Growing up, I went to a good school which had a sizeable number of asians. Their parents were made up of the major groups Hong Kong background, Korean background and Vietnamese background.
Now I don’t mean to suggest that my school represents the number if Asian Australians in the whole of Sydney but it just made me wonder why there aren’t many Vietnamese or Vietnamese-Chinese christians around…
Looking around the churches today, there seem to be many churches of Hong Kong and Korean background but there’s a pretty big gap for Vietnamese Australians I have to say…
A couple of possible reasons that came to mind was:
Parent/cultural background: Koreans have a pretty decent history of Christianity in South Korea and I suppose since Koreans came here, they brought it with them and established churches here, raising up their children to know Jesus (or go to church at least).
Similar thing with Hong Kong – since its influence from British rule, Christianity it seems is pretty big in HK. So many celebrities are Christians and are upfront about it. Lots of my parents and their friends seemed to go to Catholic or Protestant private schools…so I guess migrating here they brought it over.
Being more western minded I guess I never thought of my faith as part of my community or family since I guess we see it as more individual. But perhaps it does show that our families and culture play an important role in passing faith down the generations.
Secondly I to generalise (apologies) many Vietnamese live or at least congregate in the South West of Sydney where my church is. Since there’s such a huge mentality of moving out the South West it seems not many people stay and from the other end, not many people go there to start churches…
There are some faithful people doing a great job but I guess they could do with lots more help and prayers especially…
Why do you think there seems to be so little Vietnamese Australian christians?
Grace Lung 