Chapter 5 Saul became Paul in My Family When the first martyr in our church, St Stephen, was stoned to death, Saul was the main person to persecute him. But not long after Stephen’s death, on the way to Damascus he was converted by God’s special grace. He laid down his butcher’s knife and became a great saint, a well-known apostle, St. Paul. On Oct.8, 1951 the Chinese Communist Party officially declared that the Legion of Mary was a counter-revolutionary organization. All legionaries were ordered to register. We knew clearly that we hadn’t done anything wrong against country or people. Going to register would be to acknowledge a false accusation of the Communists against our conscience and faith. But the Communists were very smart. They not only attacked us in public, but also they often took advantage of our beloved ones. When I was persecuted for the Legion of Mary. The police came to our house to threaten my parents. The police made them weep night and day. Under these circumstances my parents and my brothers gave us much stress especially my fourth brother. He was always very cruel to us. At each meal he kept on forcing us to register. I could understand why he did so. Firstly, he didn’t know what he was doing. Just because he loved Dad so deeply, he was not willing to see Dad suffer that much, almost to death, for us. Secondly, he worried about us. If someday we got arrested, what would happen to our family? On Sundays Dad told him to keep guard on us, forbade us to go to church. It made us very upset, so I disliked him from the bottom of my heart. I blamed him and quarreled with him many times. I had even cursed him that he was the running dog of CCP. He was doing evil as a volunteer for the government. This government had put a tight encirclement for the Catholic faithful. At that time there were many innocent people like my brother. They persecuted our Catholic church severely out of blindness and without awareness. They were just as Our Lord said “ They don’t know what they are doing”. At the end of 1951 Dad ordered my fourth brother to check out the books in our bedroom. Dad said, “These two girls are extremely stubborn. Sooner or later the police will arrest them. Go to their bedroom to examine their books if they have any books against communism. If any, be sure to take them away or they will get more punishment.” My brother did what my dad asked him to do. He read the books one by one. Finally he found a book the title of which was “Marxism and Religion”, written by Fr. Matthew Chen. While he was reading it, he took notes in details. I was afraid that maybe he was looking for something wrong with it. On the same evening he talked to me in very good mood. He said, “The book which Fr. Chen wrote is very instructive to me. I’d like to talk to your priest. I have some questions to ask.” I replied; “ if you are willing to accept God, you are very welcome. If after the talk you are still not willing to accept, that is no problem. But don’t report everything to the police. I hope you are a straightforward and upright person.” This time my brother explained to me sincerely; “I have been against you on the issue of the Legion of Mary because I am a pagan, I don’t know anything about your Catholic Church. I am only standing at the worldly position to protect you. As your brother, I don’t have any bad intention. If I did hurt your feelings, I ask your forgiveness.” The next morning I went to my parish church “church of Christ the King “ I met my pastor, Fr. Xavier Chu. I told him something about my brother. Fr. Chu said “God leads every soul in a different way: since your brother is willing to have a talk with me, he is always welcome. I don’t care what his attitude to the faith was in the past. You know Saul did become Paul.” Since then my brother came to visit Fr. Chu twice a week. He had a lot of questions to ask. But God’s tremendous grace fell on his soul. In March, 1952 he decided to get baptized. Fr. Chu was so excited that he reported it to Bishop Kung. The bishop was much moved, he decided to baptize my brother in a solemn ceremony at my parish on Holy Saturday at the church of Christ the King I will always remember the scene on that special evening. Whenever I think of it, all the details come distinctly in front of my eyes. At about 4 pm, both my sister and I were waiting in the church’s lobby. All of a sudden, there came a priest who was clearly in high spirit, since he walked so fast that the two belts of his cassock were like a pair of butterflies wafted with the wind. He spoke very fast as well “Who is Mei Zhen Hu? And who is Mei Yu?” I stood up without any hesitation and drew my sister saying “We are” This priest held our hands warmly saying “Congratulation to you! You have won the first battle. Your suffering and tears have protected our church. God has blessed you very much. The baptisms of your dad and brother are really God’s gift.” I thought it was very funny. We didn’t even know his name, how could he be so familiar with us. We didn’t know what to say with our eyes full of tears. Indeed we had been suffering for several months. We couldn’t count how many nights without sleep, the hundreds of times we knelt in front of Our Lady’s statue asking her to be our intercessor. The worst thing we were afraid of was to betray her in the trial. We put our weakness into our Heavenly Mother’s hand. To be arrested someday was not terrible. The fact that Dad died just for the “Legion of Mary” was truly God’s blessing. We were not scared with whatever would happen to us except we prayed to Our Lady that she wouldn’t allow us to lose our faith. “Dearest Mother if we are to become other Judases next minute, please asks God to call us at this moment. Rose Hu's book - Joy in Suffering - in its original Chinese edition Fr. Zhang saw us with tears on our cheeks, patted us on the shoulder and said , “I am Fr. Matthew Zhang, very glad to meet you. Bishop Kung will talk to you privately after the ceremony.” When my brother was getting ready to be baptized, he was so sorry for what he had done to the Catholic Church. He wanted to imitate Saint Augustine, so he had Augustine as his Christian name. During the ceremony my brother was truly excited that the bishop himself came to baptize him. He kept joining his hands in a very fervent manner. Hearing his firm words “ I deny Satin and all his works. I’m willing to accept the Catholic faith” I burst into tears. What else could be more moving than this! Only a few months before, he was against our Church and attacked us night and day so blindly. Now we were in the same flock! How merciful God is! After the ceremony Bishop Kung had a short talk with us and gave us some rosaries and holy pictures. Finally the bishop encouraged us “You should thank God. Many trials are waiting for you. You have to walk one step at a time. Be devoted to Our Lady. Keep on climbing the spiritual hill.” After his baptism, my brother went to Mass and received Holy Communion every day. He did penance and fasted often to regret his sins of the past. Fr. Xavier Chu was his spiritual director. He kept on praising Augustine in front of many parishioners. “Though Augustine has just been baptized. See how God’s grace works on him. He loves God that much.” The Communist movement went on endlessly in the last century. The situation in China was getting more and more tense. Since my dad had a company in Hong Kong, we pushed Augustine to go to Hong Kong as soon as possible, but he rejected. He insisted on staying with us. He said ,“I’d rather be here with you than go abroad.” We explained to him. “We have no way to go out, but you can. After you get there you can work in dad’s company. In case we get arrested you are able to support us. Why we all hang up in one tree? Then there isn’t any hope.” At last Fr. Chu said “Augustine, you have to go for our Church, for your family. For yourself you have to go” On hearing this my brother said without any hesitation; :I’ll do what you say” While saying this he knelt down and asked for Father’s blessing. When he was in Hong Kong, he didn’t have a high salary and yet he only spent very little on himself. He did mail a lot of food and medicine to those who were in need, especially to the seminarians. At that time Fr. Cai (Parish Priest of Zi Jia Wei) said that without our brother’s help, some seminarians would never have been ordained. When I got to jail in 1955, through God’s providence I got many packages of food from him. Thanks be to God ! Thanks be to my dearest brother! He died of a heart attack in Osaka, Japan in 1965. Many Catholics in Hong Kong and Japan praised him and said that he was an outstanding one among them. Deo Gratias!   Chapter 4 contents Chapter 6