Rejoice in the Hope Within Us

A religious Sister on vacation at her family home went to the train station with a brother-in-law to pick up a younger sister and her child, who was in first-year elementary school. The brother-in-law asked them if there was a place they would like to visit before returning home. The religious sister, whose  pastoral work was in a big city, without hesitating, said she would like to see the ocean. And 30 minutes later they arrived at a quiet spot on the ocean. A columnist of the Catholic Times would like us to reflect on what the Sister learned on her trip to the ocean.
 
Leaving the car, they went down to where the ocean waves were breaking onto the shore. The Sister, forgetting the often troubling encounters with the people she was counseling, and her tiredness, felt her breathing slowly deepen and the cares of the day lift, as she began to enjoy the new surroundings. The child had picked up some pebbles and ran to his aunt to show her what he had found: a dolphin, a smiling ghost and a chestnut. He explained each one with great enthusiasm. To the child they were not only pebbles but something more. The aunt, moved by his enthusiasm, went looking for differently shaped pebbles, like those her nephew had found, but all she was able to see were large and small  pebbles. She realized it was not because she didn't have an imagination but because she was accustomed to seeing the real thing: a butterfly was a butterfly, a dolphin was a dolphin. The objective reality was all she could accept. What was seen had to match the fixed idea in her head.

The child's uncluttered mind and lively imagination, however, was able to see all kinds of shapes and images, while the aunt was not open to these images because of her fixation on what was real.

This kind of thinking, the columnist believes, is indicative of the way we relate with others. People we judge good, for instance, make us feel comfortable and secure, and we consider them helpful to us. With our fixed ideas we make quick judgements on those who lack what we deem important and not helpful, putting them aside as not deserving much interest or attention. The fact is, the columnist says, many of these supposedly unhelpful people would have been of great help to us.

With a little concern for spotting the gifts these people have, and giving them more respect, support and encouragement, they would have developed, he says, into different persons, more helpful persons, if we had  stretched out our hands to them. Before God we are all imperfect and weak, but God does not disregard us. Nor does he see us as immature, a mistake, or incapable of great things. God sees us not only as we are but as the person we can become. Like the child, God   sees  the possibilities, the hope that is in us,  and rejoices.

Catholic Lay Movements in Korea

A lay theologian writing in the Kyeongyang magazine introduces us  to a number of lay movements within the Church that have not followed the examples of the religious orders but are working within society, living a new type of spirituality. The article briefly sketches four of these communities working in Korea.

The Women Lay Auxiliaries of the Missions was founded in Belgium, in1937, by Yvonne Poncelet, with the help of Fr. Vincent Lebbe, a missioner in China. The spirit of the movement is focused on Gospel values: a giving of oneself to others, with complete love and always with joy, both as an individual and as a member of a community. Their faith life beckoned them to enter society, and whatever society they entered, they sought to assimilate its culture and its way of thinking so they could express God's love and evangelize and liberate using the cultural guidelines the people were familiar with.

!956 was the year they entered Korea and from the very beginning, they have been running a boardinghouse for women college students. They have established welfare centers in many areas where they offer adult education and lectures on the culture.  In 1970 they began to accept as members unmarried women, men and couples.

The Focalare Movement, started in 1943 by Chiara Lubich (1920-2008), a young college student from  Northern Italy, was intent on putting into practice the gospel message that "God is love," and with a small group of friends began helping the poor of the city devastated by war. In a very short time, the movement spread to 184 countries and entered  Korea in 1969. Members take the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. They are composed of single men, women and families.

Based on the ideal of unity that belongs to Christianity, members try to understand other religions, respect  their values and  peacefully live with them. This is the teaching of the Second Vatican Council. They realize that love resides in the heart of all, just like the heart that beats within all of us. With the expression of that love made manifest in society, they believe society can be changed.

Each year in different countries there are Mariapolises, where the members come together to experience the Gospel teachings, to discuss the movement and spirituality. This lasts only a few days, but they also have a permanent Mariapolis, in Loppiano, Italy, where 800 people from 70 countries live peacefully together, and yet have different languages, different beliefs and customs--a living testament of what is possible with the human family. The Mariapolis model has spread to other countries.

Catholic members from Germany, together with Protestant members, have gone to Africa to work with different tribes to help them to trust and work together. These experiments are also going on in other parts of the world, showing that the Gospel message can be lived in trying circumstances.

The Taize Community, an ecumenical movement  was started in 1940 by Brother Roger, in his mother's homeland France, in the area of Taize.  Because he saved Jews during the war, he was expelled from France to Switzerland. which was his country of origin. It was during this period that he gathered together those who wanted to live his form of community life. He returned to Taize in 1944, and in 1949 there were 7 who decided they were going to live the celibate life together.

In 1977, Cardinal Kim, while in Hong Kong, met Brother Roger living in a slum area, and was instrumental in establishing the movement in Korea. In September of this year they had a meeting of young people from East Asia, sponsored by the Taize brothers, a meeting for reconciliation and truth. These ecumenical meetings have spread to other cities.

In 1986, when John Paul visited Taize, he said "Taize is like a fountain. The pilgrim comes, for a short period, satisfies his thirst and moves on. The brothers of the community with prayer and silence and drinking the waters that Jesus promised have  tasted God's joy, experienced his presence, answered his call, and give proof to the love of God in their  parishes, schools, and places of work, living  in service to their brothers and sisters."

The Saint' Egidio Community, started in Rome in 1968 by Andrea Riccardi and  two of his high school friends, who began by helping  the poor in the area in which they lived.  Like the apostles, they  begged our Lord to teach them how to pray. Each of the members, in the evening, leave their families and places of work  to meet and pray together, strengthening their bonds  and committing themselves to live according to Gospel ideals.

The community is currently in 73 countries and has over 50,000 members. Even if they do not  promise to become a member, they can be friends of the movement. One of the goals of the movement is to work for the abolition of capital punishment,  They have served as arbiters between countries, helped to promote dialogue and reconciliation between people from different cultures, and are  helping to eradicate Aids in Africa. They were  invited to North Korea to begin a soup kitchen for the needy young and old.

The community arrived in Korea in 2013 and offered their first Mass at the Jeoldusan Martyrs' Shrine in Seoul. It began with 20 members. Every second Wednesday during  the month they meet for a prayer meeting, and every first and third Saturday of the month give their time, either individually or as a group, providing necessary services in their area.

Although these movements are independent of each other, they are made up of mature Christians dedicated to doing the same selfless work for the Church. In Korea there are also some home grown movements, the article points out: the "Village on the Mountain," and' the "Living like Jesus Community." The Gospel message is one unifying message, but the laypeople in these movements are showing us different aspects and colors of the Gospel that will give more light to more people.

Doing Your Best at Times is Not Enough

A  lion and cow fall in love. They met  accidentally in the woods and  intuitively knew they were made for each other. They overcame their biology, their different origins and culture, and decided to marry.  Obviously, the families on both sides were greatly upset, but no one was able to dissuade them, and with the animals from each of their worlds gathered for the joyful event, they celebrated their union.

Every morning the cow would gather all the the best environmentally friendly and organic grasses, and prepare the lion's meal. But the lion did not even once raise this food to his mouth. Never did he ever think of eating such fare. The lion on his  part spent time  preparing the best Korean meat that he could find and put it before the cow. The cow took that expensive piece of meat and buried it.  Each day this would be repeated: The lovingly prepared meals would be offered but not eaten, and both of them began to get weaker, lost weight, and quarreled. They stopped talking to one another and the relationship ended. As they were readying their belongings to depart, each said to the other: "And yet I did my best for you."

This parable, written by a priest for the Life & Bible magazine, is similar, the priest says, to the comments from a book on prayer by Fr. Thomas Green S.J. where he makes a distinction between working for God and doing God's work, and explains the distinction with an example using blue cheese. A person asked a friend what he would like for his birthday;  blue cheese was the answer.  But the person felt this was not enough of a present for his friend, and wanted to give something  better.  What should be done, Fr. Green asks: Give what the friend wants or give what the person thinks is a better present for his friend?  When I give my friend what I think is a good present this is working for God. Giving the friend what he wants (in this case, blue cheese) is God's work.

We can be working for God whenever we are doing our best. This is good work and admirable, he says, but what we think is good work is not necessarily what is going to unify us with God.  When I do what I think is the best for God, it may be my best, but not the "blue cheese" that God wants.  We give God the best present we can imagine and think this is  wonderful, but if God likes blue cheese and we give him something else thinking that we have done our best, we may be pleasing ourselves but have we really pleased God?

We think that love means giving something to the person we love. We do many things for the beloved and say we have done our best. That is a fact, but giving our time, money, and devotion, even when done lovingly, without complaint, does not always bring the best  results. Despite these efforts, quarreling, complaints and emotional scars often develop that can't be easily washed away--and yet they are the results of this love.  Where is the problem? the priest asks. Why does this happen?  It is because the love, he says, is expressed in the manner we think best, believing we are doing everything for the beloved. With the sacrifice, altruistic  attitude and feeling satisfied with what was done, we miss the opportunity of doing what should be done.


                                  

A talk by a  priest-professor on the place of repentance in our lives, written up recently in the Peace Weekly, brings a new understanding of how to incorporate the way of repentance as we go about our daily tasks. It is important, the professor says, to experience repentance as committing ourselves to making a change in our lives. This commitment, he is suggesting, will make us value religious repentance and make it more meaningful for us, helping us see the harmony of religious truths.
Like the changes in our physical and mental growth, there is also a way of describing growth in our spiritual journey. The traditional  way of expressing this growth was to talk of purification, illumination and unity.  In our own spiritual journey, we have to keep asking ourselves: What does spiritual growth mean in my daily life?

Spirituality, a word appearing more often recently, has been given different meanings; what is necessary, he says, is to determine what meaning we have given the word. Traditionally the word meant encountering God and participating in his life, or listening to the Holy Spirit in our hearts. Gradually the meaning has changed, so that today it most often means the search for the meaning of life in terms of some sort of meditative practice, or any examination of ones inner life, to uncover the connection that exists between the world and ourselves.  
 
Repentance is the word that has been used to mean change.  In the  history of theology, repentance was a basic teaching. Repentance meant one left the world of non-belief to one of belief, left a life of sin for a life of avoiding sin, and thus sacramentally approaching the unity of the  community of the Church. Repentance helps us to enter the life of grace and  experience a  religious change.

Using the words of Scripture referring to "being born again" (John 3:3), we can peer into the mirror of Jesus' life and see ourselves following the life he has shown us.  We are called by Jesus, and by our answer of repentance, of accepting change, we become his follower. That is our identity. We have been saved by Jesus in the present moment, and we try to live this new life.

Jesus  asked us who do  we understand him to be? There is no objective answer to the question. The answer comes from  the kind of religious life we are living--not  merely from our individual identity but from what we have been called to do. We need to search, the professor says, for the reasons he calls and instructs us, as members of his Church. 

And what  is the Church? We have been called to be members of his Church to work together to overcome the evil we see in the world, as Jesus did. We are to go toward God and the world with a  special type of attitude, which is the attitude that Jesus had.  As we go on this journey with Jesus, having repented, having changed--"being born again"--our experience of God will also change and deepen.                      

Defying the Law of Gravity

A pharmacist writing in the Bible  LIfe magazine recalls a time,15 years earlier, when he saw a woman selling beondegi  (steamed or boiled silkworm  pupae seasoned and eaten as a snack). She was the last in a long line of street vendors, and stood out from them by her youth and very attractive face and beautiful smile, and by being hunchbacked.

Every time he was in the area, although he didn't care for beondegi but moved by her situation and beautiful smile, he would stop to buy a bag. One day on passing by, he saw the woman hugging a small child who looked very much like her. It was the only time he had seen the child during the one year he had  walked passed, nor did he ever see a man by her side, who might have been the father. The woman selling vegetables next to her told him that one day a man appeared, made the child, and was never seen again. 

The women appeared to be sickly, and he heard that because of tuberculosis her right lung was removed.  She had been diagnosed in need of an operation, but because she had no one to take of her child, Neri, she delayed the operation until she collapsed and had to be taken to the emergency room of a hospital. The vegetable vendor, who was living by herself, took the child until the mother returned  from the hospital.

Even after she was released from the hospital, she had to spend six months in a sanatorium. The vegetable vendor had a stroke and Neri was taken by the  woman selling noodles. Neri would be sitting in the corner of the diner bustling with customers. The pharmacist felt sorry for the girl and arranged for her to spend her day in a study hall run by religious sisters. He would pick her up and bring her back to the diner in the evening. It was at this time that he heard that Neri had a gift for ballet. A teacher, noticing her innate talents and bodily flexibility, offered to give her ballet lessons.

In her third year of middle school, she had the opportunity of going to a high school devoted to the arts. But she would often miss her lessons. Along with her teacher, he would scold her. "I have leukemia," she replied. He did not want to believe her, but it was true.  For two years she was in treatment and with the anti-cancer drugs, she developed hip problems, was operated on, and the aftereffects brought the loss of feeling in her toes. Her doctor told her she would have to give up her dream of being a ballerina.

The mother tried everything: folk remedies as well as more conventional treatments. And she did finally get back the feeling in her toes, and last year was accepted in a college department for ballet.  The pharmacist would visit her as she  worked part-time outside the city, teaching women aerobatics, and in the evenings teaching health dancing to workers; her part-time work filled her with joy, she told him.  

Now, 15 years after the pharmacist first saw Neri's mother, she still has her beautiful smile but  no longer with only a tray selling beondegi. She now has a covered wagon and sells, along with the beondegi, rice cakes and rice wrapped in seaweed. The pharmacist ends his reminiscences with a quote from the economist Karl Polanyi: "Real truth is not the law of gravity but the bird who ignores the law and flies high into the sky."

Controlling Access to the Digital World

Korea, one of the leaders in the internet world, is now experiencing an increase in internet addiction because, some are saying, the necessary preparations were lacking. And the Church has been slow to address the problem and was not even aware of the problem, according to two recent Catholic Times articles. The issue was brought up in a Seoul parish forum that discussed the evangelization of the culture.

All agreed  that internet addiction is hurting society and is a big obstacle to the work of the Church. There are city centers that are working with the problem, but help should also be found in dioceses and parishes, said one of participants at the forum. He recommends, alluding to the statements from the Vatican on Internet ethics, that there should be educational courses available to help students deal with digital  addiction and, for those already addicted, camps and other programs to help them discern the problems that come along with the  digital world.

A professor who has made a study of the subject said that because the digital equipment is becoming more sophisticated, and with smartphones interacting with all kinds of programs, it will make the addiction all that easier. He said there has been a decrease in the numbers of those addicted, but those who are most prone to getting addicted, he said, are getting younger and are the more vulnerable in our society.
 
A religious sister has written a book Worrying Makes Me Beautiful, which treats some of the problems encountered by the young in our digital world. She reminds her young readers that knowledge is not the same as enlightenment. "When I have the experience of looking into myself and go beyond the worries, I gather the strength to overcome the difficulties of life."  

 

Afraid of loneliness, and with excessive worry, and by searching for instant happiness with alcohol, music, movies and games, we are missing, she says,  the opportunity to meet with dignity, without the artificial add-ons of material possessions, the world we live in. When we try to rid ourselves of stress by indulging our senses, it is, she says, like eating junk food continually and hoping for health.

The young can easily get addicted to the instant satisfactions they receive in the digital world. Without putting the digital world in its proper place in our lives, one can not hope for happiness,  she says. The only way of overcoming the addiction is living spiritually.

She recommends that the young not listen only to the voices of consolation and healing that come from outside themselves but to listen to their inner voices. She asks them to put aside their smart phones. When we become lost in the digital world, we forget to think about who we are, what we like or dislike, and frequently cease to care about really knowing others, interacting with them without our social masks. The digital world allows us the false comfort of ignoring the spiritual hunger we have inside us.

Autumn Visit to North Korea

Autumn 2013 Visit to North Korea

We just returned from another visit to North Korea with the Eugene Bell Foundation. Far from ordinary, this visit was unique in several important ways.

OVERVIEW

We were in North Korea for three weeks; one week longer than our usual visits. Our delegation was the largest yet  As you can see, this group included two priests from the Guadalupe Missioners, one applicant to the Paris Foreign Missioners as well as Father James Lynch Vicar General and myself from Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers; five priests in all. All were clearly identified as missioners on Eugene Bells application for visas. We received our usual hardy welcome from our North Korean hosts.

       During this visit our delegation was able to visit four new multidrug resistant treatment centers, bringing the total number of centers supported by Eugene Bell to twelve. Our work has also expanded geographically (please see the attached map) and now covers the western half of North Korea from Shinuiju City in the north to Kaesong City in the south.

What follows is a brief description of a day at a treatment center.

VISITING A TREATMENT CENTER

Our rural centers are located anywhere from two to five hours from the capital city of Pyongyang. Electricity is scarce in the rural areas so we had to make maximum use of daylight, meaning we usually left the hotel before daylight and did not get back until well after dark. Most roads are unpaved. When we arrive at a treatment center (a small village of simple cottages that house patients and staff) our vehicles park in the widest open space we can find. Local staff gather around the vehicles (Maryknoll provided a new bus this year) to help us unload boxes of medication and other supplies. They also set up tables and chairs, and help move the delegation’s portable diagnostic equipment into a nearby building. Our digital X-ray machine (a Catholic donation) is set up outside or under a tent as needed. Portable generators provide electrical power. Boxes of patient nutritional supplement are transported by truck and stacked in the courtyard ready for inventory. Each patient is provided two boxes of nutrition packets every six months and extra is also available for the staff. We count and collect empty nutrition packets at every site.

Patients currently receiving treatment always greet us warmly. Many of their faces are familiar. It is always good to see them but also sad to hear about those who have died since our last visit. The program provides each patient with a box of medication that has their picture on it along with the name of the donor who supplied the funds for their treatment. Our visit reminds them of the people who have sacrificed to provide the expensive medications needed to treat their multidrug resistant tuberculosis. About one third of the program is supported by Catholics. It is both a privilege and a blessing to be able to tell patients how much Catholics care about them.

While we are setting up for our day’s work, a large crowd of people seeking treatment gather around. Many have been sick with tuberculosis for years and have failed several courses of treatment with regular tuberculosis medications.  They and their families know time is running out and there is no place else to turn.

It takes about thirty minutes to get ready. By this time, a team of North Korean doctors and delegation members have set up the four portable diagnostic machines. These are expensive state-of-the-art equipment is capable of diagnosing multidrug resistant tuberculosis in a matter of hours. (three of our four diagnostic machines were provided by Catholic organizations). Documents and records are arranged on one of the tables and a joint team of local caregivers and delegation members are in their assigned places. We are then ready to start processing patients. Patients are registered, weighed, photographed for identification purposes and X-rayed. Those who are being processed for admission are watched carefully as they provide their first sputum samples. I do my best to encourage those who are so weak that they have a difficult time providing a sample for analysis.

Local medical staff line up people from a waiting list, people who have a long history of TB and who they suspect suffer from multidrug resistant tuberculosis. A member of the delegation walks down the line, counting off the number of people who will be allowed to submit sputum samples for testing. This is heartbreaking work. We have to limit new applicants because of limited capacity. As a rule, we are able to admit an average of 30 new patients per center per visit. But sadly, many have to be turned away. Those who do not get a chance to submit a sputum samples for analysis will have to wait six months for another chance…if they live that long.

Testing the sputum samples from new applicants for admission takes at least six hours. Those who are confirmed to be MDR-TB sufferers will be admitted to the program late in the afternoon and given their first box of medication. 

As soon as new applicants are processed, patients currently registered in the program provide sputum samples that will be taken to a lab for analysis. Regular monitoring of a patient’s progress is an essential part of the program.

After several hours the diagnostic equipment registers the results of the first batch of tests. It is a sobering time for everyone, particularly the applicants. Which of the applicants will test positive and receive lifesaving medication on this visit? Who will test negative and fail to gain admission to the program? Sometimes someone with a long history of TB test negative because they couldn’t provide a good sputum sample that day. We try to encourage those who ‘fail’ by promising to test them again next visit. It is painful beyond description when this happens.

While the diagnostic machines do their work, our delegation’s medical director consults with local staff, reviewing each patient’s records and charts. Meanwhile other delegation members are organizing a ‘graduation ceremony’ for those who have completed treatment and are ready to go home. Delegation members, particularly priests, are asked to address the ‘graduating patients’, many who have been under treatment for two years at the center.

After the graduation ceremony all registered patients (including newly-accepted patients) receive a box of medication that will be used by the medical staff to treat their disease until our delegation’s return six months later. Then a careful count is made of all medications and supplies provided on that visit. By this time it is usually almost dark. Sometimes we finish by flashlight before boarding our vehicles for a long drive back to the hotel and a very late supper.

As you can imagine, our days are long and hard but rewarding. Treatment outcomes (the percentage of patients who make a full recovery) continue to rise. Thankfully, we have been able to double the size of the program during the last two years. We will have more than a thousand patients in the program by next spring. But sadly, we are able to treat only a small percentage of the multidrug resistant patients in North Korea today. Giving all MDR-TB sufferers a chance to recover would require a much bigger program.

 CATHOLIC RELIGIOUS SERVICES IN NORTH KOREA

While we have focused primarily on Catholic-sponsored tuberculosis work in North Korea, we have also attempted to provide religious services for the foreign residents in Pyongyang. Gratefully, this work, which was begun four years ago, has also grown markedly during the past two years. During this time (2010-2013) I have be able to offer 9 Masses at the Polish Embassy and one at the Swiss Embassy.

        On this visit I was able to say Mass for more than seventy members of Pyongyang’s foreign community on October 27^th. This was more than double the number of participants that attended this spring’s Mass in April. Not all participants were willing to sign the attendance sheet but a far greater percentage of attendees (Catholics and non-Catholics) were willing to identify themselves openly than ever before, suggesting a gradual decrease in uneasiness with attending religious services.

        Progress in the spiritual nurture of Pyongyang’s foreign residents would not have been possible but for Edward Pietrzyk, the Polish Ambassador to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. He has made a special effort to make his embassy available for the Mass on every one of our visits. Ambassador Pietrzyk is retiring in a few months, however, and it is not clear at this time whether this hard-won tradition will continue. Needless to say, this vital effort should continue.

Father Gerard E. Hammond

November 8, 2013