The aboriginal Atayal people of Taiwan receive God’s message to fortify them for their difficult lives amid an encroaching modern culture.
By Fr. Larry Barnett

"You are precious in my eyes … you are honored and I love you” (Isaiah 43:4) was the theme of our Lent 2007 retreat here in our parish of aboriginal people in the mountains of central Taiwan. It was the first parish retreat in living memory.

Maryknoll priest Paul Duffy came from Taipei City, where he works as an Ignatian spiritual director, to lead the retreat. He made an immediate connection with the parishioners, the Atayal people of the TaiAn-HePing Parish. Fr. Duffy had worked for many years in a neighboring area among Atayal aborigines, so his pastoral experience convinced him that it was vital that Taiwan’s aboriginal people hear that God assures them that they are precious, honored and loved.

Daily life for many of our parishioners does not offer that message.

TaiAn-HePing parishioners live in eight villages of about 50 families each. The villages rise south to north from 1,300-2,600 feet above sea level and cling to the steep mountains that border the DaAn River.

The Atayal, the second largest of Taiwan’s aboriginal groups, lived in this isolated valley for thousands of years until the press of Chinese migration over the last 300 years and the incorporation into the Japanese Empire during World War II. This encroachment brought violent changes to the Atayal way of life.

Traditionally, the Atayal people lived in extended-family groups in hamlets high on the mountain slopes, sustained by hunting, limited agriculture (mainly millet) and gathering native fruits and vegetables. It was a hard life.

Modern-Day Problems
Colonization by the Japanese and Chinese has brought many physical benefits, such as more-permanent housing in common villages, access to markets for their garden produce, education and healthcare. Under the sustained assault of the cultural and social forces of the lowland colonizers, however, the Atayal now suffer many social ills found in other colonized societies.

Alcohol abuse is a chronic problem, fuelled by readily available cheap alcohol, hard physical working conditions and the high value placed on hospitality and comradeship. As a result, family life is often disrupted and other problems quickly surface, such as spousal abuse, poor parenting skills, abandonment, poor hygiene and higher incidents of accidental death.

The difficult situations of many families here mean that the heaviest burdens fall on the women of the family. Their daily heroism in the face of many evils is a testimony to their faith.

That is where our retreat was valuable. The most serious problem for our Atayal parishioners is a loss of self-esteem, the daily-reinforced tearing down of their self-worth. The attitude of wider (Chinese) society toward aboriginal people is less than flattering, and the sense of being second-class citizens is often internalized by the Atayals. Our leaders wanted to do something to counter this phenomenon.

Fr. Duffy’s contribution was God’s word to Isaiah.

Our one-day retreat was a modest affair. At 9 a.m. on a March Saturday in Lent, the 40-plus retreatants began quietly, meditatively reciting the Creed, the Our Father and the Hail Mary. Fr. Duffy led us through a similarly reflective reading of the text from Isaiah before proceeding into the Lenten journey from ashes to baptism, a movement of conversion back to God.

In the process, we watched movie clips, looked at recent newspapers and discussed several posters that asked us to consider the dynamics in our own lives, families and society and decide again whether we wanted to be part of the evils of society or the good that God can bring.

Before noon, Veisu (Wu Guo Xiong), our catechist-in-training, led us through a penitential service and the sacrament of reconciliation. Three ladies of the parish prepared a splendid lunch of rice, pork and vegetables and soup with fruit for dessert.

We then gathered to hear Fr. Duffy lead us through a discussion on our baptismal promises based on a cartoon movie about three monks who only belatedly learned to overcome their self-will to cooperate in saving their temple.

As preparation for Mass, we renewed our baptism promises together and, during the Mass, Fr. Duffy told a parable from Africa that reinforced the truth that only God can truly satisfy our hungry hearts. The retreat ended at 4 p.m. with tea and cookies in a lively and friendly atmosphere.

Since the retreat, many parishioners have expressed how much they enjoyed the experience, and the parish council has already mandated an annual retreat at the beginning of Lent. Saturday is a workday for most people here, but we are hoping more parishioners will attend next year.

Most of all, we hope that God’s message to Isaiah will remain with those who came this year, and that they will carry in their hearts the certain knowledge that, in God’s eyes, they are precious, honored and loved. It is a message people everywhere should hear but, among the Atayal people of central Taiwan, it is a message vital to their survival.

Columban Father Larry Barnett was ordained in 1981 and holds a doctorate in anthropology. He has spent most of his life as a missionary in Taiwan.