Honesty and Ideological Positions

Writing in the Peace Weekly, a member of the Bishops Pastoral Research Committee begins her article by referring to a visit, while a student overseas, to the Dachau concentration camp where many Jews were slaughtered, some being used for medical experiments before being killed. In the camp many reminders of the past, she said, could be seen: the railway that brought the prisoners to the camp, the guard posts, the water moat, the barbed wire, the high-voltage instruments, and the incinerators. Also on display were pictures of various areas of the concentration camp, and posters the Nazi government had disseminated to popularize and defend their brutal activities. 

Outside the camp, on a stone slab are the words, "Never Again," which left her, she says, with an unforgettable memory of the trip. But during her time in the camp, she said not once did she notice any words critical of Hitler or the Nazi government. She surmises that such information would have been unnecessary, that a deliberate decision had been made to allow visitors to the camp to see firsthand the horror that took place there, and to judge for themselves the meaning of it all. And the facts, she agreed, spoke more loudly than any official commentary could.

And what are the facts, she asks, that will be included in the textbooks now being prepared, presenting the history of Korea. There has been, she says, a lot of infighting between liberals and conservatives on what to include. Efforts are being made to correct the mistakes in previous textbooks, but it is a problem not easily solved; those who have the job of checking on the revised history do not have the trust of many critics.

In Korea, it is said that a person who acts according to principles is like a textbook. A textbook should follow fundamental rules: be accurate, fair, universal. A textbook, she emphasizes, should not be a place for personal convictions, values and philosophy. When what is said conforms to the beliefs of those in authority, and they fabricate laws and systems for their own benefit, change untruths to truths and beautify what is not, this becomes a great embarrassment to all. When the ideological disputes among our adult generation, she says, affect the way textbooks are written, we are blinding our children to the past and preventing them from entering a more secure and predictable future.

No one questions, publicly at least, that history books should be written solely with the intent of presenting the facts of the past as accurately as possible. Judging the accuracy of these facts will however have to be made, she points out, by those viewing the facts and will depend not only on their knowledge of history but on the qualities of heart that often inform what is known. And it is precisely in this area that the Church has spoken out clearly (in discussing the transformation of humanity, in Evangelization in the Modern World #19): "For the Church, it is a question not only of preaching the Gospel in ever wider geographic areas or to ever greater numbers of people, but also of affecting and, as it were, upsetting, through the power of the Gospel, mankind's criteria of judgment, determining values, points of interest, lines of thought, sources of inspiration, and models of life, which are in contrast with the Word of God and the plan of salvation."

We as Christians look at history through the eyes of the Gospel. We evaluate what has happened in the past and analyze it with our understanding of Gospel values, in order to contribute to a better world. Since the Church is interested in evangelizing the culture, we can't help but be interested in the factual writing of history, and concerned that the forthcoming revisions of the textbooks on Korean history be done accurately.
 

 

Professional baseball in Korea, as in other parts of the world, is coming to the end of the season, playoff time, when the best teams square off to see who is the best of the best, a time when fan interest peaks.  It also helped a writer, in the Taegu Bulletin, to reflect on the prowess of two outstanding hitters--one even considered the home run champion of Asia--and what their experiences might teach us about the challenges we all must face when confronted with change, and the difficult choices we must make at that time. 
 

When these baseball players were students they were pitchers, but when they were called up to the major leagues, both were advised to  quit pitching and concentrate on hitting.  The writer believes that this change required a great deal of thought and worry, but however difficult it must have been for them, they made the change and today have become outstanding hitters. They both must be thankful, he says, that they made the change. 

What would have happened, the writer asks, if they hadn't made the change? He feels that both would have been extraordinary pitchers, if they had continued as pitchers. The strength of their conviction of becoming great hitters, after making the change, would have similarly empowered them, he believes, to succeed at  pitching if they had not made the change. Choosing to change is not enough to successfully change, he reminds us. If we want to change as successfully as our two baseball players, our choices must be accompanied by strong belief that we will succeed.

We are all, he says, like these two athletes who were faced with making a difficult decision, a choice that would change the direction of their lives. And like all choices, our chances of making that choice successful is often dependent on the strength of our convictions.

Our decisions in life are not like winning the lottery, he says. The choices we make are not  going to determine our success or failure, happiness or sadness. What is important is how much effort we will devote to meeting the challenges those choices inevitably bring.

"If only I didn't take that road." "If only I had chosen another field, another way of life," are unproductive thoughts, he says. Those who have such thoughts, he maintains, would very likely have shown the same regret if other choices had been made. The choice for those searching for the best things life has to offer will be successfully achieved, he says, depending on the conviction and passion behind the choice. Even when this empowered choice may result in failure, as seen by others, he says that the person who gives himself to what he believes is his calling in life will be filled with happiness.

"Grace perfects nature" is a phrase often heard. Though we try to develop the natural to the best of our ability, to maximize what has been received--the mind, body and spirit--we know that with  conviction and passion on our part, God will surprise us by what we are able to achieve.

Finding One's Way to Freedom

We have a strong desire for the 'real' but are captivated by 'show', says a religious sister writing in the Kyeongyang magazine. She often lectures and conducts retreats, bringing up the topic of Truman, the protagonist of the film The Truman Show. Truman was imprisoned on a stage set for 30 years and didn't know it. All his movements, 24 hours a day, were being telecast live to a world audience of millions. The desire for reality the public seems to want to experience was offered to them in Truman, but it was only a virtual reality, and yet the audience was enthralled.
 
He was living in a large dome on an island, and everyone he met--neighbors, friends, postmen, police, and so forth--were actors. Every scene or happening he encountered from birth onward--including the death of his father, another actor, by drowning when Truman was  a teenager--was scripted by the director of the Show. The only person who didn't know that the events and people around Truman were not real as he imagined them to be was Truman.

Are we autonomous human beings? the sister asks, or have we accepted what is presented to us by others? Are we, like Truman, living a phoney life because it has been scripted by others? This is the world of the variety show in Korea, she says.  We are being manipulated like Truman was and, like him, most of the time we don't know it.

The philosopher Martin Heidegger said the lion in the zoo is not a lion, only in the jungle is he a lion. When we look at a monitor of a TV set and see the movements the camera show us, we are dealing with staging, editing and make-up. Though what we see cannot be said to be fake, they are artificially managed. Truman didn't know the truth about what was happening around him, though it was real enough for him. But can it be said, in any sense, she asks, that what Truman experienced was real.  Those who are behind the manipulation are trying to make what is presented to the audience more real than reality.

Living in the digital world, we see the real and the virtual real, often feeling the virtual attempt is more real than the real. We  leave our own reality and seek the manipulated reality of the digital world for vicarious satisfaction and pleasure. Why are we seeking the real and our  healing from the TV screen? she asks. Instead of going to TV programs dealing with children and their world, why don't we go into the world of the children we know?  Why give more attention to the situations and characters we see on TV than we give to those that surround us?

Are we not like the audience in the movie The Truman Show? she asks. Are we not being used in our modern digital world, as Truman was used, as a pawn for the ultimate satisfaction of commercial interests? The bottom line being higher viewer ratings and increased profits. Though the virtual reality we are given frequently gives pleasure to its intended audience, she wonders if it also makes our daily reality boring and uninteresting.

Truman did finally realize what was happening to him and, despite all the blocks put in his way to keep him from realizing he was being used,  did find his way out of the virtual world and to freedom.

Senior Citizens Within the Church

The Catholic Church of Korea needs to establish a Sunday dedicated to the elders, says a professor who has made a study of the problems of the aged. In an interview with the Peace Weekly she claimed that "The Church has no interest in the old," shaking her head repeatedly as she spoke, according to the interviewer, and noted that we will have to prepare for a society, in 2026, with 20 percent of its citizens over 65.

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The Peace Weekly mentioned that in the year 2000 the percentage of those over 65 was 7 percent. In the year 2050 over 37 percent, one of the highest in the world. Some dioceses don't have an apostolate for the aged, most of the concern limited to providing educational programs for senior citizens. And yet many of them, unlike seniors in the past, are in extremely good health and should not be seen, she said, primarily as needy elders requiring help, but as contributing members of society, using their talents in the service of others.

We have Sundays for the young, for the military, for the sanctification of  families, she pointed out, but no concern for those who mostly attend our Sunday Masses, the aged. There is no diocese, she says, with a department set aside for the aged, though subdivisions of departments are set aside for this apostolate.

The Seoul diocese, she says, with its bureau for the aged, has done the most to work with the elderly, and she hopes they will raise it to a department to better focus on the needs of this apostolate. Which she says, can develop along three areas of need: Education, Culture and Service. Education, to develop the capabilities of the aged; the cultural aspects, to strengthen their sense of self worth; and service, to enable them to be of service to others.  There are few parishes, she says, with classes set aside for the aged to instruct them in meeting the challenges to the faith that come as we age. And this is becoming more urgent, she reminds us, as the number of seniors within the Church is increasing faster than within the larger society.

Even those who are not well can be motivated to develop their spiritual lives and pray for the community and others. When we consider the great wealth of talent that is present in the community of senior citizens, it becomes our duty, she says, to use this talent for the benefit of all.

What is Spirituality?

A priest with a doctorate in spirituality from the Gregorian University in Rome, now teaching spirituality and its history, says we are all called to live the spiritual life. Writing in the Kyeongyang magazine, specifically about the layperson's spirituality, he does not like to see, he says, the word 'spirituality' discussed as if there were many types of spiritualities, as if it could be divided into a variety of technical subjects to be studied. 

We are called to follow the one way. God is holy and we are called to be holy.  "In a word, you must be made perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect " (Matt. 5:48).  
 
He does however admit as valid the division into clerical, religious and lay person's spirituality, as long as we remember this is not a theological division but one recorded in the history of the Church. In the beginning of the Church, there was no distinction in this call to holiness. During the middle ages, the religious began to take a leading role in the spreading of the good news, and spirituality came to be associated with the monastic tradition. In the article, he uses the Second Vatican Council and its documents to explain his understanding.

It is commonly understood, he says, that speaking about spirituality means discussing what's holy and what's worldly, holiness as being separate from worldly concerns. If we are tied to this kind of talk, he believes we will fail to understand the proper teaching on spirituality.

In the "Constitution of the Church," a document of the Second Vatican Council, in chapter four, it says: "The laity, by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and by ordering them according to the plan of God....They are called there by God so that by exercising their proper function and being led by the spirit of the gospel, they can work for the sanctification of the world from within, in the manner of leaven. In this way they can make Christ known to others, especially by the testimony of a life resplendent in faith, hope and charity. The layperson is  closely involved in the temporal affairs of every sort " (#31).

This work of sanctification is accomplished wherever the layperson finds himself: in the family, in the work place, or anywhere else in society. The priest then spells out the threefold mission, received at baptism, of Prophet, Priest and King, that is, of teaching, offering sacrifice, and ruling, which in some manner, he reminds his readers, is the mission of all the baptized.

In the past, the layperson followed the spirituality either of the priest or the religious, or gave up the idea completely. Today, it is understood that it is precisely within the world that the laity are to work for their own  and the world's sanctification. The priest, religious, and laity are all called to travel the road of spirituality.

No More than 5 Minutes and Yet--

 

"50 cents gave him 5 minutes of resting time" were the words that headlined a priest's column on spirituality in the Catholic Times. On his way home from hearing a lecture, the priest heard his stomach growling for attention and something to eat, but he had only 50 cents. Up ahead of him was a street stall selling fish cakes, where he could buy one for the money he had.

Inside, he saw a woman making tteokbokki, spiced Korean rice-cakes. He entered the stall, paid for one fish cake, poured soy sauce over it, and took a bite. With a paper cup he took some of the fish cake soup and began to eat slowly, one bite of the fish cake and a sip from the cup.

Chewing slowly on his fish cake he took his time looking around at the surroundings. He gazed at faces of those passing the stall, the cars on the street, those who were waiting for one reason or another with unease, an elderly women using her baby carriage to help steady her steps, the face of a child registering pain as the child was being dragged along by his mother. The sky looked ominous with dark clouds and pending rain. A couple, seemingly lovers, entered the stall and ordered a dish of tteokbokki, which they shared feeding one another, a beautiful sight to see, he mused. Two high school girls, dressed in their school uniforms, entered, sending out their text messages, and finally sitting down to eat a fried dish in a hurry.

It was no more than 5 minutes, he guessed, that he was in the stall, enjoying the time immensely--and all for 50 cents. He had stopped himself long enough to look at the world passing by, with a restful heart and without words.  All by himself, with no special motive, he had enjoyed a simple, yet precious, moment of time. He got up and went on his way with his stomach now satisfied, along with his thoroughly satisfied mind and heart. But it wasn't long before the concerns of the day came back: the things that needed to be done and had not been done. Quickly, he found himself back in the past he had left behind for a brief 5 minutes in the fish stall.

He thought that with another 50 cents he would be again at rest, looking at the world from his seat in the street stall. Though it was only a 5 minute view of a world that seemed not to exist for him, that brief view had freed him for a few minutes from his own busy world. The much quieter world was always there, he knew, but because of his other concerns he had not seen it.

He was grateful for those moments in the stall when he became conscious of this different, slower paced world existing alongside his own, which had for a few brief moments flitted by so quickly in the same place and time as his own world. It was, he said, a very precious experience, one he is not likely to ever forget, when his own thoughts surrendered to another, more comforting reality.

Catholic Mission Stations of Korea

To raise a child requires more than a family, says Hillary Clinton in her  book It Takes a  Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us. The Catholic villages of the past have been good examples of the effect they can have not only on the children raised there but on the other inhabitants as well.

A professor of Korean history, in the "View from the Ark" column of the Catholic Times, writes that the early Christians lived in these villages, and pasted on the walls of their homes were liturgical calendars specifying the feast days of the year, which gave a direction to their daily  activities.  Each morning and evening, the sound of prayers would come from their homes and often the evening prayers would be said in common. On Sundays they would have the mission station liturgy.

The children grew up without knowing any  great difference between their daily life and their religious life. They would play their games to the accompaniment of hymns they had learned. The food left over at mealtime would be shared with others, knowing that  they would receive it back in kind. Talents and knowledge were also shared. The village was an inexhaustible storehouse for living, sharing, and spreading the faith.

Many of these village mission stations have produced vocations for the Church. One mission station over the past 60 years gave the Church 14 priests and 16 religious. Another produced 1 bishop, 15 priests and 11 sisters. Overall, counting the bishops, priests and religious who have retired, the number is quite large of those who after being raised in these villages then went on to dedicate their lives to the Church. 

Looking at the villages from the viewpoint of the greater society, the villages would be seen as very insignificant places on the map. Some going back to the persecution, but most of them beginning after 1890, at the end of the persecution. And gradually non-Catholics moved into these villages, the Sunday liturgy became the Mass, the mission stations became part of the parish, and the stations began to disappear.

The writer tells us about a trip to one of these old village mission stations, with a friend raised in the village. A number of grandmothers were selling apples at the entrance to the village. The professor had a desire to eat an apple and was told that a container of apples would cost 10 dollars. After much haggling, his friend was able to get the cost reduced to 5 dollars. When it came time to pay, however, the woman wanted 10 dollars--no doubt responding to the influence of a commercialized society, the professor mused.

Society does change us, the professor laments. When it comes to losing a small benefit we hesitate, and have little patience when it comes to trifles. She would like to see a return to the spirit that was present in the Catholic villages of the past, and have this spread throughout society.