A fter the French, a new day
Viet Nam : « can for wo by Gordon Hedderly Smith
missionaries
T he Republic of Viet Nam is ready for an all-out missionary effort now. Never before have the doors been so wide open, the people so receptive. After years of war, the country is peaceful and a stable government has the support of the people. Perhaps no other mission field is so thinly manned, so greatly neg lected. Of the 12 millions in free Viet Nam, probably no more than 12,000 are Protestants. This is the finding of a recent survey by the World Council of Churches. The Catholics are going ahead rapidly. Here in Tourane the other day, a Roman Catholic procession took over an hour and a half to pass us. Twenty thousand of them from this one city alone. They are sweeping whole villages into their church. A comparatively new religion, “ The Cao Dai Missionary Church,” dedicated a great new temple here, built by the gifts of 60,000 follow ers in central Viet Nam. These people not only worship God the Creator, but include many others such as Victor Hugo, Buddha, Con fucius and Mohammed. It is a semi political religion, and is making great headway. For many years we and others have made urgent pleas for a great er missionary effort in this country. Writing a couple of years ago, Fred Jarvis called the church’s neglect of this great mission field one of the crimes of our time. So many such reports on the situation have gone unheeded, and various reasons
could go ahead quickly with our program. He said we had perfect liberty of action and that there should be a Protestant chapel in every town. He hoped soon to build roads back into the interior so that the wilder tribes might be civilized. I assured him I was asking our friends in America to remember him in prayer. Saigon, the capital, with over two million people, has a few hundred Christians—four or five churches. Thirty strong churches of different denominations would not be too many for such a place. Hue, a city of 130,000, has but 20 Christians. Four or five foreign missionary couples and half a doz en national pastors would find plen ty to do in this one city and district alone. Except for the province of Quang Nam in central Viet Nam, where there are 15 or 20 small groups of Christians, the other coastal prov inces have only one or two national workers with a handful of Chris tians in each. Millions have never heard of Christ. Last year, when 900,000 Viet namese fled the Communists in the north, most of them were Roman Catholics. Only 700 Protestants were counted. There are several missionary agencies now working in Viet Nam, but they are pitifully inadequate to meet the need. Orient Crusades has a missionary in Saigon in charge of a Bible Cor respondence Course. The Mennonite Central Commit-
have been given. Missionary socie ties have had a defeatist attitude, thinking this country was folding up as a field. The difficulty lies in an inadequate understanding of the need and opportunities, and a hesi tation to step on denominational toes. Now, there should be absolutely no excuse to keep hack the scores of missionaries who are needed to get the gospel out to the millions of Vietnamese and to the many differ ent mountain tribes. Americans are well liked. Eng lish is the foreign language of choice. With American aid pour ing into this country, supporting 90% of the military budget and putting millions into agricultural and technical assistance, the people are favorably attracted to America. There has never been such a spirit of cordiality as there is today. The French have gone. The coun try is entirely independent, and the political situation is evolving in an amazingly democratic way. From the standpoint of the gov ernment, there is no difficulty. The president, Mr. Ngo Dinh Diem, al though a devout Roman Catholic, is nevertheless favorable to evan gelical missions, especially if they help the refugees and do some medi cal and social work. A few weeks ago I was granted a special audience with the presi dent of the Republic. I had written him fully about our desire to evan gelize the mountain tribes. He re ceived me cordially, and assured me of his intense interest, hoping we
THE KING'S BUSINESS
48
Made with FlippingBook - Online Brochure Maker