When students raised the Taiwan flag Friday morning at St. James’ Episcopal Church’s kindergarten’s start-of-school ceremony in Taichung, with their proud parents watching through the front gates, as proud Episcopal schools parents always do, the children saluted. One has to be careful about calling Taiwan a country. Most of the world agrees that Taiwan is part of the People’s Republic of China. But it looked like patriotism to me. I’ve never seen anybody salute the California flag.
Kids know their geography, too. When we visited a classroom — we were guests of the energetic, visionary St. James rector, the Rev. Lily Chang — I used the wall map to show the students where we came from and asked them to show me where they came from. They pointed right at Taiwan. The teacher had them hand me a sticker with the Taiwan flag.
Taiwan’s schools don’t have flag ceremonies every day. Maybe once or twice a week. In encouraging patriotic pride, educators want students to be respectful, not to turn them into little independence seekers. But Taiwan is nevertheless a pretty amazing place. Prosperity, justice, religious tolerance, and freedom are hallmarks of these students’ homeland. As someone once said, when you learn it in kindergarten, it stays learnt. Their future staying as bright as they have the right to expect depends on wise, humane leaders and diplomats in Beijing, Taipei, and Washington.
As for older cohorts, I’ve been asking those who work with adolescents and young people what they worry about. A common answer is making the right vocational choice, making the right college choice leading to vocation, and not disappointing their families. When I ask about climate change and matters of war and peace, the experts say yes, those things as well.
The Diocese of Taiwan is also looking after its young adults, especially the overstressed professional class. The Rev. Shawn Wang, 33, was recently ordained as a deacon on the way to the priesthood. Lily Chang at St. James’ is known as a church planter. Bishop Lennon Chang’s and her latest mission is at Hsinchu, an historic city in central Taiwan with factories that are now churning out an historic hundred-year flood of microchips. So younger engineers are flooding in.
Residents of the neighborhood we visited pay Taiwan’s highest per capital income taxes. The year-old mission is above a pastry shop. The chain’s owner, a Christian, was Bishop Chang’s and Mo. Lily’s student at St. John’s University and lets the diocese use the comfortable, welcoming space for free. There must be a sermon in the idea of a sweet shop as gateway to the gate to heaven.
Deacon Shawn’s parents are Baptists. Attending college in Taipei, he visited St. John’s Cathedral and caught the Anglican bug. He led us in noonday prayer before offering Fennie Hsin-Fen Chang, Katherine Feng, Thomas Ni, and me a briefing and lunch.
He has 15 or 20 coming for services. His mission statement for Hsinchu mission is “an oasis in the midst of the busy life.” His ministries include Taize worship, lectures, book studies, and flower arranging. He doesn’t know what the future will bring. All he knows is what any missionary does, which is that his neighbors and their families are hungry for meaning and connection and, he trusts, the gospel of Jesus Christ’s life-giving love.
