Promising Texas

• Published date: 08 March 2023
• Publication title: The Korea Times

From the last Sunday of January to the last Sunday of February in 2023, we took the first mission trip to five Korean Catholic churches in Texas. The distance we drove on this mission was 2,698.2 miles (4341 kilometers). It is like two round trips between South Korea and North Korea.

The theme of our mission to Texas was "Rise and go on a journey. Console, console my people!" The theme was most appropriate to the difficult situations that all of us are facing throughout the world. Happily, many Korean migrant parishioners expressed that they were consoled, encouraged and strengthened through our presence. The conversations we shared with one another, and the books that we presented to them during the mission were well received.

We could meet more people because we went to the southern part of the United States in the cold winter. Parish priests also welcomed us with joy and cooperated favorably, because they were already familiar with our "Pauline" presence in Korea.

Parishioners were happy to meet us because they were thirsty for spirituality. As a result, many books were distributed, and we received another invitation to come again.

Being an area where many people are moving to, Texas is a promising destination for missionaries, with an increasing number of children, young people, young couples and highly educated professionals.

Texas, the so-called Lone Star State is very wide and vast. In fact, it was the Republic of Texas from 1836 to 1845. At that time, the landscape encompassed desert wilderness, coastlines, mountains and prairies, with diverse towns and villages, as well as a rich artistic and cultural heritage.

It is said that the future of the United States is not California, which is afflicted with high house prices, the highest level of income and corporate taxes, and excessive bureaucracy, but Texas, which is called "the heart of American conservatives," is quite different and attracting many newcomers.

Texas was originally a traditional conservative, white and...