Taiwan Church News 3342 Edition March 14 - 20, 2016 Church Ministry Aboriginal Siraya's Name Rectification Movement Accumulates MomentumReported by Lin Yi-ying In order to speed up Siraya's name rectification movement, representatives of the Alliance of Siraya Churches(ASC), including ASC's president, Rev. Lee Hsin-ku(pastor of Yong-hsing church, Kaohsiung); secretary, Mr Hsiao Chi-chuang(the elder of Ko-bei church); accountant, Mr Liu Pu-chao(member of Cho-chen church) and Ms Uma Talavan(executive director of Siraya Cultural Association), held a meeting with Rev. 'Eleng Tialjimaraw(PCT's Associate General Secretary) and Rev. Omi Wilang(PCT's Secretary of Indigenous Ministry Committee) at Presbyterian Biblical College on March 8. Two agreements were reached in this meeting. First, during the first meeting of the 61th PCT Annual GeneralAssembly on April 19, a representative of the Siraya aboriginal would report to the PCT General Assembly about the current status of Siraya's name rectification movement. Second, a series of celebrations would be planed to commemorate the 380th anniversary of Christian mission inTaiwan dated back to 1636, when the first church and the first western style's school was established by the Dutch East India Company at Siraya's Sinckang village. According to the historical records, Rev. Georgius Candidius, who was a German missionary sent by the DutchEast India Company to Taiwan in 1627, is the first western missionary to preach the gospel to the Siraya tribe on Taiwan island. And such wonderful evangelical footsteps of Rev. Candidius 380 years ago is under preparation to be presented to Taiwan society and all churches! Translated by Peter Wolfe |