in music and spent time writing verses that the Christians would be singing to the tunes of the time. He also translated religious books written in Chinese characters into Korean script for his uneducated Christians. I can recall hearing in some of the mission stations the Catholics singing some of the teachings they had learned. It was a practice that served them well when they didn't have visits from the parish more than two times a year. At times they would sing spontaneously a song of praise for those who were serving them.

The 19 letters he left behind tell us a great deal about the early Church and is now part of our history. All the letters were written in Latin but so well done that even his teachers were surprised.

The two dioceses  involved in making the spirituality of Choi Thomas known to our Christians are Andong and  Cheongju. His life and work and the influence that Fr. Choi had on Korean Catholicism will soon be getting the publicity they deserve.

Why Don't We See the Preciousness of Life?

Many of our Catholic columnists are devoting more space in their columns  drawing attention to the need for more concern on quality of life issues. The Desk Columnist in the Catholic Times did so by recounting the story of a college professor who held up a 100 dollar cashier's check before his class and asked who wants this?  Everybody raised a hand. He took the check and crumbled it in his hands and asked again. There was no change. He then threw it on the floor, trampled it repeatedly, and asked again. And again there was the same response. He said it was obvious that nothing he did took away from the value of the check.  He told the class the  same holds true for ourselves. It doesn't make any difference what happens to us, the person I am never loses value no matter what the circumstances of life have done to us. We are all very precious and no matter what others may think, we should never lose heart.

The news has made it clear the number of suicides are way too many. And the happiness index is also one of the lowest of the developed countries. Religious communities, in an effort to deal with this problem, are trying their best to promote a more positive approach to life.

The columnist explains how the writer of Genesis describes the creation of humans. In the creation of the other parts of creation it was with a command, but with humans it was with great care: God took the clay in his hands and breathed life into us, and said it was very good.  We are God's masterpieces. We are all unique existences, small universes. The order of the universe  is also part of the makeup of our bodies and spirit. God's spirit is within us.
With this in mind the columnist asks how are we living? Those that see life as a miracle live differently than those who do not see life in this way. The way we think changes the way we live. Those who have a positive vision and those who have a negative vision are divided in the way they live.

Is there anything  more important than to see life as a miracle? The things that we possess can add to life, but they are not what life  is all about. There is nothing as important as life.

When I am tired and overcome with difficulties who will comfort me? You have God and  your family and friends. We are precious  and this earth is a good place to be. Our happiness depends on the way we accept life. When we see our value, have faith in God, and do what he wants we will have more light to give.

This approach is certainly warranted and hopefully will have some effect, but at the same time we see that society has become more complicated than in the past. After the Korean War, there was an apparent material equality among the citizens. Liberty and the pursuit of happiness does bring about material inequality, which can only be controlled with a different way of seeing life.

Closing the Mouth and Opening the Ears.

In the bulletin of a Pastoral Institute, a mother writes a meditation on the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  She remembers putting between the pages of a book a holy card with two rays of light coming from our Lord's heart one red and one white. In John's Gospel, she goes on to say, "One of the soldiers thrust a lance into his side and immediately blood and water flowed out."

She is the mother of two daughters, one  nine years old and the other is six, they still need her help but not like in the past when they trusted in her and she began the long process of trying to understand  them. They often rested on her bosom, falling asleep to the beating of her heart.  She got to know by their cries when they were hungry or needed a change of diapers. It took time, she says, for them to get to  know her and she them.

From the past she remembers the words of a person  who loved potted flowers. They die from either too much water or not enough, by not being concerned with them or by being too concerned with them. Getting to know what is needed, she says, is no easy task--as she  learned  raising two daughters.

To learn about Jesus she  studied  the Scriptures and joined different groups to learn how to pray. She heard that small community groups were important and even became a group leader. But doing so many things just out of habit and doing what others were doing, she wondered if it wasn't all a great deal of window dressing.

Recently she began the study of 'listening'.  Some may think it strange, she says, to have a need to learn how to listen. But she says she finally realized how deaf she had been, how often she had been interested in just talking; becoming aware of this was a painful realization. She has decided to use her daughters, and even Jesus, in order to practice the art of listening. In her visits to the Blessed Sacrament  all was done according to rote.She came to realize that she was not interested in listening as much as persisting in overly thinking her problems and solving them on her own, so much so she was not able to hear any other voice.

She goes back to the picture with the two rays coming from the heart of  Jesus. She knows they have many different meanings and that she doesn't have the necessary knowledge to give a good explanation of what she sees, but  deep down she  knows it is important to close the mouth and open the ears.                                                     
"One remains silent not knowing how to reply; another remains silent waiting for the right moment." (Sirach 20:6)                                     

Bishop William McNaughton's 50th Anniversary

The first two weeks of June were busy ones in the Inchon diocese with the 50th anniversary of the diocese on June 6th, and on June 11th, William McNaughton celebrated his 50th anniversary as a bishop. He was the second bishop in Korea to have reached this high point in life.

Both Catholic papers had an interview with the bishop. He returned to Korea to celebrate his 50th anniversary to the priesthood the year after retirement; this second visit came after 8 years away from Korea . He retired in 2002.

He mentioned that when he started back in 1961, the diocese had only 18 Maryknoll priests, and no Korean priests. Today the diocese has 277 priests. When  McNaughton became bishop, there were only 23,169 Catholics in the diocese; now  we have 405,000.

The bishop arrived in Korea in 1954 at the age of 28 and was made bishop at the  age of 35 after working in the Cheongju Diocese. When he was made bishop, he returned to the States because there was no money to have the ceremonies here. At his episcopal ordination, he received 10,000 dollars from the  Cardinal of his home diocese, 10,000 dollars from family and friends and 17,000 dollars from Rome. This money lasted, he said, for just one month. Though from the very beginning he was always in need of money, he said he never, even for a moment, worried about finances.

Before he retired he lived with Bishop Choi for a little over two years, which was a great help to him. Bishop Choi now has his own auxiliary  Jung Shin-chul to help share the burdens of the diocese.

The bishop felt that his yearly pastoral visits to the parishes were an important part of his work. He was outspoken on the  treatment that the laborers were getting  in the Dong IL Textile Company.  Oppression by the military government was the response,  but he was not intimidated. It was by  his efforts that we have Labor Day Sunday. The Church has to be on the side of the poor. It was, he says, the example  of the  Church from the beginning, and continues to be.

The bishop mentioned that the number of abortions not only in Korea but throughout the world bothers him greatly. This is an area where Christians should take the lead in the culture for life. He feels the Church should be a  leader in living a simple lifestyle to combat the materialism and consumerism of society. In his own life, he exemplified this style of living by doing without a car and riding the subway and buses. He also gained a reputation, as he says, of being a Scotsman.  His family is from Scotland, and they are known as being closefisted. "I was known," he said, "as being the stingy person from Inchon."

He was asked  by the interviewer what he thought to be the foremost virtue of those who are trying to give the message of Jesus to others. He thought it was holiness. Without that, he said, people will not be attracted by the message.

Korean Efforts to Change a Way of Thinking

The government statistics on the number of adoptions from 1958 show 240,000 adoptions. Of that number, 31 percent were in -country adoptions,

and the rest outside the country. The editorial in the Peace weekly expresses the sadness of much of the country on this imbalance and the efforts to change it.

At present only 25 percent of those who are waiting to be adopted have found parents. The other 75 percent are waiting in many different institutions. The Peace Weekly on its 23rd anniversary has made efforts to change the thinking on this issue by using its radio affiliate and TV station, as well as its newspaper. The "Be a Mother and Father" movement, and the discussions and forums to change the thinking of Catholics on how we handle adoptions are ongoing efforts.

The forums have stressed that it is only natural to have children adopted within the country by Koreans. In order to do this, changes have to be made in our laws, and how society views the current adoption structures.

The obstacles in the way of in-country adoptions are not a few. The importance of the patriarchal blood line has deep roots in society. The prejudice against babies born out of wedlock and the welfare system that does not help unwed mothers enough to keep their babies are factors, as is the very lucrative aspects of the out of country adoption process. The financial burden on the family that wants to adopt is also a stumbling block.

A happy change in the past few years is that the number of in-country adoptions exceeds the foreign adoptions. Government encouragement has been an important element in this change. The editorial states that without a change in thinking we will not be able to hope for bigger changes. We are told that by adopting, one receives much more than is given. But this will take much reflection to appreciate.

The same issue of the paper had a very uplifting story of a family that is doing something about the situation. They had one son and now have 8 children they have adopted; 4 of them are handicapped. When they have asked about adopting the disabled they are often looked at strangely, but they have succeeded in having all become family. They admit that it takes time to win the love of the children, but with time, dialogue and love the response in love does come.

It will be examples of this type that will break down much of the prejudice, and help to prepare the younger parents to open their homes to these children who need the love of parents to grow emotionally.The government, also realizing where the problem lies, will be taking steps to facilitate in-country adoptions. The reputation that Korea is an exporter of children is not something they want associated with Korea in the future.