When looking around at different spots on the web for information about the Korean missionaries who, from the information gleaned from archived versions of their web pages that I have seen all over the web from different sources, when accessing sites such as allahholy.blogspot.com, which is basically just a compilation (albeit an angry one) of all the pics and videos from these people's Cyworld pages, I came across this:
Click to enlarge.
When going to certain sites, the National Police Agency tells you that this is "illegal information" and that it has been blocked.
I don't care what the information is, or who's involved. Information is power, and the police controlling what information you get is bullshit in a supposed "democracy." What is this, China?
Use www.proxify.com and other "proxy sites" to get around these blocks.
It's sad to have to use the same hacks that Chinese dissidents do in a society that is supposed to be "free." Well, since the "National Security Law" is still open to interpretation, I guess that means Korea is not free.
And I don't buy the argument that this is to "protect" the hostages. They put their proselytization activities all over their Cyworld pages and blogs, knew the law of the land before they went there (the death penalty to Christian proselytizers), and went there under the flimsy guise of putting on "cultural shows" (taekwondo demonstrations, Korean traditional dances), but then proceeded to conduct prayer sessions and even teach Afghan children to pray (in Korean, and since I doubt Afghan children were ever taught Korean, I doubt they knew what they were saying, which makes this even worse).
I guess that since I'm perhaps violating Korean law, I'll have to take my licks, too, if I get arrested or deported. But I won't go without making a stink, and morally, I'm not deceiving or forcing anyone to come to my site.
That's the difference between my choice to violate the law and this church group's choice.
And what are they going to do? Is the Korean government going to ban YouTube as well? YouTube wasn't around during the time of the Kim Sun-il video, but now, you can't just block a few sites hosting the video, can you? This looks pretty damning to me, and it comes from their own Cyworld site:
I don't care what anyone says. I prefer to live in a world in which governments of any kind are not slamming down and closing the doors to information. Yes, this time it's "in the name of the hostages." But in whose name will the government be banning information when perhaps the populace needs it?
And in terms of Christian martyrs who went to proselytize knowing full well what the penalties would be if caught, too few Americans (and others) properly remember the history of the Quakers being executed by the much-vaunted Puritans, who warned them that stepping foot in Mass Bay Colony and preaching against the Puritan hierarchy would land them at the gallows:
Quakers had also made their way to neighboring Plymouth Colony. Lawmakers there responded by prohibiting the transporting of Quakers into the colony and authorizing punishment for residents who provided shelter to a Quaker or attended a Quaker meeting. In spite of these harsh measures, two Quakers began teaching in Sandwich;about 18 families joined what became the first Friends' Meeting in America.As word spread, Sandwich became a gathering place for Quakers. Colonial authorities responded by seizing any vessel that was headed for Sandwich with Quakers aboard.
As the Quaker presence grew, the governors of Massachusetts Bay and Plymouth both took legal steps to prevent Quakers from entering their colonies. Under the Massachusetts Bay charter, the governor had no authority to imprison Quakers. In late 1656 and 1657, the General Court rectified this situation when it passed a series of laws that outlawed "the cursed sect of heretics commonly called Quakers." Captains of ships that brought Quakers to Massachusetts Bay were subject to heavy fines; so was anyone who owned books by Quakers or dared to defend the Quakers' "devilish opinions." As the movement continued to gain adherents, Massachusetts Bay and Plymouth passed even harsher laws. Quakers who persisted in entering the colony were imprisoned, publicly whipped till they bled, and had ears chopped off. Finally, in October of 1658, the Massachusetts General Court passed a law that barred Quakers from the colony "under pain of death."
Not all Quakers were deterred. One who defied the authorities was Mary Dyer. Arriving in Boston in the early 1630s, Mary Dyer had become embroiled in the religious controversy surrounding dissenter Anne Hutchinson. When Hutchinson and her family were forced out of Massachusetts, Dyer followed them to Rhode Island. During a 1650 trip to England, she met and became a follower of George Fox, founder of the Quaker Society of Friends. Passionate about her new beliefs, Mary Dyer returned to Boston in 1657. She was immediately imprisoned. Her husband, who was not a Quaker, promised she would not preach as long as she was within the borders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and she was released. The Dyers returned to Rhode Island.
Despite the threat of death, Mary Dyer repeatedly returned to Boston to support fellow Quakers who had been imprisoned. Finally, in the fall of 1658, she and two other Quakers were arrested and sentenced to death. When the governor pronounced the death sentence, Mary Dyer responded, "The will of the Lord be done." A week later, the two men were hanged, but at the last minute, Mary Dyer was granted a reprieve. She reluctantly left Massachusetts, but less than two years later, she returned one last time to defy "that wicked law against God's people and [to] offer up her life there."
Once again, she was arrested and condemned to death. On June 1, 1660, she was taken to the gallows. Her husband pleaded for her life, but she herself refused to repent. The execution of Mary Dyer and the other Quakers so appalled King Charles II that he ordered an end to the death penalty for Quakers in all his colonies. By 1677 members of the Society of Friends were free to hold regular meetings.
Three centuries after Mary Dyer's martyrdom, a descendant left a bequest that paid for Sylvia Shaw Judson, a Quaker woman herself, to produce a life-size bronze statue of Mary Dyer. In 1959 the statue was erected on the west lawn of the Massachusetts State House, where it stands today.
Sources
The Quakers in America, by Thomas D. Hamm (Columbia University Press, 2003).
Mary Dyer: Biography of a Rebel Quaker, by Ruth Plimpton (Brandon Publishing Co., 1994).
Dictionary of Notable American Women.
Neighbors, Friends, or Madmen: The Puritan Adjustment to Quakerism in 17th-Century Massachusetts Bay, by Jonathan M. Chu (Greenwood Press, 1985)
I doubt Mary Dyer would have gone on a hunger strike, and that's why she'll go down in history – at the time, the Quakers were crazier than even the crazy-ass Puritans, who had put themselves on a ship to leave everything they knew as "civilization" to go found a new city in what they understood to be a "wilderness" inhabited and chock full of screaming "savages."
So there's a begrudging respect that has to be given to the Puritans, who may have been murderous, racist, sexist, paranoid bastards by our standards, and were even hated by many other Christians (namely, the English Anglicans, who were the vast majority, and even the term "Puritan" is a perjorative, as is "Quaker") during their own time, but were brave mofos, all.
"Mary Dyer led to execution on Boston Common, 1 June 1660"
Mary Dyer and the other early Quakers were even crazier, because they were darn near begging for death, and their only crime was preaching within the boundaries of the same Christian religion, mind you that the only authority you needed was God and the Bible, with anyone in between being superfluous and possibly even dangerous. And so, John Winthrop and the other clergy leaders didn't like hearing that, since that would mean they'd be out of a job, as well as out of power.
But what to make of these contemporary, would-be "Dyers?" They are now reportedly (and inexplicably) on a hunger strike, which doesn't make much sense, given the fact that people who are placing a gun to your head are likely not going to care if you decide to stop eating. Well, perhaps this is a bold gesture and they are actually trying to hasten their own demise.
If you are going to a place to pretty openly proselytize to Afghan women and children, in the most public and insanely blatant ways (UCC on Cyworld while you're still in the country?!), then you can react to angry Taliban coming to kidnap and execute you by trying to get out of the situation alive – this isn't 1660, after all, and I doubt this mission group had as much of a death wish as Mary Dyer, no puns intended or implied, ahem but maintain one's dignity.
Were it me with a gun to my head, I would likely grovel and beg, or do a funny dance, and pretty much whatever was asked of me, but if my stated reason to be in the country and even mere reason to be was called into question, and it was clear that I was going to die, I think it destroys the meaning of one's own death to water down, let alone speak against the very reason you flaunted the law, under pain of death, in the first place.
Remember, they went there to preach, not do taekwondo demonstrations, and to lie about that, even after one is caught – that seems to negate one's entire being as a Christian, were that the reason I had gone. Remember, the Christians fed to the lions in the Colosseum accepted their fate with dignity – they didn't start saying, "We're not really Christian! We were just...umm...hanging out with them, but we're not really with them, if ya know what I mean...umm..."
Daniel Pearl's last words were "I am Jewish." Here were Mary Dyer's last words:
"Nay, I came to keep bloodguiltiness from you, desireing you to repeal the unrighteous and unjust law made against the innocent servants of the Lord. Nay, man, I am not now to repent."
And you can read about all the other horrible things done to the Quakers in the best primary account of it, A Declaration of the Sad and Great Persecution and Martyrdom of the People of God, called Quakers, in New-England, for the Worshipping of God, penned in 1661.
And even the Quakers' actions were as smartly political, and their plans well-laid, since their "cunning Christian stunts" were linked to political lobbying back home, among powerful friends and allies. They were smart, they were committed, and according to the abstract to the article above, they succeeded in their goals:
From 1656 through 1661, the Massachusetts Bay Colony experienced an “invasion” of Quaker missionaries, who were not deterred by the increasingly severe punishments enacted and inflicted by the colonial authorities. In October 1659, two (William Robinson and Marmaduke Stevenson) were hanged at Boston; in June 1660, Mary Dyar (or Dyer) became the third; in March 1661, William Leddra became the fourth (and last) to suffer capital punishment or “martyrdom” for their Quaker beliefs.
While members of the Society of Friends rushed to Massachusetts to test the harsh sentences under the newly enacted laws, other Friends in England simultaneously petitioned Parliament and the newly restored king for relief from this official persecution. When the Massachusetts General Court sent a petition to King Charles II explaining and defending their actions, Edward Burrough, a leading Quaker writer and controversialist, answered it with the publication that follows. Its first part is a point-by-point refutation of the Massachusetts claims; its second part is a detailed list of the punishments, cruelties, and indignities suffered by Friends at the hands of the colonial authorities; its third section is a narrative description of the three executions of 1659 and 1660, including the public statements of the condemned.
Burrough's publication (and a subsequent audience with the king) led to Charles' issuance of an order halting the punishments in the fall of 1661, although they were resumed, in only slightly less severe form, the following year.
So, in the big picture, those Quakers weren't so crazy, after all, and were testing the boundaries with themselves as cases, while pointing the eyes of the world on them, testing the willingness of the Puritans to maintain their political authority against their expectation to adhere to the basic norms of Christian love and charity.
Obviously, I don't give this summer-vacation-proselytizers that much credit, nor do I think they were that smart.
Yeah, you might say that all this is "easy for me to say" since I don't have a gun to my head, but then again, I didn't blatantly ignore both Afghan and Korean authorities' warnings, put my ass on a plane to go preach the teachings of the Lord under well-known pain of death, and then put the frickin' videos on the Internet, while I was still there.
Christ. And I don't mean that in the blasphemous way, either.
Again – what to make of these would-be martyrs? I think that they are far from the guiltless lambs they would make themselves out to be, since the penalties for their transgressions were and are perfectly clear, the dangers known, and the possibly venues in which to follow the dictates of their collective Christian conscience myriad there's a million other places in the world to carry out mission work to people who need and might even appreciate it, as opposed to people with a clearly-defined religion, one protected by worldly authorities who guard it by dint of force, for better or worse.
To lie about, or even cover up, what they did cheapens the intent of their actions, and distorts the truth. I would rather see them end up alive than dead, because I consider myself a moral person, but no one should lie about the nature of their actions, nor even try to cover up for them.
But what I see is, rather than brave Christian lambs, are rather the self-deluded and culturally insensitive Christians in Korea, whom I encounter all the time, who berate and preach to anyone within earshot about how they will go to Hell, about how Jews and Muslims are not "real" religions, and a million other things I need not mention here.
And to those of you who will take the intellectually dim (and logically fallacious) tack of "But those people are in the US, too," I'll just say that 1) I'm not talking about the US right now (duh!), and 2) even if I were, I'd point out that most American-style Christian craziness is expressed in terms of right-wing politics, and I don't remember ever being brow-beaten about whether I went to church, and I live in the Bible Belt, OK?
The point is that I think this is a case of a bunch of idealistic, mostly young folks who saw this whole thing as a cunning Christian stunt, and they never really felt the fear of death you can't watch these YouTube videos and come to any other conclusion.
These are middle-class kids who've lived in sanitized apartment complexes, have been kept in a cocoon of constructed innocence, and probably saw this whole thing as a great adventure, while the church elders who put them up to were likely thinking about how this would enlarge the name of their church as well.
"Look! We went to Afghanistan and taught prayer songs to kids! What'd your church do?" Bigger name means more members, means more money, means more power.
In the end, I don't consider these people little Mary Dyers, and I don't expect themselves to consider nor conduct themselves as good, Christian soldiers or martyrs.
The more likely explanation is that they are similar to the majority of evangelical Christians I meet in Korea, whose Christianity may seem like acts of spiritual charity, but feel more like insensitively-kept notches on the headboard of their journey to nirvana. And in the act of spiritual intercourse as well, it feels like the act is all about one them, not the other person.
I'm sorry if that sounds crass, but I can't see this from the timbre and tone of the materials I've seen – as anything other than an act of incredible naivete, ethnocentrism, and religious insensitivity. It doesn't feel like the acts of somber, Christian martyrs carrying out God's work on a field of vicious Men. The smug smiles in Muslim temples, the V-signs in the pictures, the emphasis on converting children who could not be expected to understand the haughty spiritual message, or even the language of the messenger it really turns my stomach.
And it's what makes their situation such a hard one to get out of, since it makes it even harder for the Taliban to back down, doesn't it, lest more such people start coming, and openly flout their authority more flagrantly than the people who came before them.
What I'm saying is that if they were true missionaries who'd taken their actions seriously, they might now even be in the pickle they are now. Unless getting into this pickle had been the point, which suggests they should die with dignity and let their deaths mean something.
But that's not it was, right? I think those who know Korea and know the dominant style of Christianity know exactly what this is: a cunning Christian stunt that went wrong.
And now, there are already dead bodies – and likely to be more, as well as heightened diplomatic tensions, millions of dollars spent on their behalf, and putting an entire nation, nay – the entire world on pins and needles.
And for what? A cunning Christian stunt that didn't even really have the chance of having much impact religiously or politically and was (let's be honest) not much more than what I like to call "Christian tourism" that depends on the excuse of self-sacrifice and do-gooding (only for a week or so, though!) to enable what other people simply call "yearning for adventure" or "roughing it" across Eurasia.
And I think, rather than the question of, "Am I ready to die?" the real question in most of these young peoples' minds was, "설마. 우릴 진짜 죽이겠냐?" ("Come on – you think they'd actually kill us?") Of course, I can't know that, and maybe I'll be proven wrong, but that's my strong feeling. Because if I went to Afghanistan to preach, under pain of death, I wouldn't behave as impudently or seem to take my situation as lightly as these people seem to have.
