Taliban can't stop
Korean missionary zeal By Sunny
Lee
BUNDANG, South Korea - This is the
Saemmul Church, just south of Seoul. It is this
Presbyterian congregation that sent 23 Christian
volunteers to Afghanistan last July on short-term
aid and evangelical missions. All the volunteers
eventually returned home, two of them in coffins.
A 43-day abduction ordeal the group
endured dragged the whole country into a state of
anxiety and shock, prompting thousands to join
candlelight vigils. The Saemmul Church was
criticized for having a naive evangelical
worldview and knowingly sending a group of mostly
young, overzealous Christian believers in their
20s and 30s to an obvious danger zone.
During the hostage crisis in Afghanistan,
Park Eun-jo, the founder and senior pastor of the
church, was very apologetic and repeatedly said
his church would no longer engage in missionary
work in that country. Six months have since
passed. "Things have
returned
to normal," a deacon at the church said. Park is
also now saying something slightly different,
displaying renewed mission enthusiasm for
Afghanistan. And this warrants due attentiveness.
On this last Sunday morning in February,
Park isn't here to deliver his sermon. "He is away
for three weeks in the US to hold 'Prayer Meetings
for Afghanistan'," says the deacon, who himself
had planned to join the mission team to
Afghanistan last year but eventually did not, due
to family obligations.
The church
newsletter confirms that Park is in the US,
visiting churches in Los Angeles, New York,
Atlanta, Houston and San Francisco, to name a few,
to seek their support and also prayers for the
Afghanistan mission in which two of his church
members, including the associate pastor Bae
Hyung-kyu, were slain by the Taliban, the hardline
Islamic militants.
In his letter to the
parishioners, shown in the church newsletter, Park
says: "I apologize for not being present at the
church for three weeks. I am making this trip
because the Lord gave me a challenge on
Afghanistan." Park continues: "When I think about
the heart of God who let the two people's blood be
shed in Afghanistan, I am also inclined to think
that it's the same heart of God facing me and
Saemmul Church as well as all the churches in this
age. I regard serving Afghanistan as the mission
task for all Christians today."
The letter
exudes an air of calmness. It is, however, more
alarming than comforting because, although put in
measured weasel words, the embedded determination
for Afghan mission unmistakably is felt by
readers.
Observers believe that although
Park made apologetic gestures and toned down his
evangelic tone during the hostage crisis to secure
the release of the hostages, his principled stance
on overseas mission hasn't abated at all. Rather,
some believe the crisis led him to be firmly
convinced that there is a "meaning" behind the
tragedy. After all, the tragedy wasn't a chance
event. It was God's divine providence, the logic
goes.
"Among the many [foreign] people in
Afghanistan at that time, the reason that Saemmul
church people became the hostages is a work of
divine providence. Afghanistan is the place where
our church members' blood was shed. It's a mission
place God has designated for us. I will serve more
for Afghanistan from now on," Park said in a
sermon.
The Saemmul church team wasn't the
only missionary group in Afghanistan at the time
of the abduction. Five other South Korean mission
groups were there in the week the abduction
occurred, numbering to some 180.
Park's
sermon reached its climax when he said: "We need
3,000 more Bae Hyung-kyus in the future,"
referring to one of the slain hostages, adding
"our missionary zeal shouldn't be dampened because
of this incident. Rather, we should devote
ourselves more passionately to the mission".
This provocative sermon generated such
repercussions and upset so many people in Korea
that the government stepped in to delete the
contents from the Internet completely, following a
request from family members of the group that had
been kidnapped. Park also said his church "plans
to send more missionaries to Afghanistan once the
[South Korean] government's travel ban is lifted".
South
Korea's audacious Christian
zeal Following the Afghan incident,
much discussion was devoted to South Korea's
Christianity and its very active overseas mission.
The country, which accepted Protestant
Christianity in the late 19th century and
Catholicism a century prior to that, is the
world's second-largest source of Christian
missionaries, after the US. Although traditionally
a Buddhist country, in its recent history it has
had three presidents who were elders of Christian
churches, including recently elected President Lee
Myung-bak.
The Saemmul Church, with a
weekly congregation attendance of 3,500 people,
has 50 missionaries abroad, including in the
Middle East, Indonesia, India and China. Yoido
Full Gospel Church in Seoul, the world's largest
congregation with registered attendants of more
than half a million people, has 634 missionaries
overseas.
Some obvservers point out that
the reason the killing of the two missionaries in
Afghanistan has not dented this enthusiasm for
overseas work isn't necessarily a uniquely Korean
feature. Rather, they point out, the answer should
be found within Christian teaching. For example,
it has been part of a long Christian tradition to
believe that Christians will be regarded as
"foolish" in the eyes of non-believers and will be
"persecuted", as the Bible mentions in 1
Corinthians 1:23: "We preach Christ crucified, to
Jews a stumbling block, and to Gentiles
foolishness, but to those who are the called, both
Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and
the wisdom of God."
By doctrine,
Christians also feel that they are "called to
preach" their beliefs to all people, including
Muslims, even if they know that doing so will
offend some of those they preach to. But then,
they are vindicated by the Bible, which "assures"
them that "it is good to please God than to please
men".
The Christians' feeling of
indebtedness for redemption, their moral
obligation to spread the gospel, and the
expectation of being misunderstood by people,
which even leads to death, all work as a powerful
psychological tool to keep them "brave". Thus,
Park of Saemmul Church could say, "If you see the
slew of criticism upon the church and think it as
a crisis, you are mistaken. Even 2,000 years ago,
wherever the Good News went, criticism and death
also followed."
The statement was
disapproved of by non-Christians in South Korea,
who criticized Park as not repentant about the
fatal hostages incident and "lacking common
sense". For Park, all these "misunderstandings"
were to be expected.
After being released
from the Taliban and upon arrival in South Korea,
Yoo Kyung-shik, 55, the oldest of the hostages,
said: "Now we resolve to live a life that meets
public expectations." That remains to be seen.
After returning from the US, Park plans to carry
out prayer meetings for Afghanistan in South
Korea. "I plan to hold as many meetings for
Afghanistan as possible when I return to South
Korea. I expect your prayer and participation," he
said in the letter to the church members. "It's
time to be creative to anticipate what the outcome
of such meetings will be. South Korea definitely
doesn't want to see a "second Afghan crisis".
The Saemmul Church newsletter lists eight
major prayer topics in the order of importance.
The first reads: "Please pray for those
missionaries and their families who work abroad
and bless their mission."
Sunny Lee is a
writer. A native of South Korea, Lee is a graduate
of Harvard University and Beijing Foreign Studies
University. He can be reached at
boston.sunny@gmail.com
(Copyright 2008
Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
contact us about sales, syndication and republishing .)
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
