News

Temporary Church Built

When the Sichuan earthquake on May 12 shook the old Protestant church of Mianzhu, with parts of the roof and the facade falling off, Pastor Gu probably did not imagine that the congregation would grow fourfold in the following seven months. But it did. Since May, the number of people attending Sunday services has grown from around 180 to up to 1000 worshipers in December 2008.

Gu Yumei, a woman in her late twenties and a graduate of Nanjing’s theological seminary, was already enrolled in a master’s program to complete her theological education when the earthquake happened. She headed back to Sichuan to take care of the congregation.

All of the church members in Mianzhu have gone through a time of uncertainty and hardship. During the first few months after the disaster, worshipers gathered under a tarpaulin outside the old church building. People were barely protected from the heavy summer rains.

The situation has improved a lot since then. By now, several temporary buildings have been erected with the help of Amity and other donors — based both in China and overseas. One of the buildings is a church which can hold 1000 people at a time. Some church benches have been replaced by stools so that the church can react flexibly to changing numbers of worshipers in the midst of rapid church growth.

To keep things running, Pastor Gu relies on volunteers. She has to because she cannot be everywhere at the same time. A few technology-savvy young men have helped her put up and maintain the temporary buildings. Others are in charge of the services at the three new preaching points of the congregation.

Pastor Gu has even more plans. She imagines a church which will provide medical help to everyone in need because, as she explains, almost everybody in Mianzhu needs medical attention of some kind or another. A small clinic is already up and running on the church grounds.

Part of her social commitment could be offering psychological counseling for earthquake victims. However, counseling activities outside of the church grounds are seen by some people as a possible means to proselytize. This is why, so far, the church can offer counseling to members of the congregation only. But other social services can be offered. The church stores and hands out warm clothes and quilts for everybody, believers as well as nonbelievers. Pastor Gu hopes that in the near future, she can do even more with Amity’s help. Two of the temporary rooms in the church complex have already been designated to become Amity offices.

Foreign Expert Award

Connie Wieck, one of Amity’s long-term foreign teachers, has received the Sichuan Jinding Award. This award is presented by the Sichuan Provincial Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs. It honors experts from overseas with an outstanding record of training Chinese personnel in Sichuan. On her blog, Connie says that it “is truly a great honor, not only for myself but for the Amity Foundation, the United Methodist Board and my small Luzhou college.” Connie has spent nine years as a foreign teacher in China and is currently working at the Luzhou Vocational and Technical College in Luzhou, a small town on the banks of the Yangtse river.

Award for Qiu Zhonghui

Qiu Zhonghui, the general secretary of the Amity Foundation, has been awarded the honor of “National Outstanding Charity Worker” by the General Assembly of Charities in Beijing, which is sponsored by the Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs. The General Assembly met in Beijing on 5 December to announce the winners of the 2008 China Charity Awards.