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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Wingham Advance-Times, 1984-01-05, Page 12PI .;t e a.: e s rind .d�lnth-foulded when iterreal- . hunsali #r0111 the Society of It was on fin P • >� day spialq�about a long-c,�d �axn- carni in 1635 &D. The Clio- Perm `ball !Sung 110. had iced that Nestorian mission- Jesus and had withdraWn his fo tewand to the end of their it ' on and orderer . to be crated as fax as the terminus fearful. of its organizatorial riled in his ' of the silk route, the great strength and power. The d.eaamin- and. ancient city of Singanfu. Jesuits had, -at times, threat - id ski pri- irr his heart he must have ened to impose their ese workmen were looking approved of the chril�stian re-• arms and fugitives had pene- support from it, perhaps hours of toil: They had been taught and p)rea working strenuously all day empire` after he 1 in he big:hole they were dig, . ed it personally ging in'the hard ground. The` . vate sun had been hot all those:. An ea been exulting about his dis- schemes and will, heedless (istia'n Nestor-' covert'. of . the political conse- long hoursof lakiAri, only in- 4tiii -mpg,tol�rat knownas How thrilled ,his , stipervi- quences. terrupted by a few moments . Bishop..dam,. *,*cording "to • sors in Europe would, be to In Europe the news from of rest when.Bierhad.been : the :iit'scriptier had been know that in ancient China Singangu was hailed with drinking their tea and eating with -the- emperor in his pri- an .earlier Christianity . had scorn and Father Trigault their sparse lunch. Now they vate apartments: end had blossomed. It was apparent was called an imposter 'and were .cooking forward to the counselled the migii, tyyruler. that Christianity had existed the stone slab of Singanfu a evening, to spend their hard- It must havis haveseemed to.this for a long time in China in fake. The incredible news of earned money in the House Christian preacher 'that those early days. The stone the discovery was consider - of Dreams as the opium dens great things were promised had been erected in the year ed untrustworthy and here were poetically called. for the future when Tai The hole they were digging Tsung assented to the was to serve as a cellar for a preaching of Christianity in new house for the foreign de- China. vils whom the Chinese It must have; appeared to Emperor had graciously al- him that Christianity was on lowed to settle in his domin- the verge of sweeping China, ion. The diggers could not and, perhaps, all Asia. understand why these And why not? Had strangers — "the big -nosed Christianity not conquered ones" they called them — most of the nations of the would want to live like rats West by this time, as well as partially underground, for the Near East, Persia, houses with cellars were al- Arabia, much of Central most unknoyn in China. Asia and India? The future of The workers were ready to Christianity must have look - down their, tools for the day ed bright indeedto: this when the spade of one of Christian priest who,. coun- them suddenly struck what - selled Tai F Tsung. His opti- appeared to be a large, hard mism was understandable. object, obviously of stone. - Everybody was surprised CATHEDRAL BUILT when, by a common effort, Father Trigault and the .an enormous stone slab, Chinese experts went to.' eight feet long and more than ,search the genealogies of the three feet wide, was pried imperial dynasties who had loose and stood upright. reigned in China. They found that Tai Tsung had indeed been a real-life emperor; his reign had spannedthe years from A.D. 626 to 649 and he had been an outstanding per- sonality. The stone `spoke of STRANGE MARKINGS The Chinese workers, al- though they could not write or read themselves, perceiv- ed the signs and geometrical figures on the slab were not mese randgm scratches. One of the men hurried to a near- by house where the foreign- ers from the far West were quartered for the time being and informed their leader, Father Trigault of their dis- covery. Father Trigault had been living for many years in Asia. He had dwelt here in A.D. 781as it expressly the matter rested for almost stated, and it, had been 300 years and the Stone of -meant as a memorial to the Singanfu was forgotten. earlier spread. -of Christian- ity in China, beginning its TRUTH CONFIRMED triumphal march during the ' We know now that indeed. reign of Tai Tsung, brie and a the inscription on this stone half centuries earlier. spoke the truth. We know al- FatherTrigault'scuriosity so that Nestorian clerics was greatly roused, for he from Syria and Persia,in the himself and the Roman centuries following the per - Catholic Church of the West secutions of the Nestorians, in general, were very much travelled eastward to China/ interested in the history and We know some of these past of the Christian chur- preachers by name, bot that ches of the East, even if is practically all we' know these . churches were, in about them. some ways, to be condemned About Bishop Adam, head of the . Chinese, diocese cen- tered on Singanfu, where he preached and established the .especially when they pour first Christian Church in the over the deliberations and country, we know next to no - decisions of the Councils of thing except his name. Ephesus in A.D. 431 and The Nestorian Church Chalcedon in A.D. 451, where must have been a mission- Nestoriarism was dealt with, ary-minded one, for its sane - will be lucky if they gain a tuaries and buildings soon perfects insight into the is- appeared across China. At sues. They must -be very the same time Nestorian keen off mind indeed to be. Church communities could able to fully comprehend the be found all along the route definitions put forward about through west_ and central Christian churches in many points under disputation. Asia, which the Nestorian places and mentioned that in preachers and missionaries A.D. 639 a great cathedral Personal and political far- had followed on their way to had been built in Singanfu, at tors not infregeently played file far East. This route — the express command of the a role during the council's and probably . there was emperor himself. deliberations. , more than one had follow- Hgi1►!ev merest in the ed -the ancient caravan roads :The stone they were study- Church of C e'-iast had -al- 'which had, • long before the. Ing was adorned with an ela-ways remai ed strong in the ': birth of Christ, linked the far: borately-worked cross, West during the many ages East to the lands of the West. chiseled above the lettered there had sheen no contact After more than two cen- inscription. Father Trigault with them Rumors had al -.i as heretical and unorthodox. Prospective students of the history of- the early Church, new, enough church histo t es' of witnessing to tris nganfu since the 16th"ce#i :. �" � �� ways penetrted• to and. ci>`'� - Chi'istiai� �'tiies"s`age;'''Nes-: ry had turned into.the next realize that this cross wash cfifateil' iri 1Eiirope about le- C nanism received what es and in this year, 1625;. not of the shape and form, fa ndary Christian � poten- pears to have been a mortal throughthe benevolence of seen in Roman Catholic wor- fates and bishopsin the un- blow in China. InA.D, 845 all ' China's emperor he had been ship. � � N'as also different known lands far to the east. foreign religions, those allowed .to enlarge and ex- - from the cross of.the Byzan- A vague memory of those ;which did not have their ori - tine church although more nand his mission buildings. early days when Christianity gin in China itself,. were similar to it. Father Society of It belonged g apparently,.enjoyed recogni- banned and their .priests, Father Trigault concluded to he Society of Jesus, more ' tion in those remote parts of and bishopsfor popularly known as the Or- that it must be .- and indeed the world had always linger preachersthe large part, were put to der of Jesuits. In the context it was --a Nestorian- cross. the Euro Father Trigault possessed Pe. - death. The Christian religion of efforts world-wide su ts,ssio hr scone knowledge Of church ' ' was proscribed, from then on the Jesuits,oFatherdaffairs of the early fifth cen- IMPORTANT DISCOVERY and those faithful, who had Trigault had volunteered as a missionary to China and tury. A large group of Thus the news of the did.- escaped with their lives, kept found himself far away from Christians, called Nes- coyer .. ofd the stone of to the shadows. All Christian home in the heart of China. torians, after. Nestorius, at Singanfu was considered, of churches were levelled to the Singanfu, had been, since the one time bishop of Byzan- great importance by Father ground and the bishops slain. dawn of history, the ter- tium, had been persecuted,' Trigaylt. He informed his su- * minus of the most important mainly for their rejection of periors in Europe about his" caravan route to the far=off the cult of Mary, which had findings in an excited' letter lands in the West with their gained much ground since' containing ,the irrefutable pale skinned, long nosed the Couneil of Nicea in A.D. facts about the existence of a 3'25 p�l�• Nestorian Church in China Nestorius sand his followers from c. A.D. 630 to at least; STUDENT OF CHINA had strongly objected to this A.D. 781, the year 'the stone Here in Singanfu, situated veneration of the Virgin had been erected, as shown at about equal distances Mary, which maintained, to by the date inscribed on it. from' the mighty rivers of put It simply, that Mary was Father-Trigault, however;, China, the Ithangho - in the the mother of God. could not-iiave chosen a north and the Yangste Kiang T more inopportune time to towards the south, Father • FLED EASTWARD send his report about the dis- Trigault had picked up quite Nestorius had lost the en- covert' of the stone of a bit of knowledge about suing conflict within the Singanfu and the'fornier ex - China's past while ---at the church. He himself had died istence of a Christian coin - same time acquainting him- ..in exile and his adherents ' munity-ih China to, Jesuit , self with: the Chinese script had been persecuted and headquarters in Europe. and its development fromhounded in the eastern part The order of the Jesuits the•,eerliest times. of the Roman Empire. Many had .fallen from favor, even With, help of Chinese Nestorians had fled to the- in the Catholic countries. Ob- scholars'Trigault was. able to east, to Persia; India and be- . viously; in the Protestant. deci hes~ the inscription on yond. Theyhad spread' to lands of Europe they were what is called,. "The Stone of hina durng 4hepperiods mistrusted and even feared° Singanfu". m when the caravan routes for their zealous efforts to He was astonished to learn throillgh. the Tarim basin in bring back into Catholicism that the inscription spoke of Central Asia had riot been its wandering Protestant an ancient Christianity, once ref widely spread "over large parts of China: The stone blocked by Mongol nomad sons and daughters. But tribes. more than one Catholic Father Trigault was prince had disassociated crossroads Published ever'y', Wednesday by Wenger Bros. Limited as the lifestyle and entertainment section in The Listowel Banner. The Wingham Advance - Times, The Mount Forest Confederate and The Milverton Sun. Members of the 'Canadian Community' Newspaper Association. OntarioCommunity Newspaper Association, and the Ontario Press'Council. Controlled distri- bution in Elmira, Palmerston, Harriston, Brussels, Millbank. Newton. Atwood, Clifford, Drayton. Wallenstein. Moorefield and Arthur. Display and Classified advertising deadline .— 5:00 'p.m. Thursday week, prior to publication date. ' , • Advertising and Production The Listowel Banner 188 ,Wallace Ave: N., P.O. tiox 97, Listowel, Ont. N4W 3A2 Accounting and Billing The Wingham Advance -Times Josephine St,.. 0:0. Box 390, Wingham. Ont. NOG 2W0 The Listowel Banner 291.1660. The Wingham Advance -Times 35-7-2320 The Mount -Forest Confederate 323.1550. The Milverton Sun 595-8921 r, in those fearful clays the stone of Singai ifu must have been buried, either stealthily by some faithful who might have hoped for a return of more tolerant times, tqr by merciless enforcers of . the government decrees. BUDDHISM SUPPRESSED The Buddhist religion, not a native Chinese cult but ori- ginating in the north of India, was also abolished. Four. thousand temples with all their lands and treasures and 40,000 shrines were -cen- fiscated by the state. (The list of temple properties still exisits. Hundreds of thousands of Buddhist monks and nuns were effected and had to fend for themselves, fleeing to exile in the north or being killed. We give these figures in order to convey an impres- ion of the magnitude of the lamity which had also be- fallen Nestorianism in China. Yet Christianity did not die completely, although henceforth it led an esoteric existence on the fringes of the Chinese religious scene. We mentioned a little earlier that later travellers to China, especially the Europeans who, in the 13th and 14th centuries, sought to contact the Great Khan in Caracorum or Cambaluc (modern Peking), not infre- quently found Nestorian churches along the road to Central Asia. We know now that Nestorian missionaries did not confine their activi- ties to Central Asia: All through China discoveries have been made, pointing to Christian worship at a very early date. Most of them, presumably, wer from the times when esti:Wien Christianity was ' till freely propagated, before the year 845. We have seen that in this year Christianity was pro- scribed under the.auspices,of an emperor4 .,the she T'arig Dynasty, -.which had, in 'the' third decade of, the seventh century in the per- son of Tai Tsung so warmly welcomed Christianity. .. We know the name of this earlier imperiad,protector of Christianity for his. name is• , honorably inscribed in the annals of- church ' history. However, the name of the hostile emperor who reigned in A.D. •845 is not known. What is known of this episode, is that, in many instances generals 'and; eunuchs had taken over eonVorafro'n an apparently_ weak and • ira* festive emperor. These of- ficials fficials sought to bolster their position and maintain their stature in this cabal of com- petitors by- the confiseati on of Ad:possessions; and pro- perties- of " church and .teen= ple. P ha �e si tii the t appeared ; r P easiest, soltitiof to their never-ending need to buy supporters and adherents. REMNANTS SURVIVED Although the edifif Christianity collapsed offic- ially in A.D. 845 many Nes- torians must have fled tore- gions in . China where they knew that the storm of perr- secution would be less in- tense. Along the east coast of China, in its eastern and, Couthern ports, Nestorian hurches could be found long afterward. Port cities, al- ways more attuned to the outside world, and more sen- sitive to impulses from across the waters and in gen- c eraF more tolerant of new thought and novel ideas, al- ways have afforded a more genial and hospitable cli- mate to the preachers and disseminators of other ideas. To do justice to the mis- sionary spirit of Nestor- ianism, we do well-; to re- member that the traces of their' activities are not con- fined to the Chinese interior or to the coasts of China. Far ranging indeed were its mis- sionaries. Christian finds have come to Ight in places as far apart as Mecca, Lhasa in Tibet, Delhi in the north of India and Caracorum, north of Pe- king and once the residence of the Great Khan, the Mon- gol ruler of China. If the archeologists are right, even Cambodia and Java have yielded objects connected with Christian practices and worship and the„ context in which these finds were made points to worship in those. places., A wed tf admiration for the Nestoria hiasignaries is Certainly not oiit of place for ' •their endurance and zeal were most admirable. Bishop Adam, the man who brought Christianity first to Singanfu, . was per- haps a man of the same ca- libre as St. Paulinus, who had just entered Nor- thumbria in Anglo-Saxon England, gospel in hand. They were certainly contem- poraries. Both worked and ' preached in virgin .territory approximately the same years. Those were the event- ful years of the Second and third decades of theseventh. century of the .Christian era. What a geographical dis- . tance there was .between these two missionaries at op- posite ends of the then known. world. , But their sender was the same God. -GLmuitr. TELIEVISIOM'''S ROVING titEPORTER People have funny ideas about Mennonites. Especial- ' ly tourists.. I had some pretty funny ideas about them my- . self at first. Then I started to roam' around little places like Elmira and St. Jacobs quite a bit and got to know some of those black -garbed . Old Order Mennonites who come into town by horse and buggy from the small farms that dot ' the surrounding ' countraside. They appear to be austere ' and unbending. They're not. They're fun -loving. They work hard and play hard. If they have a single outstand- ing characteristic, it's good old fashioned brotherly love. ' But. they shun publicity . and the trappings of .modern society. They prefer. ' the hitching post to the parking lot. Automobiles would take their, young people - away from farm, faith and family. They don't have TV •sets or telephones. They believe the old ways are the best ways. They're devout Christians - who emigrated from Eur"oae in• the 17th century to escape persecution. But, although the Old Order is still the group ,that attract attention, it seems. to . be dying out. The vast majority • of Mennonites these days- have become more modernized while still retaining the basic tenets of their faith. `the neVf breed also wer, comes ptiblicity.:•They've set up a beaufiful fiubltc rela- Of course, one had never heard of the other, for the Church of the west was com- pletely ignorant of the af- fairs of China- in the east and tions centre called "The ,, vice versa, bu e or w Meeting Place. It's on St. Preached: Jacobs main street. Using a When, in A.D. 845, Chinese multi -media presentation Christianity collapsed, west - experts give you a brief out- ern Christianity was also un - line of Mennonite history:- der attack. The Viking on - And one of the rooms' at- the slaught dealt the Church, in centre has been turned into a Western -Europe a severe little chapel that's classic in setback, net only in a mater - its simplicity, sal sense. *hole regions, Across the road, the. his- Frisia and parts of England, toric Snider Mill has been reverted to virtual pagan - converted into an arts and ism. But in - the West, ' crafts centre. You can watch Christianity , withstood ..the weavers, potters, and- storm and survived to pros - painters at work in the Mill's - per again. big old silo. In China, however,' Down the street, you can Christianity seemed ta,have see John Martin, the village disappeared forever, except blacksmith, hammering for a few vestiges along its away. John is a tourist at -coastal waters. traction. fie knows it and But in China it was des`- likes it. It's good for buss- tined to rise again, although nes$. after many centuries. Gen - St. Jacobs has changed erations of missionaries since I visited it years ago. came and went and preached , • But the Mennonite spirit is the Christian gospel and an still, there. - intense missionary interest I remember one time after in China has always been a 'member of the Catholic manifest in the countries of Church lost his barn in a fire, ' Christendom. This has been and his Mennonite neighbors” especially true since the rebuilt it, he toad reporters,times of the Crusades, dur- "Mennonite neighbors --are Ing which the horizon of European man had greatly better than insurance." widened and he had increas- 3 animals in balloon ' ingly become aware of the The first living creatures colorful but mysterious na- to ascend in a hot-air balloon tions of the. East waiting to were a rooster, a duck and a evangelized. The story of subsequent . sheep, in Paris Sept. 19, 1783. contacts between Christian - King Lona XVI and his en ity,ancl China is a chapter in tire court watched. The hal- itself and a fascinating one, loon, 75 feel. in height and 39 just as fascinating . as the in diameter, landed gently a story around the stens of little over. a mile away with Singanfu. its passengers safe. - e Over 100 usEdqars, and trucks on our fo�m st be sold -plus-38 brand new 1.,;983- cars and light trucks are clearout priced! CHOOSE FROM THESE 1983's:. 1 - Crown :Victoria 3 - Mercury Cougars 1 - Mercury Capri 7 - Mercury Lynxes (2 Wagons) 3 - Ranger Pickups • 3 Ford LTD's • 3 - - Thunderbirds - Ford Mustangs • -9 - Ford Escorts (2 Wagons) „ • 4 F-150 Pickups (1 Diesel) -1978 Monarch 2 Door $3950 6 cylinder, 4 speed, power steering & brakes Stock L1426B. Was $4450 . , NOW 1976 Monte Carlo 2 Door $2950 _..8 cylinder„automatic, power steering & brakes. Stock T2042A. Was $3450. NOW 1977 Buick Century 2 Door $2650 6 cylinder, automatic, power steering & brakes. Stock U2095A. Was $2950 . NOW 1979 Lada 4 Door - $1195 4 cylinder, 4 speed. Stock C3514B. 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