Catechumens Overcome Difficulties On Their Road To Baptism

Posted: 7th April 2008

Miss: Em Sokhorn

PHNOM PENH (UCAN) -- Catechumens in Cambodia commonly face challenges including family rejection, community ostracism and government unease.

UCA News spoke with catechumens of St. Joseph Parish in Phsar Thoich, Phnom Penh, recently about their journey into the Church.

Em Sokhorn, who was born into a Buddhist family and has seven brothers and sisters, admits changing her religion "was not so easy." She gained her family's consent, but friends in the village did not approve and even ostracized her.

What attracted her was the way Catholics live, the 22-year-old said. She recalled people saying Christians create turmoil in Cambodian society, but she wondered, "Are Christians so bad?" With this question in mind, she joined a catechism group, reflected at length and eventually accepted "a new way." Now she feels sure of her path. "I will receive Baptism this Easter," she said.

Paris Foreign Missions Bishop Emile Destombes, apostolic vicar of Phnom Penh, will baptize Sokhorn and 146 other catechumens from across the country during the Easter Vigil Mass on the night of March 22.

Gnim Sok Eang, 35, has had a rougher time. She spoke of villagers menacing and discriminating against her. They accuse her of straying from Khmer culture, believing in a foreign religion and even being a traitor to the nation, she elaborated, identifying her husband as particularly abusive.

"My husband often prevents me from joining the catechumen group," she said, adding that sometimes he beats her. But she is determined. "Nobody can stop me," she asserted. "I like the Good News of Christian living."

Eang acknowledges her life has changed profoundly since she became a catechumen. "It is not easy, but I believe," she said. Dung Savong, a catechist of St. Joseph Parish, told UCA News:

"The Church has a condition for new followers. They can receive baptism after three years as a catechumen. And they must be at least 18 years old." The program is long, Bishop Destombes told UCA News,

to help catechumens understand doctrine more deeply and streng then their faith before baptism. If they have strong faith, they will be good witnesses, he added, noting
that the Church does not "force" people to change their belief.

Savong, meanwhile, also pointed out that "new followers face many challenges, including chiding from family, friends and villagers." He related the story of a young catechumen threatened with disinheritance if she continued as a catechumen or became Catholic. "But she liked Jesus and the witness of Catholics, and she really wanted to receive baptism," he said.

Savong encourages catechumens to reflect deeply through relevant Scripture passages. He cited Jesus saying in Saint Luke's Gospel: "From now on a household of five will be divided, three against two and two against three."

The catechist also provides other spiritual reading to help catechumens understand that the new way of living is not easy. They have to put forward their heart, pray to God, love and suffer, he said.

Paris Foreign Missions Father Francois Ponchaud, 69, director of Cambodia Catholic Culture Center, told UCA News it is difficult for a Khmer to become Catholic because Khmer customs and culture are strict. Buddhism is popularly seen as part of the identity of the Khmer ethnic group, to which more than 90 percent of Cambodians belong.

The priest, who originally entered Cambodia as a missionary in the 1960s, noted that before 1970, few Khmer wanted to be Catholics, because they thought Catholicism was a "foreigner's religion." Around 90 percent of Catholics in Cambodia at the time were ethnic Vietnamese.

In 1970, the military government led by Lon Nol, who came to power in a coup, expelled all ethnic Vietnamese from the country. Five years later, when Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge came to power, all foreign missioners were expelled. No Cambodian priests or nuns in the country survived the Khmer Rouge's four-year reign of terror.

With the Church's "rebirth" in the early 1990s, however, things have cha-nged, Father Ponchaud said, and new followers have emerged. Today, the Church counts about 19,000 Catholics among Cambodia's 12 million people.

Three ecclesiastical jurisdictions cover the country: Phnom Penh vicariate,
and Battambang and Kompong Cham prefectures.

Article Source: UCAN