Friendship in Fenghuang (continued)
Later, Robert Mooney helped me find some more information about Father Jeremiah McNamara, C.P., St. Paul of the Cross Province from the internet. Through the Chinese priest Father GAO, I was able to contact Father Rob Carbonneau at the Passionist Historical Archives in New Jersey, who helped me locate a couple of photos of Father MacNamara and some of his articles in a column called "The Passionists in China" in The Sign Magazine. Born on April 2, 1898 in Philadelphia, Father McNamara attended St. Francis Assisi School there and the Passionist Preparatory Seminary in Baltimore, Maryland. From 1924 until 1945, he was a China missionary in Human. He died of heart failure in Jamaica, New York on June 3, 1971 after three years of extended illness.
In his articles, Father McNamara showed great dedication and devotion to his cause during a very difficult time and in a very remote and impoverished area of Human where people lived in the dark shadow of atrocious war, deadly diseases and lawless bandits. But first of all, he was a very kind and compassionate person. Writing back to the readers of The Sign Magazine from his post in Human, China, Father McNamara describes the bleak condition of the time. "To be sure, we are not in the battle zone, but we cannot but feel the effects of the terrible struggle which is still going on. The drain on the man power, the finances, the morale of the country is far-reaching. Prices are soaring" ("Sister Joseph's Homecoming," The Sign Magazine, 17 April 1938:546).
Father McNamara continues in his article to inform his readers about the crimes of the bandits. "Langton, Supu, [Xupu] Fenghwang [Fenghuang], and the whole Marang valley are affected by these lawless bands who have taken occasion of their country's distress to harass the people. Perhaps, in the absence of the regular troops, the country folk themselves will eventually find a way to put a stop to the banditry" (Ibid, 547).
At the end of the article, Father McNamara pleaded to his readers for help: "We ask our friends not to fail us in this hour of need. We ask for more prayers for peace, and for more help for our material wants. Unless we are forced out, we shall continue at our posts... I would like to remind our readers that, though we suffer, these good people to whose spiritual welfare we are devoting our lives, suffer still more. Few of them make the headlines. They live and die unknown to the world. But they know pain and poverty and heartache. It does not make their anguish less that they are not vocal.
"They are God's children, just as truly as we are. In a real sense we are all our brother's keepers. If in the grace of Faith and the abundance of this life's goods we have no thought of those less fortunate, surely our Divine Lord will ask a reckoning. ...I am sure, however, that it is not merely with the thought of recompense that our Catholics give to the missions. They see in their afflicted and needy fellowmen the image of their Maker. It is in His name that we beg for your help. Please do not fail us." (Ibid, 547)
During our long finding journey, we also met Mr. Yao Chunsheng who heard about the purpose of our trip and came from another county (Xupu) and volunteered to assist us at Fenghuang. He is a native of Yuanling and when he was a child, an American Catholic priest cured his disease and saved his life.
My father tried to find Ye Shidou by writing letters to Fenghuang, but all his correspondence was like a stone dropped in the bottomless ocean. He was certainly grateful to finally find the church, and see Father McNamara's pictures, and read his writings found in the Passionist Archives.
My father writes: "The victory of Christianity lies in its spiritual power. The true salvation is the self-salvation of the soul. During the development of capitalism, material gains blinded people's eyes in many western countries while the Christian spirit has been the spiritual pillar to purify the souls and provide social stability. It would by no means be an exaggeration to say that Christianity created the Western civilization. Christianity does not only belong to the West, it also should be the cultural heritage of all the human kind. During the East and the West cultural exchanges, if the westerners rejected the culture of Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism of the East, we people from the East would definitely find it ridiculous. In the same light, if we reject Christianity, would we not be very ridiculous also?"
My father was very pleased to see that Catholic culture has its followers in Western Hunan. The Chinese church puts its emphasis on the rural and poor areas. It is definitely the right path. However, my father thinks that the Chinese church should also try its best to deepen the merge and mutual assimilation the Catholic culture and the Chinese culture and bring this merge and assimilation to a much higher level. Only in this way will Catholic culture take root in China.
During our trip, our guides took us to see the Southern Great Wall along the border between Fenghuang County and Tongren County in Guizhou Province. This meandering wall was built to prevent the armed conflicts between the Han people and the Miao Ethnic minority people and to maintain a comparatively stable peaceful environment and economic and cultural exchanges between the two ethnic groups. Unlike the world famous Northern Great Wall of China, the Southern Great Wall of China has been unknown to the majority of the Chinese until very recently. The Southern Great Wall has lost its military defense function and become a historical testimony for the merge and mutual assimilation of different cultures through conflicts. I sincerely believe that in a similar way, the cultures of China and the United States will have a very bright future through merge and mutual assimilation.
I would like to borrow a poem by Emily Dickinson to eulogize all the American friends like Father McNamara who helped Chinese people in their time of need:
If I can stop one Heart from breaking
I shall not live in vain
If I can ease one Life the Aching
Or cool one Pain
Or help one fainting Robin
Unto his Nest again
I shall not live in Vain.
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