Korean Methodists Celebrate Americans
The largest Methodist congregation in the world is the 120,000
member Kumnan Church in Seoul, Korea, whose pastor/bishop is an
colorful enthusiast for South Korea's alliance with America.
"Without [the] U.S. presence, Korea would not have grown to be
one of the largest concentrations of Christians in the world,"
explained a senior U.S. Army chaplain to the United Methodist
News Service recently. "The Korean people are on fire for the
Lord. Bishop Kim credits his success to prayer and preaching the
unadulterated Word of God."
Methodist Bishop Hong-Do Kim is the 70-year-old pastor who led a
75 member congregation to become one of the world's largest
churches. He has helped organize three pro-American rallies in
Seoul, and has visited the Pentagon with other Korean pastors to
thank the U.S. for its military presence in South Korea. Bishop
Kim vividly contrasts with U.S. Methodist officials, who have
repeatedly condemned the U.S. presence in South Korea.
"Your country is always kept in our minds as a country that
helped us receive the Christian faith and defend our country half
a century ago, when Korea's peace and democracy were at the brink
of great danger," Bishop Kim wrote President Bush several years
ago. "We are always grateful to your country and your people and
are very pleased that we maintain the closest ally relationship
between our two countries."
Bishop Kim chairs the Korean-American Protestant Pastors'
Association, which helped raise $1.3 million for stained-glass
windows in the Pentagon's Memorial Chapel after 9/11, according
to a U.S. military news service. "Wherever I may go I like to
express my gratitude to America," Kim told a reporter while at
the Pentagon in 2006. "We can feel [the] safety," thanks to U.S.
troops.
The Kumnan Methodist Church and the Save North Korea Coalition,
of which Kim is also an officer, have produced a documentary on
the spiritual importance of the U.S. South Korean alliance called
Unite Us in Thy Righteousness. The groups made 30,000 copies of
the DVD available to Korean and U.S. military forces. The U.S.
has 25,000 troops stationed in South Korea. After a U.S. tank
accidentally ran over two school girls in South Korea in 2002,
candlelight vigils morphed into huge anti-American rallies in
Seoul demanding U.S. withdrawal. Kim organized his church and
other clergy to counteract the anti-American sentiment. But he
had already long been an ardent critic of communist North Korea.
At one prayer rally of recent years, Bishop Kim and other clergy
prayed for the "salvation" of North Korea. In his sermon, Kim
somberly warned that a peace treaty with North Korea and
withdrawal of U.S. troops would lead to a communist take-over,
ultimately destroying 50,000 South Korean churches and
slaughtering 13 million Christians, citing the examples of Maoist
China and Cambodia under Pol Pot. He also said that a communized
Korea would become a "beggar country" where "hard work gives no
reward." The bishop concluded, "When communists mention peace,
they mean 'communized unity.'"
Bishop Kim as a child fled with his family from North Korea. He
credits Billy Graham's preaching for his conversion, and he
credits continuous prayer and refusal to compromise core
Christian convictions for the fantastic growth of his church,
where 2,000 are baptized every year. The church had been founded
by a "socialist" woman who headed a women's college, Kim reports,
and after 14 years still had fewer than 100 members. Now there
are almost that many associate pastors who help lead the massive
Sunday services in the 16 level church in downtown Seoul, plus
daily worship at 5 a.m. At least two church members are praying
in the church's basement on a 24 hour, 7 day basis, and the
church sends missionaries to China, south Asia, and Latin
America. Besides pastoring his own church and serving as a bishop
in the Korean Methodist Church, Kim leads seminars and revivals
around the world.
Unsurprisingly for such a flamboyant character, Kim has had his
apparent moral failures and controversies. In 2006 he was fined
and given a three-year suspended sentence for misappropriation of
church funds. The bishop insists the allegations were false, and
the case seems not to have impaired his ministry. After the 2004
tsunami in Asia that killed tens of thousands, Kim credited the
disaster to a divine judgment on "hedonism, lechery, [and]
drugs." He opined that more observance of the Sabbath might avert
such calamities. Yet he added, "We mustn't think that it was good
that they were struck by a disaster. We must take pity on them
and help them."
A complete stranger to political correctness, Bishop Kim is
especially blunt when preaching about friendship with America or
opposition to communism. He joined a rally outside the parliament
to support South Korea's dispatch of troops to serve with the
U.S. in Iraq. And he has insisted that "Korea will always be with
the U.S. in uprooting such elements [of terrorism] forever from
the earth." Kim often recalls that the U.S. sent its first
missionaries to Korea 120 years ago. "Thanks to their missionary
devotions to our country," he says, over 25 percent of South
Korea is now Christian, and South Korea now dispatches 12,000
missionaries abroad. "If they were not here, we are destined to
plunge ourselves into death without the Gospel."
When a recent United Methodist delegation from the U.S. visited
Bishop Kim's massive church, even its most liberal members were
evidently impressed. Presiding over a declining U.S.
denomination, and usually not willing to look at growing U.S.
churches, the American church prelates might heed the example of
a thriving Korean church, even if it is pro-American.
Requiem for a General
The year was 1999. I attended one of those Washington meetings
where the inner circle sits around the big table, while
assistants (like me, at the time) take up seats on the perimeter.
We were fighting for the Religious Liberty Protection Act, which
we hoped would reinvigorate the Free Exercise Clause of the First
Amendment in the wake of court decisions that had undercut the
cause of religious freedom.
Paul Weyrich arrived early. Even then, he was in poor health. I
could see he was in pain as he walked into the room, putting a
good bit of his weight on his cane. He wore suspenders and looked
like an elderly man from Middle America. During the meeting, he
sat quietly and listened, apparently feeling no need to dominate
despite easily being the most well-known and senior person in the
room.
When I heard about his death, I was shocked to hear Weyrich was
only 66 years old. Nearly ten years ago in that Capitol meeting
room, I would have sworn he was almost 70. The revelation of his
age at death explains his face, which seemed preternaturally
youthful in comparison to his burdened body when I met him. He
suffered from diabetes. During the last year, a combination of
complications from injury and lingering illness led to the
amputation of his legs.
Many would have dropped out to rest on the memories of battles
fought and victories won. Weyrich kept working until the end. One
of his friends reported seeing him at a high-powered political
gathering in November where he was an active participant in panel
discussions.
Paul Weyrich came to Washington from Wisconsin in the 1970s as a
senatorial aide, but he quickly became an organizational and
policy entrepreneur of the first order. In addition to being the
founding president of the Heritage Foundation, he also
established the Free Congress Foundation and occupied a perennial
position of leadership among religious conservatives in
Washington.
Many will remember that after the 1998 elections, he penned a
letter declaring the culture war lost and calling, like a modern
prophet, for a welling up of new institutions and ways of life
independent from a decadent mainstream society. That occasion led
to one of many rounds of the press declaring the death of the
"religious right" as a movement. Notably, Weyrich ended his
letter with a call for further conversation and strategic
planning. He never dropped out. He never stopped working and
never gave in to despair.
Upon hearing of Weyrich's death, I called Judge Paul Pressler and
asked for his impressions of the man. For those who don't
instantly recognize the name, he was one of the prime movers
behind a conservative takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention
during the last three decades. Pressler has also been heavily
involved in the conservative political movement and this year is
an elector for the presidential race.
The Texas judge was effusive in his praise for Weyrich. Today,
few are surprised to hear that one elder statesman of the
conservative movement has good things to say about another, but
there are larger issues beneath the surface. When these two men
were young, it would have been rare to hear a Southern Baptist
offering tribute to the legacy of a Greek Catholic like Weyrich.
In fact, during those years, evangelicals and other conservative
Protestants were at least as concerned with the threat of
ambitious Catholicism as they were wi
