Taiwan Church News

3829 Edition

July 14 ~ 20, 2025

Weekly Topical

Repair and Recovery Desperately Needed After Typhoon Danas Swept Across Southern Taiwan

Jointly Reported by Lin Yi-ying and Dalul

Typhoon Danas swept across western Taiwan from south to north in the early morning on July 6, causing a serious destruction along coastal areas of Tainan and Chiayi. Rev Ng Tiet-gan, secretary of PCT Church and Society Committee, visited the typhoon-inflicted areas to survey the devastation on July 12.

In addition to external damages to many church buildings, the surveillance team led by Rev Ng found that actual casualties in scale and statistics to the houses of PCT members were even bigger than previously expected. For the PCT General Assembly (GA) to offer first-aid and resources to the needy, Tainan presbytery and Church and Society Committee of Jiayi presbytery were both requested by Rev Ng to collect statistic data on actual damages of local churches and their members.

On July 12th, Rev Ng and Elder Yu Zong-ren, director of Church and Society Committee of Chi-Hsin presbytery, visited 12 churches, including Pei-Men-Yu, Hsue-Chia, Liu-Wang, Chia-Li, Ma-Dou, Yan-Shui, Yi-Chu, Dong-Hou-Liao, Bu-Bao, Hsin-Chi, and two other churches, located in the presbyteries of Tainan and Jiayi, as well as Tainan Campus of Aletheia University.

Up to date, Rev Ng expressed, Church and Society Committee of Taipei presbytery promised to support Jiayi presbytery, and Church and Society Committee of Chi-Hsin presbytery pledged to help Tainan presbytery in post-typhoon recovery. The PCT GA would deliver its first-aid priority to those seriously impacted churches with rare resources, while the churches with better financial conditions had already started immediate repairs, according to Rev Ng.

As Tainan campus of Aletheia University was severely damaged, under the suggestion by Elder Yu Zong-ren, Dr Lee Yi-fang, president of Aletheia University, issued an open letter to its alumni association to raise fund for an urgent recovery. In response to the open letter, a cash amount of NT$ 1.5 million was quickly raised for Tainan campus of Aletheia University.

In the past, people were used to thinking eastern Taiwan would confront typhoons first, but not again this time, the path of Typhoon Danas swept through western Taiwan from south to north. Rev Ng indicated that the awareness of typhoon disaster in western Taiwan seemed relatively weak, and the first-aid mobilization inside Church and Society Committee of each presbytery should be improved in the future.

He also mentioned that, after Typhoon Danas, Jiayi presbytery promptly convened a temporary meeting, resolved to establish a command center on July 10, and designated some dates of Sunday service to raise fund for the severely affected churches and members. “This is an efficient cooperativenetwork worthy to follow up among other presbyteries,” he remarked.

After Typhoon Danas, Hsin-Wen Church of Jiayi presbytery and the area around Hau-Mei-Li were both severely hit. Meanwhile, Bai-Shuei-Hsi Church was also seriously damaged. As the recovery of traffics, water, electricity and facilities for agricultural and fishery farmings could not be restored overnight, regular services and meetings of the church were therefore seriously interrupted. A dire demand for house-repair and construction worker is therefore needed.

Rev Kang Wen-hsiang, pastor of Hsin-Wen Church, recounted that on the very day when Typhoon Danas swept across, “almost electric poles and roadside trees near the church all fall down, the traffics is totally stopped. The church has no tap water or electricity for days, tiles of the church’s roof peeled off, front door broken, electric gate derailed, ground to third floors inundated, and certainly facilities are all seriously damaged.” After the typhoon disaster, Rev Kang said, the church tried to locate an electricity generator first to support basic lighting and pumping out of water flooded into the church buildings. The electricity from Taiwan Power Company was not restored until July13th, and the following recovery would be a great challenge to work on, he said.

According to Rev Kang the devastation in the neighboring Hau-Mei-Li community was much more striking: the windbreak ephedra forest had been severely damaged and fallen down; thousands of oyster racks were swept ashore by huge waves; even some of them were still floated along the coast, soon they will be washed up onto the land; many roofs of the chicken coops raised by some church elders were lifted due to strong winds, seven or eight metal doors were utterly broken, and farming facilities such as fish-feed barrels, oxygen-pumping equipments and electric motors were all badly damaged. All these casualties caused a big blow to daily livelihood of local residents, he said.

On Sunday service on July 13th, vice president Hsiao Bi-khim came to visit Hsin-Wen Church to care the inflicted residents. Introducing herself as the daughter of Rev Hsiao Ching-fen, who pioneered to establish of Hsin-Wen Church, vice president Hsiao affirmed the close cooperation between local governments and lawmakers to deliver first-aid relief, and encouraged the church members to carry on the spirit of “burning but not consumed”, which is a PCT motto to inspire people to love each other and stand firm in dark hours.

Rev Kang sincerely called to the public, “currently the urgent need is not drinking water or food, but repair manpower and skill workers, including plumbers, electricians, ironworkers, door/window fixers, roof maintenance workers, waterproof canvas and plastic cloths and miscellaneous resources to facilitate house repair.”

Bai-Shuei-Hsi Church, located at Baihe district of Tainan City, was also hit hard by Typhoon Danas, with more than one-third of its chapel roof was blown away by strong winds. This made raining waters easily poured into the chapel and caused great damages to the sound control system, pianos and pew seats. Church deacons urgently laid a plastic canvass for emergency, but the main roof-structure was obviously ripped off and rocked loose. It is estimated that the damaged roof could not withstand the next wave of strong wind and rain, so an urgent repair is urgently needed.

Evangelist Liu Hong-chuin, pastor of Bai-Shuei-Hsi Church, said that the iron eaves of the pastor’s residence hall fell off, and the falling rain penetrated into the wall and the ceiling via cracks. A short term mission team from Tainan Holiness Church, which was scheduled to hold a missionary service at Bai-Shuei-Hsi Church, immediately turned into disaster relief volunteers after Typhoon Danas. More than 20 youth went into the church and its community to do clean-up jobs, which significantly relieved the labor shortage of repair workers. Due to a stable power supply is still under way, the Bai-Shuei-Hsi Church is now facing a decision: whether its regular service should be relocated into the education hall or the community-care center?

Typhoon Danas also brought a big damage to Tainan Office of Taiwan Church Press. The iron cover on the roof was ripped off by strong winds, resulting rainwater pouring in, and the stocks in warehouse were spoiled with an estimated loss about NT$ 200,000. As the affected stocks were under way to clean and count, TCP earnestly wished that PCT members and the public could deliver relief with intercession and donation.

Translated by Peter Wolfe