By Sun Hee ‘Sunny’ Kim

The author is a Columban Lay Missionary from Korea who came to the Phliippines in 2011. This article first appeared on the blog of the Columban Lay Missionaries – Philippines.

In January 2015 I began a new ministry in Payatas, Quezon City, known as the Second Smokey Mountain, the original having been in Tondo, Manila, a landfill that had been used for more than 40 years. I am assigned to the CBR (Community Based Rehabilitation) Center for special children. In the center, physical therapy and learning programs are offered to the children three times a week.

In assisting in the program and spending time with the children in their activities, I found that many of them were underweight and malnourished. I saw the need for a feeding program for them. I was worried about having a stable financial resource to start such a program. I took the initiative to ask around and approached people who were running similar services and shared with them my intention and sought their advice. Through this I got to know about the Joy of Sharing Foundation in Korea. Through a series of processes and reflection I came up with a verse from the Gospels: ‘For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened’ (Matthew 7:8).

Sunny (L) and Hyein Noh, Columban Lay Missionaries from Korea

I submitted my proposal for the Feeding Project of the CBR Center to the Joy of Sharing Foundation.  I was grateful to receive the good news from the Foundation that they had decided to support our project for one year. 

The application and donation worked out well with the support of the Columbans in Korea, where I’m from, and here in the Philippines. A very pleasant surprise was that the Chief Director of Joy of Sharing Foundation was visiting projects it was funding in the Philippines and he was able to visit our CBR Center to see our children.

At first it seemed hard to find ways for those involved to have a common point of view about the project. However, when I asked, sought and knocked on God’s door with trust, I found that the way was shown. Nothing is impossible. God knows everything about me; what is necessary for me, what is best for me. He prepares everything and does not force me. God waits for me until I ask, seek, and knock. He will help me.

Thanks to the donations, we started the feeding service to twenty special children in October 2015. They have since gained weight and their parents are happy.  Praise and thanks be to God!

Crossing boundaries ‘to the nations’

Bayan Ko, a patriotic Filipino song associated particularly with the overthrow of the Marcos regime in 1986, sung by a Korean choir

The first article in the Constitutions and Directory of the Missionary Society of St Columban declares that it ‘is an exclusively missionary Society sent by the Church ‘to the Nations’, to proclaim and witness to the Good News in Jesus Christ of the full Christina liberation and reconciliation of all peoples’. Part of this involves ‘Crossing boundaries of country, language and culture’.

One area where people cross such boundaries is through music, sharing their own and learning that of others.

Korean Song, sung by the University of the East Chorale, Manila

‘Arirang’ is a traditional Korean song that has many variations. It is considered part of Korea’s cultural heritage.