Show Role in Today’s Religion dispelling the myth that God's ministry is “for men only" By BILL SURFACE traught Chinese weaver's wife trudged up to the Mary knoll hospital seeking “a place to sleep until I die" After quieting down the woman explained that a Chinese herb doctor had diagnosed her pains as “bad cancer" The woman's husband already angered at her apparent inability to bear children refused to pay for medication and “waste" money that he needed to “buy a baby" Moreover the landlord evicted her from their shanty on grounds that it was “against the law to die in a rented house" The sisters the woman then found a surgeon who operated on her for a slipped disc She now has two healthy babies and a husband who attends church every ed Sunday Many women missionaries though face violent death by accepting assignments in war-torareas That fact has been tragically illustrated at the Protestant Christian and Missionary Alliance’s Banmethout Leprosarium in Vietnam’s Central Highianda On the night of May 80 1962 a Viet Cong platoon stormed into the leper hospital just after a doctor’s meeting ended The Viet Cong took all the medicine and kidnapped Dr Eleanor A Vietti a missionary doctor from Houston Tex and two male nonmedical missionaries presumably making Dr Vietti the first UA prisoner in the Vietnam war 8ome missionaries heard that Dr Vietti is dead Others have been told that she was being forced to treat communist troops in a jungle Zone D Yet the hospital in the Viet Cong-helwomen missionaries did not abandon their hospital patients Mrs Betty Mitchell wife of one of the captured ministers remained at Banmethout for two years for example to help train a Baday jungle tribesman to beat lepers in the event the missionaries were ever driven away That came during the communists’ recent Tet assaults in Vietnam Two Viet Cong battalions overran Banmethout’s local militia destroyed the leprosarium and in addition to killing three ministers massacred three women missionaries —Carolyn Griswold Ruth Wilting and Mrs Ruth Thompson Still there has been no decrease in the number of women volunteering for potentially dangerous assignments Says Gerald Smith a member of the Christian and Missionary Alliance’s executive staff: “Women missionaries are just so anxious to get started today that they take the isolated dangerous posts that men often regard aa too unimportant" That type of spirit is characteristic of many women in religion today and it shows every sign of growing into a viable counteraction to the seeming weakening of religion in other aspects of modern life n d RtligioiiM librariee like thie one in Akdla India provide mieeionariee direct contact with the people An a result of their “revolution" bum are gradually leaving their eloiatered life to participate in social activities Nuns can be seen picketing forming grocery cooperatives bidding "sing-ins-" in slums or even living in an apartment like three young Franciscan Missionary nuns in Portland Ore Instead of wearing habits the nuns wear regular dresses and a cross hanging from a chain m they teach remedial reading and advise slum dwellers and other needy persons on ev erything from organising ball games to finding a lawyer to help someone In jail All denominations of Christian women are making their presence even better known as missionaries —and are engaged in such diverse projects m 1) broadcasting daily sermons over amateur radio stations to friendly Congolese livareas to 2) solving crises ing in at hospitals like the one operated by the Mary-kno- ll Sisters in Kong Kong In a reasonably typical case a young but dis rebel-controll- ed Family Weekly April H IMS f |