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2008 Report 1
from Hong Kong JLSchmalen@AOL.Com September, 2008
The course on Conflict has a very large attendance. The Diaconal Ministry and Pastoral Care are tutorials to prepare our Batak student to teach those when she returns to Sumatra's Deaconess School and to prepare a Doctor of Ministry student to return to Viet Nam to teach Pastoral Care. The course on church planting is for 10 students from other countries in Asia who will return to establish new congregations. It will be interesting to watch this take place over the next couple years after they go home and try it out. Pastoral Theology is taught over the internet for a Doctor of Ministry student who is unable to get out of Thailand right now because of the upheaval in the government there. Other Faculty members from the ELCA this semester are: Dr. Ted Zimmerman, Dr. John LeMond and Dr. James Bergquist, the latter also being a volunteer. In addition we have the former Bishop of Sweden, Dr. Jonas Jonson. Two young ELCA people teach English: Katrina Vigen and Ryan Smart. On the faculty from Germany is Dr. Gabi Hoerschelmann whose ordained husband coordinates the English publications and the international students. The former Malaysian Lutheran Bishop Voo heads up the interns hip program. He was one of my D.Min. students some years ago. There are an additional 14 faculty who are Chinese. A Large Regional, 95 Year Old, School LTS is a large regional seminary with 325 full time day students. They come from the following countries: Indonesia, Philippines, Taiwan, Cambodia, Laos, Viet Nam, Hong Kong, Myanmar, Malaysia, Canada, Nepal, Macau, Canada, Germany and Mainland China (Cultural Christians). In the dining room someone sneaked up behind me and put her hands over my eyes taunting me to guess who it was. It was a former student of a number of years ago named Sophia whom I advised in her research here at LTS. A "cultural Christian" which means she is not a believer, Sophia participates in our daily worship and Sunday liturgies. She came from a large Communist University in Mainland to do research on Luther's theology of justification, with which I helped her. She has returned again for 3 months to serve as a research assistant at Tau Fong Shan. Sophia is brilliant and we developed a nice friendship while she was here the last time. She looked me up to tell me with great joy that she is now a believer and wants to be baptized. Even though she is Chinese, she calls me her "Ompung," Batak for grandfather. We have 8 new students from Mainland this semester who are also cultural Christians, 7 women and one man. Sending these young intellectuals back into China with a deep respect for Christianity is bound to pay off. And about a third of them return as believers! A Really Interesting Book on China On the flight over, I read a really interesting book on China, Out of Mao's Shadow by Philip P. Pan, Simon & Schuster. It is by a Chinese American reporter for the Washington Post and was published just last June. Pan was stationed in Beijing for 8 years and has written very interesting narrative accounts of the Cultural Revolution, the Tiananmen Square Massacre, the barbaric enforcement of the one child policy, the manipulation by party bosses of the courts. the horrible Abourong system (how Chinese handled the problem of street people) and of most interest to me because I was here, the SARS epidemic cover up. Vietnamese Students It is encouraging to see the number of Vietnamese students now at LTS. The communist government has eased up on the Christian Church a little and Seminaries and Bible Schools are being built. A former school teacher, a middle aged man in our Doctor of Ministry program, will be returning to teach a subject little known in Viet Nam: Pastoral Care and Counseling. When he arrived here he found that the only offering in that area was in the Chinese language. It is the same story for a student from Myanmar. So I have Trin Chien (Barnabas) and Salai, Yaw Ba for a tutorial in Pastoral Care. Many Christians in Viet Nam are aligned with the Missionary Alliance Church in the USA. Reunion with Former Students In a meaningful reunion of former students very soon after my arrival, I met on Hong Kong Island with 14 from the 2004 graduating class. We do that each year and it usually turns into a therapy session when they all describe their joys and pain. After graduation from this seminary each must serve in a church for at least 3 years before the congregation can ask that the Synod ordain them. It is a very complicated system for approval which involves the local congregation as well as a Synod committee. One woman there had been approved by the congregation and her ordination was announced after which the Synod said no. This was a very painful Òloss of face.Ó The female candidates for ordination seem to me to be treated like slaves for those three years. The surprise of many theology students around the world is that the ministry is very, very hard work which also plays into this picture as well. A Side trip to Sumatra I took a 5 day trip to Sumatra to attend the STT-HKBP seminary graduation where I also teach. Ronald, one of my Cucu, graduated #1 in a class of 71. He has applied to do a Masters here in Hong Kong. I have asked the ELCA to grant him a scholarship if we would pay his 3 round trip airfares.We are the same plan for a graduate of the Balige Deaconess School named Eleven. Also at graduation the faculty bestowed upon me the title of Blessed Professor. I have been Affiliated Faculty there for years. Evidently this is something more and a great Batak honor. That evening they threw quite a party celebrating the honor. We danced and danced the TorTor to Gongdong music with tuned drums and other native instruments. A visiting German woman there was one of my students in the Augustana Hochschule at Neuendettelsau, Germany. These international connections happen more and more and I delight in them. Major Cover up in Mainland It is the same old story again. When the SARS epidemic hit some years ago the Mainland Chinese denied that there was a problem. Even when hundreds were dying in Beijing, they announced that there was no problem. Finally a medical doctor exposed the cover-up and was jailed for doing so. Currently over 60,000 babies are very sick from baby formula which has the chemical melamine added to make it test high in protein. It is also in powdered milk here in Hong Kong. Each morning's news brings new info about the tainted milk in China. As of today about a dozen have died from the contaminated formula which causes kidney stones and damage. The government knew about it for at least a month before someone exposed the problem. Indications are that they did not want to admit the problem until after the Olympics. This is the same additive which killed many of our US pets a couple years ago. A Satisfying Project Last week I met Dr. Wong, Hon Fai, whose English name is Solomon, who attended our Berkeley seminary for a time as an exchange student. He has just begun his teaching here in a Hong Kong Seminary. Some years ago I was able to arrange for Solomon, after being my student at this seminary, to go to the Augustana Hochschule in Germany (where I also teach) to work on a Doctorate with my good friend, professor Dr. Wolfgang Stegemann. Solomon received his Ph.D. Magna cum Laude last summer and has returned here to teach. His wife, Cheung Chung Kwan “Ackie,” remains in Erlangen, Germany working on her Doctorate in Education. What a gift these two will be to Theological Education in Hong Kong and China! Jerry Schmalenberger |
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2008 Report 2
from Hong Kong
Sompheng's story |
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2008 Report 3 from Hong Kong November 2008 Hy and Van's Viet Nam Story They met in a Bible class he was teaching and she, five years younger, a student. The romance soon blossomed and they were married in May of 2007. Both worked for a Korean Missionary. This Vietnamese couple are now at LTS, Hong Kong. Huynh Thi-Thuy-Van, having graduated from the University, is working on a Master of Divinity in order to return to her country to teach in her church's seminary. Because he is the son of a Christian pastor in the Evangelical Church of Viet Nam and has received two Master's in Theology in Korea, Nguyen Trvong-Hy is now working on a Doctor of Theology. It will take three years for both of them to complete their academic program. They will be very valuable assets for the re-emerging church in Viet Nam which still must endure many hardships under the Communist government. Hy's father studied, and was ordained, before the war and continues to serve as a pastor in the church which does not allow the ordination of women. Van, a petite and vivacious woman with sparkling eyes and personality to match, is in my class on Human Relationships and Congregational Conflict Management and explains that she is content to be a female "preacher" without ordination, which is permitted. At lunch one day Van told me that when she was a child and her family converted to Christianity, her grandfather disowned all of them including his own son! Neither are sure just who provides their scholarships but they will be speaking soon in a church in Hong Kong which evidently must have provided it for at least this year. When asked about their experiences here, they made interesting observances. Hy stated that he wasn't used to the more formal Lutheran liturgies and worship. Van said that she was shocked at the way faculty gave many different opinions and then she had to decide! In Viet Nam, they just followed whatever their Pastor taught. Bergquist, our LTS TreasureAfter serving in the parish ministry, James Bergquist and his wife Lorrie went to India as missionaries for The American Lutheran Church. After their term there he became the academic dean of Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Columbus, Ohio. Then it was on to head up American Missions for the TALC continuing on in that leadership capacity in the new merged ELCA. From there "Dr. James" as students at LTS call him, moved to lead the Lutheran Bible Institute in Seattle which became Trinity Lutheran College under his leadership. He retired in 2000 and signed up for the ELCA's Global Mission Volunteer program. Under that auspiceses he has taught 9 semesters at LTS, 3 in India, and one as interim Pastor in New Zealand. Having graduated from Luther College and Luther Seminary and receiving his PhD from the University of Southern California, he has specialized in New Testament and Missions. A large man with an even larger heart, his fatherly concern for students and expertise in his field have been invaluable to LTS faculty and students alike. President Lam, Tak Ho calls him, "Our LTS treasure." Visitors from China: The Three Self Church in China (self supporting, self governing and self propagating)Oct 21 we had a large delegation of Christian educators, Pastors and Seminary professors from mainland China come here for an afternoon visit. Some were former LTSstudents and my acquaintances from working in Bugi and Guangzhou while teaching inHong Kong. Here is what I learned about the government approved "3-self" church in Mainland China: The statistic from some years ago was that there were 16 million church members. Now they say20 million. And the believers are much younger on average. 35% have a college degree. There are 55,000 registered churches which are always overflowing. There is a dire shortage of Pastors, but to compensate have additional 5.5 million presbyters and 150 thousand volunteers. They have published 2 057 million Bibles. (3 million a year). Mainland has 18 seminaries with a total enrollment of 1,800. The challenge is for better educated Pastors who can teach their congregations true Christianity as many still follow the superstitions of their ancestors like sleeping on a Bible to get rid of their head ache. Melamine is still with usNow it is in eggs from the Mainland. The toxic substance which killed many pets in the US and babies in Hong Kong and Mainland has now been found in our eggs. Evidently farmer's price paid to them for chicken feed is based on the protein level the feed has in it. So, not unlike the problem with the baby formula, they are adding melamine which makes the protein content look high. Here at the seminary, Tuesday is "eggday." I think I will pass. Fruit money debateThe hot debate in Hong Kong right now is how much "fruit money" the elderly should receiveeach month. (Fruit money is the pension paid to old people.) The chief administrator of HongKong announced that he would not raise the present amount; and, that there would be a test to determine if they really needed any. The citizens really demonstrated. And the administrator backed down and said there would be no test and the the allowance would be raised to Hong Kong 1,000 per month. That is about US $130. Did we make a difference? Because I will return to the US to my American wife on November 15th and I am presently going through class evaluations and composing of my report to the Global Missions of the ELCA, I am asking the question that I always ask: did I make a difference by being here this semester? Perhaps you can judge: - There will be two students from Laos, two from Hong Kong, one from Nepal, one from Hong Kong and one from Myanmar who will return to their country to try planting a new church. - There is a new student who is presently working in an institution for the disadvantaged in Sumatra who has begun her Master's degree in Pastoral Care at STT-HKBP. And two new Batak students will begin their post graduate work here next September. One is from the Deaconess school and one from the Seminary. - There are 3 Hong Kong Pastors who have suffered from conflict in their congregations who feel that they are ready to try again. In the same class there are an additional 20 who we hope are equipped to handle congregational conflict (some better than others) in their respective ministries and 12 different countries. Four of them are now prepared to teach this subject in their seminaries. - There are at least 24 former students, now Pastors in Hong Kong, of many different denominations, for whom I have provided support and encouragement. - There are 13 post graduate students who have been exposed to a different style of teaching and learning and will serve on different faculties: Myanmar, Indonesia, Philippines and Viet Nam. - 16 students from 12 different countries will return to their churches having experienced the Martin Luther "Table Talk" style of mentoring. They have been exposed to a variety of theologies, worship practices, cultures and strong opinions...including the Lutheran faith. - A seminary professor from Viet Nam and one from Myanmar will return to their Bible schools ready to introduce a new-to-them subject, Pastoral Care and Counseling. - A young Deaconess from Sumatra, Indonesia will have finished her study of Diaconal Ministry and take her place on the faculty of the HKBP Balige Deaconess School. (I also learned so much from this tutorial) - A pastor from Thailand, who could not get out of his country, will continue his work on his D.Min. program, thanks to my work with him over the Internet, so as to teach Practical Theology after he graduates from here. - The first female Pandita to have a Th.D in the 3.5 million member HKBP Indonesian church will graduate June 7 and return to teach at the HKBP Seminary. And another Batak student will return with his Th.D degree in New Testament to teach in Medan, Indonesia. Still a third willreturn equipped to organize and run a theological library at the same seminary. - And an Indonesia Fellowship here in Hong Kong of about 250 domestic servants will have heard the Gospel preached in a narrative style based on solid theology. Their Pastor has received a good dose of homiletics and dogmatics as well. - This seminary has also learned about transparency and bylaws and faculty handbooks and the need to spread the decision making power among many. - And the difference between teaching to accomplish good test results and teaching for learning in order to be best eqquipped to respond to their call from God to ministry.
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