Korean Church Moves from Receiving to Sharing Aid

January 27, 2023254 views0

Korean Church Moves from Receiving to Sharing Aid

2023-01-27T12:25:27+01:00

By Marie

A Catholic Church in South Korea, once largely dependent on aid from foreign churches for relief, rehabilitation and development projects, is now on a mission to provide vital assistance to countries and churches around the world, church officials say.The Korean Church has been a ‘receiving church’ until the mid-1980s, and it has slowly become a ‘sharing church’ since 1992, said Bishop John Baptist Jung Shin-Chul of Incheon, president of Catholic charity Caritas Korea, the Catholic Times reported on Jan. 22.In the 1950s, when Korea was a war-ravaged country it needed aid for damage restoration, self-help development, and rural development projects that continued until the 1980s, the prelate said.Bishop Jung made the comments as Caritas Korea International, the overseas aid agency of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea (CBCK), carries out a fundraiser campaign on Overseas Aid Sunday, the last Sunday of January.“The scale of overseas aid by the Korean Church has increased. The bishops’ conference aims to strengthen professionalism, publicity, and transparency in overseas aid,” the prelate said.From 2011 to 2022, Korean Church through Caritas provided aid worth 45.21 billion won (US$36.65 million) to 20 countries for 625 projects. The aid increased to 4 billion won in 2021 and 4.5 billion won in 2022 despite the setbacks stemming from the Covid-19 pandemic and war in Ukraine.Bishop Jung says that apart from emergency relief, rehabilitation, and development projects, Korean Church supports dioceses, parishes, religious societies, and church-run organizations in various parts of the world.This year, Caritas Korea plans to increase aid to emergency relief and long-term livelihood support projects in countries suffering from the climate crisis and conflict.In his message on Overseas Aid Sunday, Bishop Jung said, “If we act together now, we can present a better tomorrow to our brothers and sisters.”“Let’s act together,” he appealed.Father Paul Choo Seong-hun, secretary general of Caritas Korea pointed out that Korean Church is on a mission to help those across the world “who cannot stand up on their own due to war, historical and geographical circumstances, etc.”Thus, the church has been supporting refugees in Ukraine and development cooperation in the Palestinian region as major priority projects.Since the outbreak of war in Ukraine, Catholics in South Korea generously offered donations to Caritas Korea, and a total of 711,295,864 won was raised through a special fundraising campaign from March to October 2022.ALSO READ Korean Catholics Honour The Elderly With A Photo Contest