Some of my earliest memories are tied up with the war in Vietnam: I watched the evening news from behind my father’s chair; every night, it seemed, Walter Cronkite announced how many more American soldiers had been killed in Vietnam since the last report. My ideas of life beyond my direct experience were all tied up in the black and white images of marches in protest against the war, and stern, fatherly types lecturing the world on what was wrong with hippies and students and draft dodgers and boys who burned their draft cards. As I entered my teens, we counted down the years until our brothers and fellow high schoolers could expect to be drafted. When I graduated from high school, the local Selective Service board, unfamiliar with the name “Ardis,” sent me a helpful postcard reminding me to register for the draft.
I learned to be suspicious of government claims because of Vietnam. I learned to be mistrustful of my fellow citizens because of Vietnam and citizens’ reactions to the war and to each other. I watched with relief as the POWs came home. I watched with horror as the Babylift plane crashed. I watched with despair as Saigon fell.
I hunted out returned POWs who spoke to packed lecture halls. They became my heroes: Survivors of the Hanoi Hilton and other notorious camps, they had retained their humanity despite everything that could be done to destroy that humanity.
The war in Vietnam was simply the background that I grew up in, and that shaped my outlook and colored my expectations of the world. I didn’t choose that background, I may seldom have been aware of how deeply it affected me, especially since I had no direct contact with it. But it was there, always.
This morning, the Church announced three new missions, two in Africa, and one …
… one to be headquartered in Hanoi.
The Vietnam Hanoi Mission.
The war really, truly, is over.
Well, that war, anyway. There’s another war that started long before that–and this is another step on the road to victory.
Wonderful news! I think about the family history that will be done and maybe that part of the world will get a Temple someday?
Since connections often come up with Keepa posts: The mission president is my wife’s uncle. He was a missionary in Vietnam 40 years ago. Below is a link to a newspaper report from twenty years ago on one of the humanitarian trips he made to Vietnam as a doctor.
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2457&dat=19940624&id=3OAzAAAAIBAJ&sjid=0zgHAAAAIBAJ&pg=2104,3575069&hl=en
Yes, “the Vietnam Hanoi Mission” sounds so good! I’m not prophesying, just pure speculation, but wouldn’t “the Ho Chi Minh City Temple” be pretty cool?”
This gives me chills, and I’m a generation removed from your experiences. What a wonderful announcement.
I just had a family member get engaged to a woman from Vietnam. It’s exciting to see the world getting smaller, both in the church and in the family.
Boy, could I hijack this thread, but I’ll just leave it with an Amen.
My Canadian parents lived just across the border in Alberta, close enough that they received both American and Canadian radio, which often differed significantly in the details they reported.
I’m just a few years away from having been a convert for half a century; things like this drive home the dramatic changes that I’ve seen in those 48 years. It’s both remarkable and wonderful.
There were many that said the Berlin Wall would never come down in our lifetime. That was before we saw the TV footage of people on top of the wall with hammers and chisels and not being shot in the process. This event and the new mission in Hanoi shows that the Lord’s work does go forward, methodically in His time.
Hanoi Vietnam Mision went active on 1 March 2016
Vietnam Hanoi Mission(D:1)
Hanoi Vietnam District (B:4)
Hanoi Branch
Hanoi Vietnam District Branch
Tan Son Nhat Branch
Thao Dien Branch