{"id":312,"date":"2007-11-26T23:18:38","date_gmt":"2007-11-26T23:18:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html"},"modified":"2007-11-26T23:18:38","modified_gmt":"2007-11-26T23:18:38","slug":"remembering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html","title":{"rendered":"Remembering"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Sunday in Southern California, thousands of Catholics of Vietnamese orgin gathered to remember martyrs of the faith. Two stories –\u00a0
\n\u00a0The LATimes<\/a>
\nThe OC Register:<\/a><\/p>\n

Julia Pham leans against a hallway wall behind rows packed with thousands of people in UCI’s Bren Events Center, covers her face with her hands and quietly sobs.
\nIn front of her, a crowd stands up in unison: elderly ladies fingering rosary beads, toddlers snuggling into their mothers’ Sunday dresses, youth with yellow and blue and green scarves around their necks. An artist’s rendering of 117 people is projected onto a screen in front of the amphitheater.
\n“Today is a big day for everybody,” said Pham, 49, of Garden Grove, wiping away tears. “A lot of people died. So that’s why I cry. \u2026 And because I hope I can change my life.”
\nVietnamese Catholics from 14 parishes across Orange County worked for six months to prepare for this gathering to honor 117 martyrs killed during the persecution of Catholics in Vietnam from 1798 to 1861.
\nPope John Paul II canonized the martyrs in 1988. More than 100,000 were believed to be punished for their faith during that period.
\n“This is one of the biggest religious celebrations for the Vietnamese in the diocese,” said Father Michael Hoan of the Vietnamese Center in Santa Ana.
\nThe three-hour ceremony and Mass began with a procession through the amphitheater. People dressed in traditional long silk garments and black suits flooded to alters on a stage, some helping to carry two red and gold platforms adorned with dragons in honor of the martyrs and of Christ.
\nChildren wearing the silk frocks, called ao dai<\/em>, danced with flowers and streamers after the procession. Then the crowd watched a video recounting the introduction of Catholicism to Vietnam by French missionaries.
\nAfterward, actors re-enacted the tragedy that ensued when the Vietnamese monarchy ordered Christians to renounce their faith. One by one, actors wearing gold breastplates and helmets pretended to stomp, jab and behead Catholic prisoners who refused to comply.
\nThe government attacked 37 parishes and seminaries in Dinh Cat, Vietnam, during the 63-year persecution, but, according to the historical film, the destruction only strengthened people’s faith and helped Catholicism spread in Vietnam.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Sunday in Southern California, thousands of Catholics of Vietnamese orgin gathered to remember martyrs of the faith. Two stories –\u00a0 \u00a0The LATimes The OC Register: Julia Pham leans against a hallway wall behind rows packed with thousands of people in UCI’s Bren Events Center, covers her face with her hands and quietly sobs. In…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":180,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nRemembering - Via Media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Remembering - Via Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"On Sunday in Southern California, thousands of Catholics of Vietnamese orgin gathered to remember martyrs of the faith. Two stories –\u00a0 \u00a0The LATimes The OC Register: Julia Pham leans against a hallway wall behind rows packed with thousands of people in UCI’s Bren Events Center, covers her face with her hands and quietly sobs. In…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Via Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-11-26T23:18:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"awelborn\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Remembering - Via Media","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Remembering - Via Media","og_description":"On Sunday in Southern California, thousands of Catholics of Vietnamese orgin gathered to remember martyrs of the faith. Two stories –\u00a0 \u00a0The LATimes The OC Register: Julia Pham leans against a hallway wall behind rows packed with thousands of people in UCI’s Bren Events Center, covers her face with her hands and quietly sobs. In…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html","og_site_name":"Via Media","article_published_time":"2007-11-26T23:18:38+00:00","author":"awelborn","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html","name":"Remembering - Via Media","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/#website"},"datePublished":"2007-11-26T23:18:38+00:00","dateModified":"2007-11-26T23:18:38+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/#\/schema\/person\/aea2dcda1635c9c2d6030d9c7595725a"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2007\/11\/remembering.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Remembering"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/","name":"Via Media","description":"Amy Welborn","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/#\/schema\/person\/aea2dcda1635c9c2d6030d9c7595725a","name":"awelborn","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/9f2\/9f2100183464289fedc5b8a621c15110x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/9f2\/9f2100183464289fedc5b8a621c15110x96.jpg","caption":"awelborn"},"description":"Amy Welborn was born in 1960, the only child of a now-retired professor of political science, a teacher-librarian-artist mother,deceased since 2001, was a teacher, librarian and artist. The Catholicism comes from her side. Amy grew up in a number of places - Indiana - Washington, DC - Lubbock Texas - Arlington, Virginia - DeKalb, Illinois - Lawrence, Kansas - and Knoxville, Tennessee, where the family settled in 1973. She attended Knoxville Catholic High School, then the University of Tennessee where she majored in history. She received an MA in Church History from Vanderbilt University, where she wrote a thesis on the changing role of women in 19th century American Protestantism, and the ways Scripture was used to justify those changes. She worked as as a teacher in Catholic high schools and a Parish Director of Religious Education and started writing for the diocesan press - the Florida Catholic - in 1988. Amy has written columns for Our Sunday Visitor and Catholic News Service at times over the past twenty years. Her articles have been published in venues ranging from Our Sunday Visitor to the New York Times to Commonweal. She has written 17 books. 18, if you included the as yet tragically unpublished novel. Amy has five children, ranging in age from 26 to 4 and was married to Michael Dubruiel, who died unexpectedly in February 2009. She lives in Birmingham, Alabama.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/author\/awelborn"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/180"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}