The Monte Carmelo publishing house publishes a book that corroborates the great resemblance and nuances differentiators of another of the missions in China at the beginning of the 20th century, of the Capuchins in Kansu, with that of the Augustinian Recollects in Shangqiu, of which now we celebrate 100 years.
Parallel lives. Those of all the Augustinian Recollects of China. At least, the Spanish. The same origin, identical training, shared ideals, similar hardships… Even like in physical appearance, with their long beards, identical clothes, stereotypical photos, hieratic… Many times, it is not easy to distinguish the characters. And this parallelism of the Catholic missionaries of the early 20th century in China goes beyond the institutional channels, as evidenced in a recent book: Fulgencio de Bargota. Letters from Kansu (China). 1927-1930.
This publication from the Fonte collection of Editorial Monte Carmelo (146 pages, 2022) focuses on another of the Catholic missions in China, that of Kansu, “the poorest in China”, as was the title of his memoirs, in the 1940s, one of the protagonists. Geographically, Kansu is not far from Shangqiu, and borders Qinghai, where several Augustinian Recollects sentenced to forced labor met their deaths.
The book describes that same ecclesial environment born in the heat of the encyclical Maximum Illud of Benedict XV (1919). The same enthusiastic spirit of newly ordained young people, possessed of an ideal: to conquer the world for Christ. The letters that we can read in this book are cut from the same pattern as those written by the Recollects, and were also sent to a missionary magazine with a view to the edification and the recruitment of both prayers as resources for the evangelizing work.
The vicissitudes that these Capuchins of Kansu went through are very similar to those of their companions of the Recollect habit: with their component of soldiers on the warpath harassing the missionaries, bandits lying in wait for the entire population, rampant misery and omnipresent hunger. And finally, on the other hand, by way of contrast, hunger for the Gospel and response generous to the announcement of the missionaries.
When the Capuchins left, the Augustinian Recollects had already been in China for years. For the little understood they could mean “the competition” but in the eyes of the Church and its orders they do not they are just not rivals; On the contrary, they enrich and add nuances to the missionary panorama in which the Augustinian Recollects carry out the mission of Shangqiu, the beginning of which we fulfill 100 years.
Fulgencio de Bargota Jerónimo Segura Gómez (September 30, 1899 – May 10, 1930), Navarrese Capuchin religious, died suddenly of typhus in Sifengchen, Prefecture from Pinpliang (China).
From there he regularly wrote letters to his community in Pamplona, which were later published in the magazine “Verdad y Caridad” (Truth and Charity) and which have now been republished in this book.
Rafael de Gulina, frater Fulgencio’s traveling and living companion, said after the death suddenness of this: “The sight of so much pain, and the deprivations that were imposed to mitigate it, made him “They surrendered in their fullness, when their dreams of greatness for the Mission were at their highest.”
Fulgencio’s missionary zeal is shown in one of his letters, in which he remembers with often his homeland and his literature, which he adapts to the situation in which he lives in China:
“And like the hero of Amaya standing on the summit of Aralar on the peak of Alchueta, pushing his knife he launched that cry of ambition: ‘Land of the Basques, you will be mine’, We, with the crucifix in our hands, launch another cry of missionary ambition into the air: ‘Land of Kansu, you will belong to Christ! What will all the obstacles be worth, if Christ is with us?’”.
