Government permits restoration of a cistercian monastery
Chau Son (AsiaNews/Ucan) The Vietnamese government has given permission for the total restoration of the Cistercian monastery evacuated after the communist victory over the French in 1954. A "bright future" is what Father Jean Pham Van Hung, 35, sees for his Order at the Chau Son Cistercian Abbey, 105 kilometers southwest of Ha Noi, since a four-year process ended with the local government's approval to "restore the whole building".
Father Hung explained in late May that the abbey in Phat Diem diocese dates back to 1936, when Cistercian Father Thaddeus Le Huu Tu founded it as an offshoot of the Cistercian monastery in Quang Tri province, in the southern part of Vietnam. Father Tu later headed Phat Diem vicariate as bishop. The abbey, at the foot of Mt. Chau Son in Nho Quan district, Ninh Binh province, became autonomous in 1950.
However, following the communist victory against French colonizers in 1954 and Vietnam's division into the communist North and U.S.-backed South, Bishop Tu fled south with 124 priests and 60,000 lay Catholics.
All but one of the abbey's members joined the exodus, said Father Hung, who added that the building was not damaged during the wars with France and with the United States but has steadily deteriorated, with the roofs and walls now in terrible condition, he said. The lone monk that remained died in 1998.
Father Hung said the restoration of the 1,500-square-meter monastery began early this year and will be completed in 2005. The 1.5 billion dong (US,451) project is being financed by foreign benefactors. The 100-room building was begun in 1939 and completed in 1945.
He called this development God's "great award" to the monastic community that has "faced many challenges and losses the past half-century." His priestly ordination in 2001 was the first at Chau Son abbey during that time. Fr. Hung expressed his hope the restored monastery will draw young men from all over the country to join his congregation, provided the government relaxes its policy on religion. In recent years, he said, some northern dioceses wanted to send young men to the monastery, but the government has allowed it to admit only residents of Ninh Binh. He is hopeful "everything will change in the future." He added that he had explained to local authorities that "Religious vocations belong to each person's freedom, so the government should not prevent young people from other provinces studying here." The law on religion in Vietnam sets a fixed number- confirmed by the government- of entrants into seminaries and religious orders. Further, each Vietnamese is obliged to live in his region of residence and cannot travel freely.
The abbey residents support themselves by raising cows, tending fruit trees and growing rice and beans in a 5-hectare field. They also offer retreats, teach hymns and catechism, and serve other spiritual needs of nearly 2,000 Catholics in three subparishes of Vo Hot parish. Every month, they give 1,000 kilograms of rice every month to about 100 poor people including ethnic Muong, and provide scholarships and awards to poor and meritorious students.
The abbey superior is 86-year-old Father Joan Berchmans Nguyen Van Thao spends most of his time in southern Vietnam as he does not have permanent residence papers for Chau Son.
According to Church records, the Order of Cistercians in Vietnam was founded in 1918 in Quang Tri by Father Henri Denis Benoit Thuan, not a native Vietnamese. It has six abbeys for men and a convent for women with 52 priests, 303 professed brothers and sisters, 88 novices and 71 postulants.
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