Tears of Blood by Mary Craig RELIGION BOOKS
Chang, Emmy
to unexpected developments? The con- as much to John XXIII. John Paul II's dition has scarcely improved. One of duct of the recent synods of bishops evangelical fearlessness...
...As Chinese dissiGod to give him another one...
...The Chinese even have twice subject to rule by outsiders...
...By human-rights concerns need have noth- REVELATION 1979, 60 percent of Tibet's libraries had ing to do with one another...
...has been deliberately altered: "Tibetan Emmy Chang And after nearly fifty years of Com- history [has] been reduced to a matter munist occupation, the Tibetans' con- of fairy tales and legends, the very word here has been no shortage, in our century, of genocidal regimes that slaughter people by the millions...
...I human person that has been a hallmark fruit in Vatican II and in John Paul II...
...Some chains, he explains, were attached lower on the wall than others...
...Since A Cry for Tibet Mary Craig a system for those who might try to speak the occupation, however, the Chinese a last word of defiance: Condemned pris- government has taken pains to rewrite Counterpoint...
...of thinkers it brings together, this were forced to adopt Chinese names, one Ever since Deng Xiaoping said he work is a classic introduction that syllable of which would be taken from didn't care whether a cat was black or will shape the third millennium Chairman Mao's...
...Even to speak against white so long as it could catch mice, the of relations between Jewish the PRC in Tibet today is a capital of- Chinese Communists have explicitly di- and Christian people...
...Maybe it will change some- New words include Bopa, meaning "Tibetan," thing...
...lars for every monk she would seduce...
...hope it is clear to you," an official told a of John Paul's pontificate...
...We must tell...
...ours has been a victory for the Com- and HAYIM GOREN PERELMUTER As recently as January of last year, the munist regime, and they know it...
...526.331 pp...
...Indeed, the Chinese take great the West is continually forgetting is that pains over their public image...
...fense...
...Methods of execution include "crucifixion, dismemberment, vivisection, beheading, burying, burning and scalding alive, Commonweal 30 March 10, 2000 for history (gyalrab) being reserved for side world about Tibet," says one young Chinese history only...
...Monks dent Harry Wu has been demonstrating and nuns were forced to marry...
...They in foreign policy, indignation has a short 1-58051-042-6 hardcover 256 pp made a great show, for instance, of lifting half-life...
...A father and daughter are forced to have sex...
...cide has provided as blatant a demon- The Bernardin Center Series Nor is it very difficult to "endanger na- stration as one could ask for: At least with Catholic Theological Union tional security," as the Chinese call it: 1.2 million Tibetans, one-fifth of the You need do nothing more extreme than population, have been killed or have sing, or even listen to, a Tibetan song- died of starvation under the wanton or be caught with a picture of the Dalai sadism of the Communist regime...
...dragging the victim to death behind gal- these were for children...
...But there is no "Extraordinary for the quality and Bo, meaning "Tibet...
...EUGENE FISHER, "[denies] torture, [denies] in fact that human rights...
...oners often have their vocal cords sev- the past, insisting that Tibet has always ered before execution, to prevent them been a part of China...
...Just about every imaginable barbarism of war or peace has been perpetrated in the fifty years of the Chinese occupation...
...in Tibet...
...A monk who begged massage from the invisible hand...
...have been averse to going to the other In 1965, when the genocide was still Jews and Christians extreme...
...Even the language from crying out...
...Meanthe Chinese not to use the Buddhist while, the Chinese can continue their Scriptures as toilet paper had his arm cut reign of terror, with not only our indif- P1 ,IN I. I'1i1I Ih..W .i.I.1..\.}1 off," Craig notes, "and was told to ask ference but our help...
...The Tibetan genopolitical offenses are ipso facto criminal...
...Tears of Blood is an account of what has happened and is happening in Tibet, but its landscape could have come straight out of Dante or Hieronymus Bosch...
...El west...
...at Drepung, formerly the hear instead is that economic openness biggest monastery in the world, a popu- will eventually lead to democracy...
...John's evangelical to 1999...
...that TRADITION lation of ten thousand monks was re- we need only sit back and wait for a duced to eleven...
...Journal illustrates how, despite the Craig quotes freely and extensively overwhelming influence of John Paul II Christopher Ruddy is a doctoral candidate from scores of interviews she conductin the formation of its generation, the in theology at the University of Notre Dame ed with refugees, including the Dalai substance of its Catholicism owes just and an intern at Commonweal...
...Every concession of JOHN PAWLIKOWSKI, O.S.M...
...One of duct of the recent synods of bishops evangelical fearlessness has been a gift the subtler shocks of Mary Craig's book suggests otherwise...
...And in 1987, the House Jewish and Christian covenants, tival of 1988, enacted to convince foreign of Representatives unanimously con- the contributors explore ways journalists that religious freedom thrived demned the annexation of Tibet...
...Their firsthand accounts allow for a depth of detail no mere historian could match-as, for instance, when one ex-prisoner describes a wall to which MADE IN CHINA Tibetans were chained for days at a stretch...
...Tibetan policies-and Tibetan save Tibet in 2000, any more than they life-remained the same...
...When circumstances required, young, the United Nations passed a res- in Conversation Tibetans could just as easily be forced to olution expressing "grave concern" and In this exploration into the worship, as they were in the Prayer Fes- "deep anxiety...
...saved it in 1965 or 1987...
...Not that PRC forces pose us, how can you...
...What of more fully understanding God's relationship with humanity...
...Communist officials gouge out a man's eyes and throw him from the roof of Tibet's holiest shrine...
...Other deleted monk...
...When Chinese Communist party has cam- most-favored-nation status was re- Reinterpreting paigned to encourage atheism specifi- newed in 1994, Chinese police taunted Revelation cally for the purpose of quelling support the Tibetans: "If America dares not op- and Tradition for the Dalai Lama...
...Children were forced to Tibet had existed for nearly two thouTears of Blood shoot their parents, disciples their reli- sand years as a sovereign state, only gious teachers...
...The Holy Spirit you do of seeing the sun rise from the sage to the council...
...Commonweal 3 9 March 10, 2000...
...Or, in the face of to the church, one to which youth es- is that the atrocities she details continue relentless challenges to human dignity pecially have responded...
...Time will re- in an unbroken line from 1950 through and life, could John have sustained the veal the fruit it bears...
...Maybe it won't...
...unfortunately, the West Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, NCCB there are any political prisoners, since eagerly followed suit...
...the out- in New Haven, Connecticut...
...Certainly the People's Republic prophetic, unyielding defense of the gentleness has already born abundant (PRC) has no intention of leaving...
...If Tears of Blood does nothing $22.95 martial law in 1990, when in fact many else, it must stand as a brutal reminder believe the only real change was that sol- that unless backed by deeds, "concern," SHEED & WARD diers exchanged their uniforms for plain "anxiety," and "condemnation" will not clothes...
...neither those killed at Tiananmen nor In order to destroy Tibet, it was crucial those killed in Tibet have ended our for the Chinese to supplant religion, the politicians' insistence that trade and mainstay of Tibetan culture and life...
...Yet Lama...
...gives both...
...What we and been burnt...
...But Communist China must be unique in at least this regard: In Tibet, after they've killed you, they charge your family for the price of the bullet...
...Lama...
...Craig for years, PRC gulag-manufactured mentions a Tibetan peasant to whom the products make their way to Western Edited with an Introduction by government promised one hundred dol- markets regularly...
...Simply put, John, and Journal of a Soul, remind us- crowd of Tibetans after a failed uprisone can scarcely imagine John con- particularly those younger-that bold- ing in Lhasa, "that you stand as much fronting Sandinista hecklers, or John ness need not exclude gentleness, nor chance of getting your independence as Paul II delivering John's opening mes- gentleness boldness...
...Many Tibetans other way...
...El call: 1-800-266-5564 The refugees Craig interviewed seem fax: 1-419-281-6883 to have no illusions as to the only hope Emmy Chang is a free-lance writer who lives www.bookmasters.com/sheed for their nation...
...loping horses...
...Indeed, Craig notes dryly, China vorced issues of trade from issues of - DR...
Vol. 127 • March 2000 • No. 5
