NEWS ANALYSIS/OMNIS TERRA - Missionaries in Taiwan: "Like dwarfs on the shoulders of giants"

Wednesday, 23 October 2019 missionary animation   missionaries   evangelization  

In Taiwan, more than the "mission of the Church", it is better to refer to it as "Church of the mission". In fact, in a place that is so "ignorant" to Christ, it is nearly impossible to consider the mission as something extrinsic or as a duty. It is much more natural to consider it an identity that I live with.
The Republic of China known to most as Formosa or Taiwan, is a tropical island in Southeast Asia, East of China, not much bigger than Sicily, with mountains that reach 4000 meters and about 23 million inhabitants. Chinese land, culture and history contribute to the complex political history of Taiwan, making the island of Formosa as per its ancient Portuguese name, one of the most complex cases in modern international politics. Its constitution maintains the old name Republic of China (R.O.C.) born from the ashes of the millenary empire that disintegrated in 1912. At the end of the Chinese Civil War (1945-1949) fought between Mao Ze Dong’s communist troops and General Chiang Kai Shek’s nationalist troops, the latter, already defeated found refuge on the island of Formosa, and declared Taipei the new capital of the Republic of China, while he attempted to regain control over the territories lost to the communist troops. On the other hand, the Beijing government has never stopped claiming its rights on this “rebel island”, turning the slogan “free Taiwan” into a mantra of its political rhetoric (…)
The Catholic Church has been present on the island for little over 150 years, although the first missionaries arrived on the island of Formosa in the XVI century. We are a small minority with just over 1% of Catholics and a total 4% of Christians (...)



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