The Face of a Religious China

"Grace means that a life is not assessed for its faults but by a love of God that overwhelms all those faults"  -- Rev. Verity A. Jones

Today, around the world many more are coming to the teaching of the Christ. Forming a community, a Church that stands for all people in solidarity with suffering humanity, and engages peoples of all cultures and religions, is the Church teaching of the Gospels (bible stories). She stands with principle. All peoples the world over, want something to believe in, regardless of their faith heritage, be its origins East or West.

Jesuit Father Myles Sheehan, member of the same Jesuit Christian community as Pope Francis, recounts the Jesuit community experiences since their recent arrival in China. He writes in US Catholic magazine that there were 200 persons attending at a recent prayer meeting; this scene is being repeated every day throughout the country. On Sundays throughout China it occurs in multiplicity. There are now thousands of churches in China, representing all Christian denominations alongside the native faiths of that land.

What is becoming clear is that the number of Christians in China is growing. With the incorporation of Hong Kong into China since 1997, including its free prevalence of all faiths, non-native faiths are now taking hold within the mainland. In fact says Sheehan, there are now more regular church attenders in China today than in all of Europe. China saw more than 20,000 Catholic Christian baptisms in 2011 according to the Church in China.The call to love your neighbor is taking hold.

There are also what Sheehan calls "cultural Christians," many young and educated persons who believe but do not belong. They are a growing group, in many ways coming to the forefront of bringing the Good News to all parts of China. They play a significant role in the future of their nation, carrying with them the ideas, values and philosophies of the Christ.

Their growing Church is a place which holds for her guiding principles, an all inclusive, all-encompassing view, without walls or buildings nor ideologies that omit the value of the dignity of a person. In this modern, industrializing world the Church forms a harbor, a counter-force for harmony, and a home.

This Church of China must stand for all; its aims must be lived, not merely proclaimed through work for charitable causes and advocacy for social justice. In other parts of Asia, this mission takes its fulfillment in solidarity with the Minjung of South Korea, the Dalit of India and the Burakumin of Japan, for example.

While the marginalized in Asia are not all Christians, the indigenous faiths of the region share same or similar deep concerns for Asia. As for the Church in Asia, she stands alongside others with a message of not just a church in Asia but the Church in Asia, uniquely representing her community. After all, building community is at the heart of relationships.

The Prayer of the Holy Spirit

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful with the fire of your love.

The Prodigal Son
The Bible tells a story of the prodigal son, or lost son. Prodigal because though this son left his father's house, when he returned, his father spent lavishly, even wastefully celebrating this child's return. The origins of this word, prodigy-prodigal, are interesting. In the old English language, prodigy carried the usual meaning of 'omen,' a portentous event.
So while the particular Bible story tells of two brothers, one obedient and one flagrant and a father desperate beyond reason to reunite with the child who has left, spurning his family. The message is clear: once lost, now found.
There is a documentary recently produced by American Public Broadcasting System (PBS) about the lives of 12 people whose origins go back to the protestant christian sect, commonly known as the Amish, a community which believes in community first and always, as a necessary means of witness. They do sometimes nurture the lost souls who see to a way beyond the gates of their community into the wider American community. Leaving is not often welcomed by the Amish. Sometimes they are "shunned."
And yet when they do this, their family may still treat them as the Bible instructs, hoping, looking and waiting for their return, a prodigal child. The family sets a place at meal times each and every day their loved one is gone, to remind themselves of the mercy of the Christ when dealing with a 'lost sheep.' They, as singer Phil Collins sings, Hold On My Heart.

Parents, friends, and others in their Amish community remain apart from the ones who leave. Often they fear hell or damnation, as they understand it, if one lives among the wider society and their materialistic ways. The Amish, you see, highly value plain, simple living. They believe that the clutter of 'stuff' gets in their way and their conversations with God. So they eschew common materialism for the favor of the riches of creation, honest work and community.

The Amish, a breakaway Christian sect formed by followers of Roman Catholic Priest, Father Menno Simons in Switzerland during the counter Reformation. Their faith-ways led them to the relative religious liberty of America and a place in William Penn's Pennsylvania.
They are devout Christians, keeping the way of discipleship before their eyes; their way is independent with minimal hierarchy, no church buildings or seminaries, and a desire to baptize those who come forth willingly. Thus children in these families are church members if they choose it when they come of age.

In another story, the Bible tells us of a certain shepherd and a flock of sheep. When one lamb goes missing, there is an all out search to locate and return the lamb to its flock. This story, unlike the Prodigal Son is without comparisons. There is simply the fact of a lost sheep, now found.
In both stories however, we can take away the meaning that each of us is with value, each has his own importance, irrespective of any other thing we may or may not do in the world, because we are the love and the product of the Creator himself, who has loved us into existence, and means to sustain us with the very same love, the love poured down on us by the Holy Spirit.
So to you, I say, 'Amen, Amen. Be on your way.'