I walked along the lane leading to the Beijing Diocesan seminary with one of the priests one day last week. “That wasn’t there when I came here last,” I said referring to the three hillocks of mud and rubbish on the left side of the lane. “Neither was the huge crater in the ground on the right side, from which the earth had been excavated. Where is the vibrant community and the marvellous market they had?” I asked. My friend replied, “the town has been demolished like many of the old communities and hutongs [narrow streets or alleys] in Beijing; the families are gone, and the workers are scattered across the country as in many similar situations before.”
All along the road to the seminary was a construction site, a kind of coliseum all lit from below. Before my eyes, another vast expanse of the new, modern Beijing suburbs was about to rise on a twenty acre site. Even in the darkness, the welders were still working, very high up, possibly twenty fi ve stories. In the darkness, we could see the sparks rising from the outline of the half-fi nished buildings.

Over the past ten years I have seen a gigantic construction boom not only in cities like Beijing with its Olympic feast of building but also in small cities and the expanding suburbs everywhere. Highways are being hewed out of mountains; airport terminals are sprouting like mushrooms. Malls are everywhere, often quite empty, and conference centers and hotels are to be seen even in third-tier cities. Land is being extracted from farmers for this expansion, because cites and skyscrapers are the fashion. The process that marks the end of an old community’s destruction to the grand opening of the new with banners and fanfare is sometimes only a matter of months.

The television ads and glossy magazines are harbingers of this new development from slums, hutongs, and old communities to sweeping yuppie suburbs with underground car parks and massive malls where every western luxury brand item can be purchased, even diamonds.

However, there is little or no space in the Chinese media or in the minds of many for the men and women from the countryside who construct these buildings, who labor hour after hour, day after day on minimal wages, terrible working conditions, and who live in the most basic, unsightly shacks that are just bulldozed when the project is over. I feel these are the real heroes, whose blood and sweat have created all the new buildings of this massive transformation of the landscape of Chinese cities and countryside that has taken place in China over the past years, including the now world famous Bird’s Nest of the Olympic Village.

I have seen these workers arrive at railway stations, in groups, sometimes with their families of little children, with plastic bundles strapped to their backs holding all their possessions. They may have walked, cycled or hitched rides from their villages, often from houses with mud floors, trying desperately to make something of their lives, and especially for the lives of their children. I have been in a couple of villages, where the only people remaining are grannies, granddads and the children. The mothers and fathers are so missed by their children, but they are just another statistic in what has been described as the greatest internal migration in human history. It is a migration that contributes immensely to what many consider will be the first economy in our globalized world in about fifteen years – China.

Individually and collectively, they are heroes, the men and women who come to the cities and the old and very young who remain at home. The workers move dirt, mud, water, glass and rubbish. They shovel cement and run between jobs; sometimes the women are indistinguishable from the men as they work. Their features are burnt black by the searing sun, rain, humidity and pollution as they shift bricks, steel and earth, and their hands are full of welts. Their food is very simple. The old who are left at home in the villages are heroes also coping with a young generation; they knew poverty prior to the 1950s, now they have deep feelings of loss in their community, and uncertainty in coping with the social challenges that arise in parentless villages. Yet, they firmly believe their grandchildren will have a better life. These families, ripped apart from each other, are providing the comfortable world where the rising middle class of China live in, while they, alas, will never be able to afford it.

As I walked to language school four years ago, I had to pass what must have been the biggest building site I have ever seen. The men and women were often on the morning break as I went by, and I must have been gawking at them. A man, later known to me as Mr. Wang, gestured me to join them, offered me a breakfast, a split pancake with a fried egg and some vegetables. On that cold morning, it was delicious and led to a similar curbside breakfast for two weeks. We laughed, joked and gestured about our language capacity, mine in Mandarin and theirs in English was pretty low, and their dialect may not have been Mandarin, but I wouldn’t know the difference anyway! But still, we communicated. They had photos of those most dear to them, children, wives, parents and their old home towns. I had photos too of my nephews, nieces and grandnephew. I don’t think I ever convinced them that they were not my children! My gang was moved to another site, but before that Mr. Wang welcomed me to visit his family in South west China.

As we had breakfast, hundreds of well-dressed passers-by rushed to their air-conditioned offices in the new national television tower or the posh multi story buildings nearby. They were dressed in their immaculate suits, shoulder bags and exuding deodorants. They sometimes slowed down, clearly bemused at this strange scene, some laughing, maybe scoffing, their disapproval. I often reflected on both groups: the workers, whose labor was taken for granted and whose names would be written out of history, except in the hearts of their dear ones. It must have been, I thought, like the laborers who built the cathedrals of Europe or “won the West” in the great American adventure. For many of the yuppies passing by on the street, and their glitzy media culture, their internet exchanges, silvery computer screens and rolling images of a vibrant, young star of the month, there is no place for Mr. Wang and his fellow manual workers in the Chinese dream. These workers are seen by many as dirty, uneducated peasants, to be avoided and even feared for what they might do to you.

Recently, I had a retreat in Worth Abbey, where I was informed that the architect chartered to redesign the Abbey Chapel was also the one who designed the U.K. Center at the Shanghai Expo 2010. Tens of millions of people went to the Shanghai Exhibition. The local and the international press marvelled at the buildings, and praised to the sky all of their foreign designers, but I scarcely saw a word about the real heroes and their families at home, who constructed these marvels. Their lives were broken in the making of this exhibition Center and every other urban sprawl all over China. But despite the immense challenges to the workers and their families, lives also were made a bit better in small ways – a builder’s pay packet going to the village regularly, assurances of a child’s education, payment for medicine, a small shop serving the village, or the best house in the area.

The empty rhetoric about the place of workers in this society is being named as bogus by many. The indomitable spirit of Mr. Wang and his colleagues are playing their part in that process. With them I pray that in the near future they will fully reap what they have sown and enjoy the fruits of their labor. Now the pain is more evident, and the gains are simple such as those listed. But deep inside them I sense an unquenchable will which will prevail. It was well illustrated by the father of Mr. Wang and his village mates when I visited them and heard their story of how they managed in their hostile environment over the past 30 years. After a wonderful time with them, their resilience was admirably summed up in the final goodbye of Mr. Wang’s father. He was brought up in the French Catholic tradition, and he bid me goodbye in French with a determined twinkle in his eighty five year old eye, “all the best Fr. O’Brien, I have been the CATHOLIC party secretary of the Communist party of this village for 30 years. Long live Catholicism!”

“With a new generation in Hong Kong which had not been born at the time of Tiananmen, we need to do a few things differently,” Peggy Siu, the convener of a youthstyle, drop-in-and-out and get a taste of Tiananmen Square space in Victoria Park, explained on the afternoon of June 4, the twentysecond anniversary of the massacre of student demonstrators by the military in Beijing.

Organized by the Alliance of Patriotic Catholic Movements for Democracy in China, people were invited to drop in and learn a bit about what Legislative Council member and union leader, Lee Cheuk-yan, calls the importance of remembering. “In particular, the young people of Hong Kong and China need to know what happened on June 4, when the regime washed the call for democracy in blood,” he said. He said that right now, it is especially important as this year we are seeing history repeat itself.

“This year is one of the worst in this regard; an era of darkness seems to have fallen across the country,” he continued. “All free and democratic voices are being silenced by violence.” Lee told the 150,000 people who gathered in the park that evening to burn candles in memory of those who died on that fateful morning that in the centenary year of the expulsion of the Qing dynasty, “The dream of our grandparents of the empire being taken over by democracy is also being crushed.”

Siu said that although the reality of Tiananmen may not be pleasant, an education space needs to be welcoming. She explained that the drop-in display offered a gentle insight into the harsh realities of
what life must have been like for the one million people at the mass rally in Beijing back in late May and early June of 1989.

“It provides an opportunity to get involved by doing a few of the activities that the students did during the long days and weeks they were camped out in the square,” she explained. “They made flowers. So people here are making them too,” Siu continued, pointing to several bunches at the foot of a miniature replica of the memorial column constructed by the students in Tiananmen. “Although we can’t build a Goddess of Democracy here,” she laughed, “we do what we can.”

She added, “We have set up small tents, as a reminder of the tent city that sprang up around the rally, and are using them as a memorial to those who died.” The path to the tents featured poster-sized photographs depicting both the humane and inhumane sides of Tiananmen. One showed students giving food to soldiers, whose convoy of trucks had been trapped in the massive crowd and ordered to stop. Another showed a mother giving her small child to a soldier to hold, and the big smiles on both of their faces as the soldier held the boy up in the air.

Catherine Baber, Amnesty International Asia Pacific, and Alberto Ho Chun-yan at the Amnesty International report briefing in China

Another shows a young girl, her yellow dress blowing in the wind, standing at a microphone in front of the students’ Command Center, as she addressed the crowd. She represented a group of children invited to spend the day there on June 1, 1989, the International Day of the Child. Other photos depicted the inhumanity; a blood-soaked towel, tanks lined up in battle array and the violence of the soldiers as the students were making their retreat. Siu said, “The truth of these pictures may cause you sadness, but it is important to accept the truth even when it is sad.”

Those who dropped into the display were invited to do calligraphy, brushing their own reflections or the themes presented onto paper. Others recited a poem, read from the writings of the students in Beijing twenty-two years ago, sang or just sat quietly. A few watched a video presentation. Others expressed their response in art form, drawing, painting or sketching. A small group spent the afternoon putting Tiananmenthemed tattoos on people’s arms while others were on hand just to chat with people.

Siu explained that you could write a statement, make a prayer or expression of hope, and fix it to the prayer-line, containing the cards that had been presented at the novena of Masses that had been offered at various churches around the diocese in the run up to the Tiananmen anniversary. Siu, herself, attached two reels of cotton thread to the handle of a small, mechanical music box; one black and one white. “Good and evil,” she explained. “I entwine my hands and fingers in the thread and, as I turn the handle, the cotton tightens around my fingers and hands until they begin to hurt.”

She said it reminds her that pain is part of the struggle for freedom and justice, but the music cheers her up and is a source of hope. When it really hurts, I stop,” she said, “and just reflect that after one setback, we need to replenish our hope and try again.” She engages passers-by, placing the music box near their ear. “If they stop and ask me, I explain what I am doing,” she said. “I just figure that if they can come to understand something about me, then they have learned something new.” Siu explained, “Our little display is just one way that a younger generation can learn to relate to the big things about Tiananmen, like why we will pray in this space tonight and have the candlelight vigil.” Lee said that we must keep the memory of Tiananmen alive, as memory is a powerful weapon in the struggle against oppression. As the words inscribed on many t-shirts at the memorial read, “Don’t forget June 4.”

The Columban Center for Advocacy and Outreach organized the trip and selected these five El Paso Catholics for the exposure trip, which will last 18 days and provides the participants with a guided tour of various cities in China, with a view to familiarizing them with the work of our Columban missioners among the people of that Asiatic nation.

A permanent deacon and his wife are also in the group.  Rev. Mr. Rolando Lujan and his wife, Norma, joined their travel companions for the two Sunday Masses at St. Pius X a few days ago, where the pastor, Mons. Arturo Bañuelos, with Columban Father Bill Morton at his side, asked the assembly to extend their hands and ask God’s special blessing on the group.

Deacon Rolando read the Gospel at the Masses, and his wife spoke briefly of her battle with cancer over the years.  With prayer and commitment to living the Christian mission among a Native American community in nearby Mexico for weeks at a time each year, Norma credits God with her recovery, and with bringing her in good health to this tremendous opportunity to live an experience of mission in China, sent forth by her own parish.

Norma’s father came to the airport to see her and her husband off, and performed a brief, moving tradition just before she joined the line in the security area.  Many Mexican parents, on leaving church after Mass with their children, will take the holy water from the fonts at the doors of the churches and bless their children with the sign of the Cross.  Norma’s father tearfully repeated the gesture over his daughter, to bless her on her journey.

Sylvia Price is the fifth member of the group, and she was very excited about going.  “I will be open to what God wants to show me,” she said breathlessly, and with a little anxiety over the last-minute changes to their flight plans.  Their airlines cancelled their flight to Los Angeles, but another airline agreed to take them at about the same time, so that they wouldn’t miss their connecting flight to Hong Kong.  Columban Father Dan Troy would meet them on their arrival, and guide them through the exposure trip.

We’re going to pay attention to the group’s messages as they proceed through this experience—stay tuned, and visit this website for more information!

Frs. Gerry Neylon and Dan Troy

My main contribution to our mission in China is facilitating overseas study for priests,  Sisters and laity from both the underground and the patriotic Catholic Church. I feel that in my present role in China I am more a missionary now than I have ever been in my 37 years as a Columban priest.

I was ordained on Easter Sunday 1973 and appointed to South Korea in August. At that time all the Christian churches were attracting lots of new members because the churches were standing up for those who were being harassed by the government, in particular the industrial laborers. I was there for four years: two years in language school and two years of parish work. We were kept very busy with programs helping catechumens understand and appreciate the Catholic faith, a variety of catechetical programs for Catholics, sacramental ministry and plenty of opportunities to be involved with parishioners. Most of our contact with parishioners was related to the Church. The language was difficult, but we had every opportunity to practice and plenty of people willing to help us.

Fr. Gerry Neylon with AITECE teachers Rachel and David Winton

After four years in Korea I was asked to go to Taiwan and spent seventeen years there, from 1979 to 1996. I found it a totally different scene, where there was little interest in the Church. There were large numbers of Catholics on the books, but not many people 6 June/July 2011 www.columban.org Becoming More Missionary The Life of a Witness By Fr. Gerry Neylon came to church. Many had come into the Church during the 1950s and 1960s when relief goods were distributed through the parishes. Once the goods stopped most of these so-called “rice Christians” ceased coming to church. On weekends we would have only 70 to 80 worshippers at Mass, so there was no way we could approach the mission as we had been doing in Korea. Another factor that affected Mass attendance was the work pattern of many parishioners. They did not, quite simply, have time to go to church. They often worked two jobs, one during the day and one at night, and had just two consecutive days off each month!

Fr. Gerry Neylon celebrates Mass.

In these circumstances we had to ask ourselves how we might be relevant to the lives of those around us. After much discussion with parishioners and the local people, another Columban priest and I opened centers for the mentally impaired children in our parishes. Taiwanese society generally looks down on these children. They feel that they are useless, and many are kept at home because their families do not want the neighbors to see them. Without other options available, some children are sent to a huge, state-funded institution where conditions are often horrific, where many are locked up in cages like animals. Lay missionaries from the U.S. with expertise in special education came to work with us. They insisted on one teacher for each five children and emphasized helping the children to help themselves, so that they might be as independent as possible. The centers are still going strong, and the children’s progress and wellbeing are wonderful to behold.

This work made sense to me, but I was also challenged in other ways. On one occasion, while traveling on a train, a fellow passenger asked me, “Is your wife also American?” I replied, “I’m from Ireland, and I don’t have a wife.” He continued, “You’re not married? You know, we Chinese all marry.” I said, “I’m a Catholic priest, and Catholic priests don’t marry.” He was totally taken aback at this. Noting his reaction, I said, “What do you think of this?” He said, “I think you’re very selfish.” So I said, “Why is that?” He said, “We Chinese all marry because it’s our duty to produce grandchildren for our parents. You’re not doing that. You’re only thinking of yourself.” It was pretty clear that the value that I, and Catholics generally, put on celibacy meant nothing to him. However, my fellow passenger’s comments had a big impact on me and suggested a need to be more in touch with his way of thinking and the values of non-Christians in Taiwan. In Korea I had been immersed in doing obviously priestly work in a busy church, but in Taiwan they were not buying that.

My missionary journey in Taiwan came to an end when, in 1996, I received a phone call from the Columban leader asking me to go to China. Columban Fr. Ned Kelly, a fluent Chinese speaker, had died in 1994. He had spent the previous ten years researching possible openings for Columbans working in post-Mao China. The other Columbans who were in China at the time primarily taught English in Chinese universities as an effective form to witnessing to Jesus Christ in a country where non-Chinese are not allowed to be involved in religious activities.

By 1996, my emphasis had moved from parish work to outreach to mentally impaired children. The idea of moving to China did not sit well with me. I didn’t see the need for it. How could teaching English compare with working with children who were shunned and ignored at home or shut away in some large institution?

After much soul searching and discussion about my particular role I came to China with the intention of doing more or less what Fr. Ned had been doing. I arrived a month after the British handed over Hong Kong to the Chinese on July 1, 1997. In both Korea and Taiwan I had been free to do as I wanted, finding my way along with other missionaries as best we could. In China, as non- Chinese, we are restricted in many ways. My training as a priest and my experience of working with special needs children could not be used directly in China. Most of the props of my Irish cultural background, my seminary training and my experience as a missionary in Korea and Taiwan were effectively removed in my new situation.

My new mission forced me to put all my emphasis on witnessing to Jesus Christ by the very way I live my life as a Christian. There is no shortage of opportunity to do that in a country that attaches no importance to religion. My being in China is about forming relationships, interacting with the people here in as deep and profound a way as I can, and letting them see for themselves what a Christian is. My mission obliges me to adopt a low profile. I cannot talk about my Christianity, but I can witness to it as I relate to others. I would like to include a short story to illustrate this point.

On May 12, 2008, there was a massive earthquake in Sichuan Province which killed almost 90,000 people. It happened at 2:28 p.m. in the middle of a school day. Many local schools collapsed and thousands of children died in the ruins of poorly built school buildings. Because of the onechild policy, this meant the end of the line for many couples, which translates into unimaginable desolation for Chinese people.

A doctor was working her shift in a local hospital when the earthquake hit. She lived alone with her mother and wondered all afternoon what might have happened to her. She was so busy with the dead and dying arriving at the hospital that she could not contact her mother. After work, she returned home to find her house destroyed and then began frantically searching the area for her mother. To her great joy she found her mother alive but pinned under a boulder. They talked for a while, and then her mother died suddenly. The daughter was totally distraught and inconsolable. She had no religion of any kind. She was a convinced materialist. For her, her mother was dead and that was the end.

A few weeks after that, in the course of my work, I was asked to see this woman. I talked to her but, because I am not allowed to be involved in any form of proselytizing, I spoke to her about my own belief in the afterlife and what it meant to me when my mother died. I was able then to introduce her to the local Chinese priest. She is now taking instruction in the Catholic faith with him.

I am convinced that it is at the level of witness that we can make the most impact. I can facilitate, but I cannot instruct people in the faith. However, I can show others what my faith means to me, and they can decide whether or not to take the next step.

In fact, I have come to believe that witness by the way I live is the the most effective form of evangelization. I take very seriously the advice of St. Francis of Assisi: “Preach the Gospel at all times – if necessary use words.”

• Discover the roots of Columban history in the original mission country
• Walk in the footsteps of the first Columban missionaries
• Experience modern China and meet Columban missionaries
• Witness the connections between the past, present and future of the Missionary  Society of St. Columban

Click here to download a flyer with details of the trip to share with your family and friends.

For more information and to apply, contact
The Columban Center for Advocacy and Outreach:
Brian Radziwill
301-565-4547
ccaoprograms@columban.org
www.columban.org

Fr. Peter O'Neill (back row center) and team

William Wilberforce led a campaign against the British international slave trafficking business just a few hundred years ago. About 150 years ago, a vicious civil war was fought in the U.S. over a way of life that had institutionalized the slavery of Africans who had been trafficked like animals to many parts of the Americas since the 16th century. Over the centuries, national and international campaigns have done much to change attitudes regarding slavery. However, modern forms of the same evil continue to rear their heads in most countries, despite being rejected by our laws and the moral sensitivity of citizens. Working nationally and internationally to prevent human trafficking continues to be a major challenge to all who believe in the United Nations charter of human rights.
As the Hsinchu Diocese migrant and immigrant chaplain, I was invited to be a member of the Migrant Forum in Asia (MFA) delegation to the 99th International Labor Conference (ILC) and the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva in early June 2010. At the ILC we discussed the draft report on the U.N. Convention on Decent Work for Domestic Workers. We lobbied government members to support a clear and robust Convention. I had the task of lobbying the governments of Australia, New Zealand and the U.S. It was considered too
sensitive for me to lobby the Chinese government as I was a non-government organization
(NGO) delegate from Taiwan. The week-long process tried the patience and negotiating skills of the tripartite members of workers’ and employers’ organizations and governments as they battled it out on the conference floor debating each word in the draft report.
On day three of the ILC, the employer members requested a recorded vote to have recommendations only without a Convention. It is quite rare at the ILC to have a recorded
vote so early in proceedings. Of the 109 government members’ names called, 62 voted against the employers’ proposal (57%); 13 voted for the proposal (12%); 4 abstained (4%); and 30 were not present (27%). In response to this historic moment the worker members and NGO delegates erupted with applause. Asia was the only continent where the majority
of governments supported the employers’ position. The battle had just begun as we lobbied governments to make sure the Convention substantially protected the human rights of domestic workers.
We will return to Geneva in June 2011 for the 100th ILC and the final debate on the U.N. Convention for Domestic Workers. Following that meeting, we will start lobbying governments to ratify the Convention. We have a long road ahead of us.
December 18, 2010, the U.N. International Migrants Day, marked the 20th anniversary of
the U.N. Convention on the Protection of Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families. To date, only 43 governments have ratified this Convention, and sixteen governments are signatories to the Convention. No receiving government has signed
the Convention. We highlighted this anniversary and the U.N. Convention for Domestic Workers at a press conference in Taipei on International Human Rights Day, December 10, 2010.
Exorbitant Cost of Migrating
In 1989, Taiwan began to welcome documented migrant workers. Prior to that there were an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 undocumented migrants in the country. Today there are
approximately 370,700 migrant workers in Taiwan, who work as fishermen (1.9%), in domestic service (0.6%), as caregivers (48.7%), in construction (0.9%) and in the manufacturing industry (47.9%). The migrants come from the Philippines (76,725), Vietnam (78,858), Thailand (64,342) and Indonesia (150,767). The present system allows migrant workers to come on a two-year contract that is renewable for one additional year.
They can renew their contract for a maximum total of nine years after leaving the country for at least one day after each three year period. All migrants need to have a job arranged before arrival, and it is around that need that government bureaucrats and the private
sector weave a web of abuse and exploitation.
The sending country has placement agencies, and Taiwan has brokers. They coordinate with each other, and both charge the migrant worker a fee. Philippine migrants can pay up to U.S. $3,800; Thais up to U.S. $3,500; Indonesians up to U.S. $4,000; Vietnamese up to U.S. $9,000. In my view, the cause of this abuse is massive corruption at the high government level in both Taiwan and the countries of origin. With a system of government to government direct hiring, the cost to the migrant workers could be reduced to about U.S. $450 plus the cost of the airfare. The Taiwan government agreed to adopt this system for all Philippine migrant workers beginning January 2010. This advance towards fairness
has come as a result of constant campaigning and social pressure over a period of years.
The struggle is not over. Other sending governments continue to support exploitive migration systems. Also, caregivers and domestic workers generally cannot use this method the first time around as employers don’t know them, but they can use it for subsequent two-year work contracts, a practice which is allowed by the Indonesian
government.
Wage Discrimination
The Taiwan government allows factories to employ 30% migrant labor who are paid the legal minimum wage, which was raised 1% in 2007 after no rise for ten years. Taiwan workers are on a higher graduated wage scale with increases being determined by each company’s wage policy. This is clearly unjust and discriminatory. It seems that the local government does not want more factories moving their operation to other countries so collaborates in whatever way it can to keep company’s wage bills down. This, of course, only applies to blue-collar workers.
In 1986, the Columbans founded the Hope Workers Center (HWC) in the Hsinchu Diocese to assist local Taiwanese workers. Migrant workers began to frequent the center soon after. I went to work there in 1995 and worked as the center’s director for eight years.
In 2006, I became the Migrant and Immigrant Chaplain of the Hsinchu Diocese and at this time Sister Doris Zahra, originally from Malta, was director of HWC. In January 2009, in coordination with the local bishop, the Columbans decided to place HWC under the
auspices of the Diocese. There are also two other centers dedicated to working with migrant workers, which also function under the auspices of the Diocese.
These centers engage in the following activities in favor of migrant workers:

• Crisis management and counseling
• Lobbying and advocacy
• Proactive education
• Community enhancement
• Sheltering victims of trafficking and abused migrant workers
• Reintegration programs for their return home
• Religious services.
Worker’s and Caregiver’s Rights
Workers and caregivers suffer the most abuse and exploitation. They are not covered by any labor law, only by the terms of their contract. Even then, unless they know how to stand up for themselves and protest, they often end up without a day off despite the stipulations in their contract. This is frequently the case with the Indonesians and Vietnamese. However, the Filipinos are generally more confident and better educated, so they usually know how to stand up for their rights. The Thai government refused to
let Thais migrate as caregivers and domestic workers until they were covered by Taiwan labor law.
We will work untiringly towards ensuring that the U.N. Convention for Domestic Workers will be a firm basis for insisting on upholding the rights of migrants.

Fr. Warren Kinne and Friends

I came to China fourteen years ago, settled into Beijing to learn Mandarin for three years and then came to Shanghai. Mrs. Cecilia Tao Bei Ling, whom I met about 20 years ago in Manila, the Philippines, where she was studying to improve her English had suggested that I might be able to help her translate books at Guang Qi Press. Along with our friendship, two practical matters infl uenced my decision: my desire to find a way of being on mission in China and perhaps Cecilia’s need for someone who might check the accuracy of her translations or at the least explain what the English meant. I began going to her office each day, and with the help of Chinese friends I gradually found my way into other jobs.
Four churches in Shanghai now have Masses for the English speaking community, and I help out with these Masses in two locations. As is the custom with many priests, I greet worshippers at the church door after Mass. Through such contacts I have made a few friends who have helped me move deeper into my missionary Chinese Friends
Welcoming Me to Mission commitment in a variety of ways, beginning with a concern for the life of the Church itself. I see it as an ongoing dialogue with the local Church. I’ve taught English to a bishop, priests and Sisters, and I am ready to help in the translation
of documents or in polishing up English translations. I do what I can to help in the pastoral care of the large and scattered expatriate Catholic community in Shanghai.
I have a good relationship with Bishop Jin who was born in 1916 and who has supported me in my life here. On some occasions I join in the celebrations in the cathedral at significant moments in the life of the Church, such as ordinations and anniversaries.
During my second year in Shanghai, Cecilia spoke to Evelyn and Jim Whitehead about me, and they spoke to the Fudan University authorities in the school of philosophy. They are consultants in education and ministry who serve university programs and other institutions throughout the United States and internationally.  The university sent out their scout Rachel Zhu Xiao Hong to see whether it was worth talking with me or not. I then met Professor Zhang Ying Xiong who invited me to teach a course the following
semester. I have now been teaching there for nine years although at the moment I now teach only one philosophy course to postgraduate students each semester. The university was founded over 100 years ago by Ma Xiang Bo, a former Jesuit. It is one of the top universities in China with an enrollment of approximately 50,000 students.
The comments and questions of the students often allow me to introduce ideas and perspectives quite unfamiliar to them. In one paper a student wrote: “Those who
lived in the Age of Enlightenment gradually cut the doctrines of Christianity out of their brains. They then fi lled them with scientifi c knowledge.” In response I remarked, “Such an imbalance led to the greatest slaughter of human beings in the 20th century, wars
and revolutions,” which of course prompted a lively discussion. On the topic of the Renaissance one student wrote: “On the one hand it (the Renaissance) releases man
from the bondage of religion, on the other hand it makes later generations have a bad obsession with individualism and money worship.” This opened up a similarly good discussion. On the topic of religious faith and science, one student wrote: “Just as science
gives us the eyes to perceive the physical realm; faith grants us the eyes to discern the spiritual realm. Science and faith are not mutually exclusive,” a position that flies in
the face of so much of what they have been taught that has colored all their formal education in the communist context, although one must always add “communism with Chinese characteristics.” On the topic of Jesus of Nazareth, the thoughts expressed in student papers are many and varied: “The deeds of Jesus remind me of those Communist Party members and warriors who died in wars for a new China. Just like Jesus, in order to make people have a happy life, they sacrifi ced their precious lives.” One can always
fi nd a reason to explain some of the basics of Jesus’ teaching and its sacramental celebration when you get comments like: “According to Christian Gospel, it is the salvation
when Christians eat the bread and wine, which represent Jesus’ body and his blood. But it is so repellent that we absolutely can’t understand and accept it in Chinese culture.” One can follow through with a lively discussion with the class when someone writes: “But in Chinese tradition, it is different, because there is not a superior God beyond human beings.”
As the years passed, Rachel became a trusted friend. We were teaching in the same department and had the opportunity to get to know each other well. Rachel’s whole family has in fact became Catholic. Then, once it was clear to them that I intended to remain in China for some years, they invited me to be the godfather of the younger son. On returning from study in the U.S. where their second son was born, they had a hard time in the university due to their breach of the one child policy, but that has passed, and I generally have dinner with the family once a week.
About five years ago, I was talking to friends about the difficult lives of internal migrants in this city of 20 million inhabitants, 6 to 7 million of whom are migrants. By “internal migration” I mean people who have moved to the big cities but were born and brought up
elsewhere in one of the 32 provinces outside Shanghai Province. With a concerned group of Catholics, both expatriates and Chinese, I began to put some practical shape on our
shared concern and eventually the You Dao Foundation was formed. We felt we were responding to a need that no government, individual or organization would be able to solve alone. Every day each one of us saw migrants sleeping rough on the street or on building sites and in makeshift shanties. We researched the matter professionally with the help of Audrey Leung, a well qualified business executive who is also an attorney at law, who came onto our board.
We formed a non-governmental organization (NGO), which we then registered in Hong Kong. We would prefer to register in mainland China as it would permit us to regularize our way of working and so make many things easier. However, very few charities have been able to do so as the government is slow to allow what it does not fully control.
An observer may wonder why we put so much effort into doing so little in the face of such a massive challenge, such as the injustices suffered by the millions of migrants in Shanghai. My response can be summed up in the saying: “Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness!” the origin of which is uncertain but some maintain that it is derived from a Chinese proverb.

For more information about the You Dao Foundation, please visit: www.youdao.org.hk

Sisters in Church of Former Columban parish in Hanyang

I am grateful for the opportunity to have met Bishop Peter Zhang, the first Chinese bishop of Hanyang, on a number of occasions in the few years before he died in 2005 at the age of 91. He succeeded Bishop Edward Galvin, co-founder of the Columbans and a native of my own County Cork in Ireland. As one of many victims of religious persecution by the Chinese government, Bishop Zhang spent 24 years as a priest in prison. He was a strong and faith-filled leader until his death. It has taken some time for a new leadership to begin to emerge, but I now sense new life in what was the first mission of the Missionary Society of St. Columban.

Fr. Chen Tian Hui was in his first year of theological studies in 1956 when the local seminary was closed. He found a job as a bus driver until 1993, when Bishop Zhang invited
him to be ordained a priest for the diocese. Even though he is now 83 years of age, since the bishop died Fr. Hui continues in the role of Apostolic Administrator. There is little hope that a new bishop will be appointed to Hanyang Diocese in the near future due to its weakened position.

Fr. Chen Tian Hui (center) with Fr. Joseph Jie and a recently ordained priest of Hanyang

In the meantime, Fr. Joseph Li Chang Jie, from Lu Lin Hu, a local town, has taken on the administrative and planning work. Due to lack of freedom at the time, Fr. Jie was ordained in 2001 in an out-of-the-way church with twelve or so present in a very short night time ceremony. But so much has changed in just ten years; this year Fr. Zhang Wei, who recently returned from three years of theology studies in Rome, was ordained with great public fanfare at Huang Lin Church, followed by a sit-down meal with 850 guests in a local restaurant. Prior to 1949 there were about 100 churches and chapels in the Hanyang Diocese, but after 1953 there were no public religious activities in any church. Most churches and chapels were demolished or transferred to other use during the Cultural Revolution.
Recently I saw one church in the countryside being used as a chicken coop; our cathedral in the city was converted to a factory for making electrical fittings in the 1960s. The Church is still in the process of recovering property confiscated in that period. Fr. Jie tells me that during the Cultural Revolution people were forbidden to pray, but in the early 1980s he saw his parents praying in a dark room with some neighbors. Clearly persecution and government decrees did not prevent all practices of the faith. Fr. Jie also tells me that he was nine years of age when he first attended Mass in 1985 and that over the past twenty years they have enjoyed ever increasing freedom to practice their faith publicly.

Columban fr. Thomas Ryan's Tombstone in Hanyang Diocese

Fr. Jie speaks energetically about the diocese’s five to ten year plan. He recognizes the limited opportunities for the Church in the rural area, which was the heartland of Church life in Hanyang Diocese prior to 1949. There is still work to be done in the rural area, primarily with the very young and the elderly. In many country churches the Sisters run a summer course for children from nine to sixteen years of age where, among other things, they teach the children some of the basics of the practice of the faith. Simplicity of life is close to hand even when running such summer courses. There are usually problems with power outages, probably due to overload resulting from the extensive use of air conditioners, but they get by with candles. Unfortunately, when the water is cut off because there is no electricity to run the pump, things become infinitely more difficult.

However, priests and Sisters agree that they need to give priority to pastoral work and missionary outreach in the urban centers. In the words of Fr. Jie, “The majority of the youth have gone to the city so we must follow them there.” That may be easier said than done. In the city the Church has limited access to land so the first step is to negotiate with the government to acquire a place to build parish centers. This is not a simple matter in any part of China, but in some places it is more difficult than in others. In Hanyang Diocese it continues to be rather difficult. Recently in one town, after a public demonstration by Catholics protesting the government’s inaction on the matter, land was assigned to the Church. The basis of the land grant is a State commitment to compensate for property confiscated since 1949.
The twelve Sisters, who belong to two communities in the diocese, are committed to the project of Church revival, but they also need to ensure an adequate income. Sister Li Shuang Qun told me that they want to run a home for the elderly. There is a need, and there are facilities that could be modified for the purpose but it seems that other interests have so far stood in their way. The Sisters would like to make a living from running
the home and at the same time dedicate themselves to the care of the elderly as an apostolate. The diocese has five priests, twelve Sisters and five seminarians. They want to put more energy into formation of Church personnel, including laity, but locally there is little opportunity. A few laity are Columban Fr. Thomas Ryan’s tombstone in Hanyang Diocese. currently preparing for the mission, one in a two year course in Beijing, another in a six month course in Handan. Fr. Jie wants to specialize in personal faith development. He also wants priests and Sisters to help train catechists at a local level, but the problem of adequate facilities has yet to be solved. He has been behind the organization of a local, one year course for catechists in which twenty people are participating, but the facilities are poor and it costs U.S. $15,000 a year to cover the cost of teachers’ wages. A former seminarian from Hanyang directs the program.

The active priests and Sisters are relatively young and want to attract youth to the Church, but other than personal contact they have no organized strategy for this. They desperately need urban centers from which they can work and to which they can invite youth. For a Church that has been through so many difficulties in the past 60 years, it is also likely that they will now find a way forward in faith through these more recent challenges

Sisters Shen Ai Yun and Zhang Jinping, the current and former leader of the community respectively, describe some of the community’s dreams and plans for the future.

First, we dream of a bigger community; we need to grow in order to do what needs to be done here in Hanyang. We want to do mission work in the Hanyang Diocese. We would like to help improve the spirituality of Catholics and attract others to the Church. We would help Catholics deepen their spirituality through courses about our faith and the Bible and by inviting people to come to church more regularly.
Then, in order to interest others in our faith, we would begin by visiting them, especially in their time of need. Showing compassion and friendship is very important in Chinese culture regardless of religious belief. We would also encourage Catholics to invite their friends to church. Some Catholics might ask us to go to the homes or the workplaces of friends to talk about our faith. Many people in China are searching for a deeper meaning in their lives; this is so especially among the youth.

The Sisters in their courtyard with Fr. Dan Troy

In order to tackle these tasks we would need preparation, and there are courses in theology and Bible for Sisters in three cities in China—Taiyuan, Beijing and Shijiazhuang. Some of our Sisters have already done the two year course in Taiyuan. A three year course will soon be available in Beijing, for which the entry standard will be quite high.

There is very little missionary work being done in the diocese of Wuhan; we lack organization. We could start a training center here in Hanyang for Catholics so that priests, Sisters and laity might work together to help renew the faith of our people and, at the same time, reach out to others with the Good News of the Gospel.
Pope Benedict XVI, in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est, tells us that our faith in Jesus Christ urges us to respond in three ways: first, to preach the message of Jesus; second, to live a religious life by the practice of prayer and the celebration of the sacraments; third, to serve those who are in need. Being religious Sisters we should care about those whom society does not care about as it seems that their number is increasing.

Maybe we should not say that society does not care at all, but what we can say is that it does not care enough. For example, younger family members may give money to help the elderly of their family, but then do not live with them, accompany them in their illness or loneliness. There is so often a lack of personal care rather than a lack of money.

To help do even more of this outreach work we have formed a lay group called “Loving Heart Small Group,” which has seventeen members. We know we cannot solve other people’s problems, but they like us to visit them in their homes. We find this is so with both Catholics and non-Catholics. We have also seen that this kind of outreach has a big impact on people.

Although their numbers are small, the Sisters continue to reach out to the community, to find new ways to serve. Their lives are witness to the Good News of Jesus Christ.

You Dao was initiated in Shanghai when Columban Fr. Warren Kinne invited a group of friends to discuss the issue of migrant workers over dinner in June 2005. A lawyer at the dinner, Audrey Leung, later initiated a research project about the plight of the migrant workers. She did extensive research on all aspects of the phenomenon and started to give seminars to various groups including professional
and women’s leadership groups about the fruit of her research and her own growing commitment to do something helpful. The members of the You Dao Foundation work to better understand the situation of migrant workers and try to respond in appropriate ways to help them contribute to the development of their country.

Solidarity with those Living in Poverty in Shanghai, China’s Largest and Wealthiest City

I was born in Hong Kong and was brought up speaking Cantonese. I then went to the U.S. to the University of Wisconsin in Madison where I completed a degree in developmental psychology, with an emphasis
on the development of children. I then worked as a preschool teacher for two years and saw the need to work with parents as well as to coordinate what they and I were trying to achieve with their children. That motivated me to take a second degree in child and family studies at Syracuse University in New York. After my husband’s company transferred us to Shanghai, I began my work with the You Dao Foundation as a volunteer and was recently asked to take on the job of executive director, which I also do voluntarily. Our foundation works to raise awareness of the plight of migrants; we build alliances and partnerships to support migrants; we look for practical ways to support migrants. Working in a formal association with the local Church in the social apostolate is very complex, so we have decided to pursue our objectives in other ways. Also, due to government rules we cannot establish and run educational institutions. Some of our projects have prospered for a time but then, for reasons beyond our control, they might finish overnight. We take on what we do knowing that we are working in a gray, insecure area.

peace

The local Church is reasonably good in its response to emergency situations created, for example, by an earthquake or a flood. However, it seems that it is difficult for the Church to take on longer term social outreach projects. First, the government generally does not want the Church systematically reaching out, as it opposes the development of a civil society independent of its control. Second, the Church has been pushed in on itself and, in a sense, is finding its way to get going again with its primary focus for now being the development of the Church itself as an institution.

We have projects in two places, Fengxian District (on the southern outskirts of Shanghai city) and Baoshan District (on the north western outskirts of the city). In the former we offer a number of scholarships to migrant children attending two kindergartens. They run a five day a week program from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The scholarship covers the cost of tuition fees, three meals per day and other miscellaneous costs. With the support of our sponsors we also are setting up a community center to support the ongoing formation of migrant children. Various social programs, including healthcare and education to the end of high school, are run to a certain extent as if they were independent countries throughout the 33 provinces of China. Healthcare and education are available in each province for all who are born there; however, such basic services are much harder to come by for those who cross provincial borders as internal migrants. This has become a significant social problem in the major urban centers along the eastern seaboard. The government is in the process of partially addressing the educational needs of migrant children in Shanghai by collaborating with some of the better run private schools, and offering the children free education from grades one to nine. However, such schools continue to offer a second rate education to the migrant children, who still cannot attend the state-run, fee-based kindergartens, a circumstance that our foundation sees as a window of opportunity.

When we first began to offer scholarships, the migrants were quite suspicious of our motives in offering the scholarships, with some wondering if we wanted to win their trust so that later we might kidnap their children and sell them. By visiting and talking to the people, we persuaded them of our honorable intentions and then what we did for their children won their trust.
We began with home visits to obtain basic information about the families applying for scholarships. Once we determined the list of children to receive scholarships, we arranged to visit each family monthly in order to update ourselves with regard to their work and health situations and how the children were doing. Our goal is to promote an integral formation of the child, which of course requires parental participation in the education of their children. In many parts of China, parents are forced to leave their children with their grandparents while they go to work in distant urban centers. As a consequence, thousands of children have grown up without knowing their parents, and the rate of delinquency among such children has risen. While the families with whom we work are poor, they are also together, and we want to help them remain that way.

In Baoshan District volunteers from two universities come to the small center that the local Catholic parish lets us use on weekends. The center was built perhaps 100 years ago in the town of Beiyaowan, which at that time was a rural town surrounded by farms. It is now hemmed in by small factories and workshops and is a temporary home to thousands of migrants from neighboring provinces, whose lives are a constant struggle to make ends meet. On Saturday and Sunday afternoons the children from the neighborhood are queued up outside the gate anxious to enter and get on with the afternoon’s fun. The university students, who for the most part are not Catholics, play games with them and do activities around tables with those who prefer that. One student commented to me, “We may not be doing much, but we are doing something, and I know that if I don’t do this I will not try to change anything.”

I support the volunteers with training sessions each quarter on child development, and I go to the center every two weeks to talk to the students about their experience with the children. We would like to have a student do an internship with You Dao and then take on a job of home visiting. This would be a step towards a partnership with a university. As in all our projects, we are always on the lookout for openings and coordinate as best we can to take advantage of them. For more details about the You Dao Foundation, please visit www.youdao.org.hk.