The Memoirs of Jin Luxian: Learning and Relearning 1916-1982

Preface

In 1933 when I was 17 years old I was given an introduction by friends to the aged patriot Ma Xiangbo,1 who was then 94 years of age. He was wearing a long black gown over which he had on a mandarin jacket and he was sitting straight up in a formal chair. I offered my respects and congratulated him on his great age. He replied: “Ninety-four years have passed by in an instant.” I wondered how 94 years could pass by in an instant. Now I too have reached my nineties, having frittered away 92 years. When I close my eyes and think back, those years have truly passed in an instant, but on close examination this instant was full of hardship. Having been born into a moderately prosperous family, I, from the age of ten on, met with repeated misfortune. My mother and father died and my elder sister passed away. In a short period of time I lost everything, found myself both without close relatives and as poor as a church mouse. In the prime of life I even lost my liberty for a period of not less than ten thousand days. Only on reaching my seventies was I able to practise my vocation, although I was assaulted by groundless accusations on every side and subjected to slanderous attacks in the face of which I found it hard to establish my innocence. The ancients opined that human nature is inconstant, that gossip is a terrible thing and that the resulting wounds are deep indeed. As things turned out, every time I thought that I had reached an impassable section of the road, I would come across the shelter of yet another village to which the angels would guide me by their invisible hands and the Lord’s 1. Ma Xiangbo S.J. (1840–1939) was the most prominent Chinese Jesuit in late Qing and early Republican China. He was involved in the founding of Aurora Academy, Fudan Public School and the Catholic University of Peking (later known as Furen University). Preface 2 The Memoirs of Jin Luxian assistance would come just in time, leading me to the inevitable conclusion that in life one could overcome all difficulties. When my father and my mother had both died, the family property had been lost and I had no home to return to, my great-uncle arrived on the scene, carried my siblings and me to his own home and treated us as if we had been his own children. When my great-uncle died and my elder sister’s life ended prematurely, Lu Naying and Rong Dexian both said to me: “From now on I will be your elder sister; please don’t worry.” They both treated me with the love of an elder sister until the day they left this world. While I was at the prison in Baoding, the most painful period of my reform through labour,2 the parents of my German friend Donate came from afar to find me and thereafter looked after me until they died. My road was replete with perils, but I travelled in peace and overcame all the dangers that beset me. Born into a Catholic family, educated at a Catholic school and then joining the Society of Jesus, I was at every stage guided by the Holy Spirit through the medium of the Bible and prevented from stumbling. When beset by challenging circumstances I recalled the phrase: ‘All is Vanity; vanity of vanities’ (Vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas). While I was doing my novitiate in the Society of Jesus I was made miserable by the attitude of the master of novices, but found solace in the words of the founder of our order: “Rejoice in the slights and neglect of others” (Ama nesciri et pro nihilo reputari). When in jail and having lost my liberty, I recalled the words of Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity: “Heaven is the Trinity; with the Trinity in my heart, I am as if in Heaven.” Thus I made of jail my heaven, never ceasing to praise the Trinity, forgetting all pains and living replete with joy. After completing my sentence I returned to my diocese, first as rector of the Sheshan seminary and then later I was chosen to be auxiliary bishop. I always made use of the following phrase to remind myself who I was: ‘He should grow and I should shrink’ (Oportet illum crescere, me autem minui). Life is but a...