Testimoni…
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Sun Yat-sen has both a strong, holy, and great side, as well as the limited and fragile side of our ordinary human nature. Throughout his bumpy and colorful life, he has not only been zealous in serving the Lord, but also has been tested by temptations, low tides in faith, and has experienced successes and countless difficult tests, and even the cruel blows of many failures, and has borne all kinds of heavy and painful crosses. From a historical and practical point of view, as well as from a religious point of view, the Christianity he pursued had a profound impact on his spiritual life, revolutionary pursuits, and ideological concepts, and has given a beautiful testimony to the faith he pursued.
After being baptized in Hong Kong in his early years, Dr. Sun Yat-sen devoted himself to church ministry and spared no effort to spread the Gospel of Christ to his fellow citizens. While in secret custody in London by the Qing embassy in Britain, he prayed fervently to the Lord and relied on Him with all his heart. He once recalled to his friend the prayer life in prison and the change in grace he received: “My brother is in prison, and he will die. At this time, the only way to do this is to repent and pray earnestly. For six or seven days, he prayed day and night, and the more he prayed, the more earnest he became. On the seventh day, there was a sudden comfort in my heart, and I was completely carefree, and unexpectedly, I answered this prayer and received God’s favor. This is a natural, genuine expression of the feelings of a devout Christian.
Sun Yat-sen denounced superstitious elements and bad habits in religion, including rejecting the idolatry of witch culture in folk beliefs in his youth, and in the anti-imperialist patriotic movement and the first “non-Christian movement” in the early 20th century, he criticized the church system as a politician and denounced the words and deeds of some people in the church who were tainted with colonialist and imperialist ideology. As the founding head and political leader, it was also inconvenient for him to go out in public and attend public congregational services in churches or prayer halls, and to attend public liturgical services of the church community every Sunday. He may have even had periods of confusion, disappointment, and coldness away from the church. However, this was not enough to lose his Christian status, and future generations have no right or denial of his Christian status.
Standing in the long river of human history, today we should take a fair, objective, and inclusive attitude to examine the people including Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of the nation, and the difficult history of the Chinese nation, as well as his radical words, behaviors, and attitudes towards religious circles, including folk beliefs and churches. Even today, the utilitarian words and deeds, superstitious colors, and religious extremist fanaticism that exist in religious circles should still arouse the attention of all sectors of society, including religious circles, and resolutely reject and bitterly criticize them, and thoroughly eradicate them.
As a Christian and the father of the nation, Sun Yat-sen loved the church respected the religious community after entering politics, and established friendships with religious circles. In 1912, he donated 3,000 silver dollars to the Nanjing YMCA as the initial funding for its establishment, and in 1919, he also donated 10,000 taels of silver to Nanjing Qixia Temple to assist in its repair. Sun Yat-sen’s concern and support for religious circles without discrimination and his tolerance are worthy of appreciation and commemoration.
Sun Yat-sen attached great importance to the contribution of religion in moral construction, believing that “morality begins with the country, and morality begins with the world”, and introduced religious ethical values that are beneficial to the nation and the state. He was the first to advocate the separation of church and state and freedom of religious belief in China. On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Sun Yat-sen’s birth, all sectors of society, including China’s religious circles, should remember, cherish, and practice.
At the same time, as a zealous Christian, Dr. Sun Yat-sen strongly identified with the spirit of “freedom, equality, and fraternity” based on Christianity. On the basis of the spirit of “concomitant love” of benevolence and Mozi in traditional Chinese ethics and morality, and the gospel of Christ’s unconditional compassion, love and service to one another, Sun Yat-sen put forward the ideological concept of “fraternity” in the context of traditional Chinese culture, and advocated the concepts of “the world is for the common good” and “the world is in harmony”.
He believes that the “benevolence” in traditional Chinese culture is a concrete manifestation of “fraternity” in the three dimensions of “benevolence to save the world, benevolence to save people, and benevolence to save the country”. In terms of the concept of governing the country, he put forward the concept of “fraternity and benevolence”, regarded “fraternity” as “the treasure raft of mankind, the extreme rule of politics”, and further took the concept of “fraternity, the world for the common good, and the world harmony” as his motto, and gave many inscriptions to comrades and friends to encourage him, taking it as his ideal and life pursuit. He integrated the values of Christianity into his political concept of salvation and survival, led the Chinese people to overthrow thousands of years of feudal imperial system, brought hope of democracy and freedom to the Chinese nation, and tried to build a society where everyone is equal, rich and poor, free of oppression, no exploitation, no war, freedom, democracy, fraternity, and the common good, and fought for it all his life.
On his deathbed on March 11, 1925, he dictated the “Fourth Testament” to his comrades, family, and close friends on his sickbed: “I am a Christian, commanded by God to declare war against the evil spirits! In some historical periods under the special political background, this “fourth will”, which could not be publicized publicly and would not be taken seriously, proved that Sun Yat-sen was a true Christian.
His son, Sun Ko, also testified to his father’s affectionate teaching to his children in his family letter: “The day before my father died, I proved that I was a Christian and had struggled with the devil for more than 40 years. Sun Yat-sen witnessed the Gospel of Christ in his words and deeds, lived out the true meaning of Christianity, and was worthy of the identity and title of a devout Christian. Sun Yat-sen’s persistent pursuit of life goals, religious beliefs, and revolutionary ideas, his unremitting struggle, his tremendous contributions to the survival of the nation, national unity, prosperity, and world peace, as well as his noble character of selflessness, are models for political leaders in the three regions of the Taiwan Strait, as well as for all the people and religious circles, including Christians, to emulate and learn from today.
