THE COLUMBANS ARE a society of missionaries, founded in Ireland in 1916, with home houses in Australia, Britain, Ireland, New Zealand and the US. In recent years we have ordained quite a few Columbans from our mission territories and they are the hope of the future. Our founding vision was to work in evangelization among the Chinese, but we were forced by circumstances to branch out in East Asia and South America. In the 1920s and 1930s, we were a suspicious lot to the British authorities. Documents recently released by the British government show that British diplomats in the Far East viewed us with singular suspicion: they saw us as an organization of Sinn Feiners, bent on the destruction of British institutions. It makes amusing reading today. The last Columban priest in China was expelled in 1953. Anticipating what was coming, the society expanded into the Philippines, Burma, Japan and Korea. In the 1960s, prompted by a call from the Pope, the Columbans moved into South America.

In 1964 I came to Korea as a Columban.

By any standards, the Columbans were an extraordinary group of men, especially those I call the men of old, who were mostly in their fifties or older when I got here in 1964. I look back now at these giant men, the lives they lived, the isolation and loneliness of their parishes, the Spartan conditions they endured, and I marvel at their strength.