샘물교회 1차 집회 성명서 영어 번역본

[아바타있으면다냐]

아고라 자토/종토방에서 활동하는 사람입니다.
'그들의 명언들'이라는 (괴독관계) 좋은 글 스크랩해서 모으는 까훼도 운영하고 있구요.
이 곳에 올리면 안 되지만 대한민국의 한 국민으로써 너무 속이 쓰려 이렇게 올리니 많은 양해를 구합니다.
주제넘게 짧은 영어로 번역을 해봤습니다. 널리 알려주시기 바랍니다.

Sam-Mool Church Rally Manifesto

On July 19th, 23 South Korean citizens were kidnapped in Kabul, Afghanistan. Many South Koreans were shocked and anxiously followed the situation. However, they became furious due to several complications and dilemmas in the process of dealing with the situation as well as the sacrifices caused by this no-win situation.
This was brought about by Sam-Mool, a Protestant church in South Korea, which arranged ‘missionary work’ in a hazardous area through their ‘one-nation public welfare organization’.

South Korean Protestantism has become addicted to its own dogma, which singles out ‘missionary work’ for its top priority whilst it completely ignores the international context. Unsurprisingly, their ignorance of the target country resulted in an uncontrollable incident.
This type of missionary work has already been abolished by some Protestant churches. According to a daily newspaper, this was an accident, which followed the old American mission method from the 19th century for unilateral, conquering, self-praising missionary work.

Even though Sam-Mool claimed that their missionary work was voluntary in order to protect the hostages and themselves from public criticism and also from danger, the majority of the public with an endless supply of digital information did not believe them.
We had seen those images and videos on the internet which contain an application form for short term missionary work and their ‘Jesus’ preaching in Korean before the children of Afghanistan. However, Sam-Mool continued to argue that it was pure medical voluntary work.

This led to an incredible public disillusionment with the Protestant religion whose believers are supposed to be ethical and moral because not only did these volunteers and Sam-Mool representatives lie through their teeth, but they also performed ‘verbal diarrhoea’, which only came across as excuses and self-rationalisation. Besides, despite the fact that the public is foaming at the mouth, the South Korean media has been busy hiding and protecting their unjust and immoral actions on their coverage of the situation and it has also been making fools of the South Korean citizens, who can easily access international media in this global and digital era.
Broadcasts, which cover and sanctify the hostages and the people that are involved in the incident, still continue and the public feels that they have been mocked and ignored by the media, the state as well as the enormous Protestant organisation, which is nothing but a commercial establishment. The public feels betrayed by the media whose conduct is far from just and impartial.

Regardless of the fact that international media has announced that the South Korean hostages were on ‘mission’ to spread their faith, – which turns out to be true – the South Korean media is infringing the public’s ‘right to know’ by insisting that it was pure voluntary work in order to protect the hostages and the people involved in this. It is also doing its best to idealise these people by promoting the holy death of two hostages, the hostages’ voluntary ‘yielding up’ the privilege to return to South Korea and the ‘diary on the trousers’ as such.

If the South Korean media continues to flatter and fawn upon the authority like it did during the totalitarian regime and therefore does not realise its fundamental role, people will surely turn their back on it. As clear as the public’s consciousness and conscience, we hope the media will develop its quality and morality in order to go hand in hand with its public. We also hope that the South Korean government will demonstrate fairness and justice to every single citizen.

Are the Afghan hostages first-class citizens? If, in spite of many sacrifices, the government was able to deal with the matter at full tilt, why is it not trying its best to rescue the kidnapped fishermen in Somalia? How come the Afghan hostages did not pay a penny for their own safe return home, but the fishermen in Somalia have to bail themselves out?

We would also like to ask the Sam-Mool hostages. They drew so much attention to their voluntary work and surely they must realise what kind of situation those fishermen find themselves in and empathise with them, but why are they not trying to rescue those poor men? Does it not bother you because those fishermen are not your sons and daughters? Is this the right attitude for church followers and volunteers?

Not only the hostages and the Sam-Mool people are the victims of this incident, but also the South Korean public, who watched the news on the hostages everyday, worrying and hoping for their safe return home. The public has realised that the entire nation could be in danger because of a few people who blindly follow the dogma of a religion in their own peculiar way. Up until now it has only been a religious matter and according to religious theories, it has nothing to do with our safety and comfort, the public has also realised that our welfare is being threatened by these religious fundamentalists.

Moreover, the fact that Minister Park Eun Jo of Sam-Mool had announced that the church would give up on further missionary work in Afghanistan as well as other hazardous areas before the hostages were released was reversed when he said that it would continue their missionary work in Afghanistan after the release of the hostages. This statement provoked more public chaos. Of course the Protestant fundamentalists will carry on their missionary work in hazardous areas in secret. They argue that they will take full responsibility, but this type of missionary work will surely cause international repulsion. If no one stops them from doing what they have been doing until now, South Korea may have to face enemies in the Arab world, as if having North Korea on the other side is not enough.

Eventually, the South Korean government did its best to get 21 hostages released. However, an enormous amount of tax money – it is as precious as people’s blood – was wasted on this matter, the compromise with the Taliban caused international criticism as well as diplomatic damages. If the state’s honour is the same as the people’s honour, ours has hit rock bottom. That is why we accuse and criticise
1. Sam-Mool church, which firstly put all of us in danger, secondly is responsible for international condemnation and last of all, disgraced the nation
2. the media and the government, which are controlled by the insolent Protestant churches in South Korea with their bigoted method of missionary work and by the religious authority
3. the leaders of conservative Protestant churches with more than enough power and authority, who lack self-examination and reflection and send church followers to hazardous areas instead of going there themselves

We demand ‘self-cleansing’ of the Protestant church because through countless cases of scandal, corruption, bribery and accidents of the Protestant leaders, we conclude that it has lost its capability to ‘cleanse itself’. Even though these leaders are supposed to be exemplary, they have been committing adultery, frauds; they have been paid an extremely large amount of annual income for religious leaders (and even for others) and they have kept the hereditary claiming of the ministry titles, etc. Now their behaviour! cannot be understood by any of us ‘normal people’. Let us take the example of taxes. We paid the terrorist organisation Taliban our tax money in order to get the hostages released, but the Protestant church does not pay any taxes. It is only natural that we now demand that religious leaders pay taxes since they are also citizens of a nation. This society has become too transparent to simply keep this matter in the religious sanctuary. There is no reason why we should not demand transparency of the religious world, which is expected to be clean, ethical and virtuous since we have been demanding the same of the financial world. The South Korean Protestant church is degenerating this society in the era of transparency, justice and democracy.

Also this rally urges the South Korean government to re-examine the legal system in order for the nation to tackle the crises in which the conviction of a particular ‘religion’ or group is prioritised due to excessive respect for religious and ideological freedom of individuals. When the Jehovah’s witnesses refuse to join the compulsory army, the government punishes them for violating the penal law. Then why does it not punish the rash missionary work, which could cause war between two countries and then would threaten the lives of its citizens? If a religious dogma jeopardises a nation’s welfare, the nation must determine its attitude on the issue. The Aum Shinrikyo incident in Japan was also caused by the same reason. There are always people who are obsessed with a particular religion or ideology in any country or society. Therefore the state has to strengthen sanctions against these people with the help of a suitable legal system and its practice.

Furthermore, we urge Park Eun Jo and those who are involved in this matter to truthfully reflect on their behaviour!. They have been lying to the public with obscure apologies after the release of the hostages. If they have heard what the public has to say to them and meditated on their actions, they could not have commented so easily and quickly that they would keep on doing missionary work in hazardous areas for a mass production of ‘missionaries’. They are scathing the public criticism and call it ‘persecution’ because they have never really contemplated their inner selves. We, the public, urge the Protestant church leaders to realise and recognise their wrongs. We also hope that the government makes sure that Park Eun Jo, who is responsible for this incident, gets what he deserves. We hope that he does not promote enmity and discord in the name of ‘Jesus’. We hope that the government, the media as well as the Protestant church do not regard this as a rally of an anti-Christian organisation or of a few internet users. We hope that the Protestant church will listen carefully to the public criticism and accept this rally as fair criticism. We hope that it does not condemn the public, who criticises those who deserve criticism and that the Protestant church will be born again.

[NJcross]

이건 짧은 영어로 주제넘게 한게 아닌데요...대단한 실력...

[in 번역]

긴 글은 읽고 싶은 충동이 잘 생기지 않기 때문에 첫 단락만 읽었는데, 두 개만 지적하겠습니다. 샘물교회는 Saemmul Community Church입니다. 그리고 한국어의 작은따옴표는 영어로 옮길 때 큰따옴표를 대신 사용해야 합니다.

[아바타있으면다냐]

알겠습니다...고치도록 하겠습니다. 감사합니다...