Christians, Justice and Tibet

By John Scawen

Tibet is a casualty of a repressive regime with blindspots big enough to swallow a whole culture. John Scawen writes passionately of the importance of standing for the weak against the strongest and most overpowering odds imaginable.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gilead Books Publishing
• Release date: Oct 14, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452344423

John Scawen

My wife and I have just completed eight years (on and off) working for a Christian charity in China, on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau. A sudden visa refusal, presumably prompted by the wider political situation affecting Tibet, forced us to return to the UK with just a few weeks’ notice.During our time in China, I developed a growing concern for the way in which Christians engage with the obvious issues of injustice that affect life for many ordinary Tibetans. Concern became torment as I sought to trace the roots of some of these issues.On our return to the UK a friend suggested we attend the Willow Creek Church leadership summit in the United States. One of the speakers encouraged Christian leaders to take note of the ‘positive deviants’ in their midst, realising that sometimes they will be on the leading edge of a God-inspired new initiative. I hope and pray that this short book will be unadulterated positive deviancy of exactly this sort.

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Christians, Justice and Tibet

By John Scawen

Published by Gilead Books at Smashwords

Copyright © John Scawen 2010

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

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This book is available in print at Gilead Books

Scripture quotations taken from the HOLY BIBLE, TODAY'S NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 2001, 2005 by Biblica®. Used by permission of Hodder & Stoughton Publishers, A member of the Hodder Headline Group. All rights reserved worldwide.

‘TNIV’ is a registered trademark of Biblica®.

An extract of Chapter 1 was first published in ChinaSource Online, February 2010.

Cover design: Dave Magill

Editor: David Burton

Cover photo: ©John Scawen

DEDICATION

To all of those individuals and churches who have supported, encouraged and prayed for us through our years in China; but particularly to all at St. Michael's.

CONTENTS

Foreword

Preface

Chapter 1: Rinchen’s Questions

Chapter 2: Dedicating Ourselves

Chapter 3: Untangling the Intractable

Chapter 4: Are We Bandits?

Chapter 5: Kid's Wisdom

Chapter 6: Avoiding Eye Contact

Chapter 7: Business as Usual

Chapter 8: My Complaint

Chapter 9: In the End

FOREWORD

Having travelled in China on several occasions to help train the burgeoning mission movement, I am left with questions about what really goes on under the surface in that great land; especially concerning ethnic minorities.

Through the eyes of Rinchen, a Tibetan young man, this book takes the reader beneath the surface to identify the less well-understood issues and to suggest where hard answers are to be found.

While compellingly written and passionately expressed, it is not a comfortable read for a mission leader. Its stance as a ‘positively deviant’ message gives it the potential to be spiritually prophetic and even politically subversive—perhaps, inevitably, it will be seen as both.

National Director of a Christian Organisation

Please note that throughout this book the names of individuals and organisations have been changed or withheld in order to protect their valuable but sensitive work in the region.

The author is writing under a pseudonym.

PREFACE

My wife and I have just completed eight years (on and off) working for a Christian charity in China, on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau. A sudden visa refusal, presumably prompted by the wider political situation affecting Tibet, forced us to return to the UK with just a few weeks’ notice.

During our time in China, I developed a growing concern for the way in which Christians engage with the obvious issues of injustice that affect life for many ordinary Tibetans. Concern became torment as I sought to trace the roots of some of these issues. My worry became more and more vocal, which I know was causing some of my colleagues a degree of unease, and I would like to sincerely apologise for any discomfort caused by my manner obscuring my message.

On our return to the UK a friend suggested we attend the Willow Creek Church leadership summit in the United States. One of the speakers encouraged Christian leaders to take note of the ‘positive deviants’ in their midst, realising that sometimes they will be on the leading edge of a God-inspired new initiative. I hope and pray that this short book will be unadulterated positive deviancy of exactly this sort.

John Scawen

Chapter 1: RINCHEN’S QUESTIONS

There is something very peculiar about life in western China. It’s unlike anything that we experience in the Western world. Maybe it is even more alien to us than anything we might experience in the rapidly-becoming-more-familiar eastern coastal region of China itself. Rich and poor, chaos yet somehow order too, new-found freedoms alongside old-style state control, a melting pot of different religious beliefs in an officially atheist country, an economic boom without any industry to speak of, and open spaces stretching for thousands of miles in a vastly populous country — to an outsider's eyes, a thousand apparent contradictions that all appear totally normal to local people. See if this everyday example strikes you in the same way that it strikes me.

Thursday, 12 March 2009: Taking the children to swim. The taxi is weaving in and out of the trucks and three-wheelers loaded with seasonal vegetables at the entrance to the wholesale market. A fish, still alive and flopping about pathetically, is dropped and, in the retrieval process, traffic chaos reigns. No one crashes (today). We turn the corner at the top of the hill, away from the crowds, and head out of town on an open city boulevard. At the lights we pass a column of ‘People's Armed Police’ vehicles, heading back into town. Two which, I assume, comparing them to those I have seen on the news over the years, are water cannons; and

four trucks. The tarpaulins on the back of the trucks are open enough to strategically reveal that they are full of soldiers in riot gear. The taxi weaves ahead of the competition and life moves on. We arrive at the pool to enjoy an hour's swimming. The news that evening makes no mention of any public disturbances.

It certainly strikes me. It is absolutely incredible that just thirty years after the opening of the Chinese economy, life has progressed to this point. It was thirty years ago that the Cultural Revolution came to an end, which might be considered point zero on the economic development scale. Since then, life has progressed to the point where there is not only a plentiful, healthy food supply for this large city, but also leisure facilities of a standard that would be considered good anywhere in the world. Well, maybe only anywhere in Asia, since this particular facility is designed not for an hour of swimming practice with the kids, but for a day of chess, smoking, saunas, reading and talking with business clients or extended family. Within a period of just a few years, a motorway network has been constructed, railway lines extended, airports refurbished and built from scratch, tens of thousands of high quality apartments built, a mobile telephone and broadband network established, and many other developments made. In each case the quality of infrastructure rivals that found anywhere in the world. How is this possible? Particularly, how is this possible in a province of China with very little industry, a poorly-skilled workforce and a rugged and inhospitable terrain? How has it been achieved so quickly, especially considering that the vast majority of this development has taken place in the last decade?

For many years now the Chinese government has pursued a policy called ‘The Grand Opening of the West’. This policy is worked out in many and various different ways but, broadly speaking, central government funds are liberally distributed for infrastructure construction in the economically backward western provinces of China. The aim – much trumpeted by government propaganda departments - is to narrow the economic divide across the country, to promote social harmony and