Editorial - The burdens of a bishop
Gary Walker
My decision to review our Columban missionary efforts during the last 90 years by taking stories from The Far East has been rewarding.
Each bound volume has heroic stories; Bishop Edward Galvin's letter to the priests of the Vicariate in Han Yang is riveting. In a time of increasing unrest and bandit activity he asked the Columban priests to stay with the people in the parishes even at the cost of their own lives.
His priests were dodging bandits and Communists in their parishes, escaping out the back door as soldiers came in the front entrance.
Other issues of the magazine carry stories about the deaths of Fathers Timothy Leonard and Cornelius Tierney at the hands of bandits. Another Columban priest Father Hugh Sands was held in captivity for eight months.
The Yangtze River flooded in 1931 causing a national disaster. His harrowing letters show the huge responsibility he shouldered as bishop. Only 49 years old, he had to watch people die in great numbers, having given all the help he could from Church resources.
Bishop Galvin had life and death decisions to make. Always short of money, he wrote letters each night to friends and supporters around the world appealing for assistance.
He told the priests that they were not in China to convert the people but to do God's will. It is a surprising and even cryptic remark about what is essential in our relationship with God.
