Introducing “Crossroads – A Journey from Communist China to Christ”     

Bob Blundell,  a former columnist at Catholic Stand has written a book, “Crossroads – A Journey from Communist China to Christ”.  Bob brings one of the stories from the reign of Mao into the light. It is not a detached account; “John Ma” has been Bob’s beloved friend and brother in Christ for more than seven years. This article is the first of a three-part series of excerpts introducing readers to Bob’s new book.

Crossroads provides a glimpse into a time in China’s history most of us never knew. A survivor of that tumultuous period, spent thirty years seeking peace and understanding. His travels took him across the world as he explored dozens of faiths. When traditional religion failed him, he sought fulfillment through shamans, mystics, and the supernatural. This book is not as much about one man’s struggles, as it is a testament to God’s love and commitment to remain with each of us throughout the storms of our lives.

The following is an excerpt from the opening chapter of Crossroads.

Imagine for a moment you live in a time where lawlessness and violence flood the streets like a raging river. It’s a time of rebellion, uncertainty, and chaos. This story is about a man raised in that world, in China in the 1960s. As a child living in an atheist country immersed in turmoil, he was forced to witness atrocities and suffering most of us can only imagine.

He later fled to America with only a few US dollars, and minimal English skills and was educated as a psychologist. Though he physically escaped the clutches of the country he was raised in, the traumas of his childhood remained like a dark cloud of depression and despair.

My name is John Ma. It is a pseudonym. For reasons you’ll learn as you read my story, I have chosen to remain anonymous. I was born in China and lived there for the first 23 years of my life. I am the son of college professors who taught in the university system in Beijing in the 50s and 60s. For over two decades I lived under the rule of the communist Chinese government before escaping to America in 1986. I tell my story now so others may learn from the journey

God created for me. It is a pilgrimage that has taken me around the world in search of truth and meaning. My footsteps have sometimes led me to dark forbidden places, but each step was part of God’s plan for me. I had to explore, stumble, and fall so that I might be saved through the love and grace of our Savior, Jesus Christ. As you hear my story, I pray you will see and understand, the Lord is always with each of us every minute of our lives.

When I came into the world, my country was in the throes of the worst famine in world history. The Chinese communist party had been in control for seven years, and Mao Zedong ruled the most populous country on earth with an iron fist. The Great Leap Forward, Mao’s flawed plan to thrust China into the forefront as an industrial giant, had already sputtered and failed. It had left tens of millions dead due to hunger, as well as millions of other fatalities through atrocities perpetrated by the government. It was a time of anarchy and upheaval. We were a land and a people ruled by intimidation and violence.

My most vivid memories are shaded by a paralyzing fear and terror that engulfed me, following me wherever I went. Fifty years later, that same cloud of darkness remains a part of my life. I can no more put the memories behind me, than I could walk without legs or live without my heart or lungs. I am stained by what I witnessed and experienced in China, but thanks to God I have hope.

Growing up in the Chinese culture is a structured existence. It is a regimented life, laden with obedience and conformity. Non-conformists do not survive in China. They are ostracized, discounted, and rarely able to persevere.  From my earliest memories I resisted conformity. I questioned many of the tenets I was taught as a child. I wondered, ‘Why did I exist? What was my purpose?’ That is the reason I became a psychologist: to gain an understanding of life’s meaning.

I was born in 1964. My mother was a professor of Mathematics, and my father was a professor of Sociology. They were strict disciplinarians, as was often the case with Chinese parents in that time. I had three sisters. The youngest was seven when I was born. The other two were teenagers who soon became obsessed with the revolution and left my parents’ home to perform the work of the communist party. One served the party by living in Mongolia and becoming a shepherd. The other was called to the southern part of China where she lived her life as a peasant. These were the occupations the party chose for them. Neither of them played a role in my upbringing.

My birth was not a planned event for my parents. For months, my mother hid the fact she was pregnant from my father because he did not want any additional children. When she gave birth to me, like many Chinese women during the famine in the 60s, she was malnourished, a victim of the Great Leap Forward. I was born with Rickets, a disease which is most common in third world countries. I struggled with many physical and psychological problems in my early years such as insomnia, depression, respiratory issues, and skeletal muscular problems, partly due to the disease but also because of the harsh environment I grew up in.

The most frightening days of my childhood in China were when my mother and father were taken by the government to a ‘reeducation’ camp. The camps were intended to mold and change the ideological values of those deemed to be dangerous to the communist party. They were designed to brainwash and turn the victims into better communists.

My parents were accused of being spies because they spoke English and had ties with American professors. This was a bitter pill to swallow for them because they were very loyal to the Mao government. Since my parents were intellectuals, and potential enemies of the party, many of their friends abandoned them. In those days it was dangerous to have ties with people being investigated by the government. It was much like the German citizens distancing themselves from the Jews in the early days of Nazi Germany. I could tell this hurt my parents greatly, though they rarely spoke of it in front of me or my sister.

My father was the first to be taken, but soon after my mother was also sent to the camp to be indoctrinated in the communist ways. My two oldest sisters had already left our home to become revolutionaries, so my 11-year-old sister was left alone to take care of me. I was just four. On some days my mother would be allowed to return home in the evenings, but on many occasions over several months, she was held at the camp. No one told us if our parents were alive or if they would be coming back. Not knowing was the most frightening part of our lives.

There were community canteens where my sister and I were allowed to eat three meals a day during the months when my mother was gone. Neighbors also provided some meals for us as best they could. Each morning when we were alone, my sister dressed me, then packed me up and carried me to kindergarten. She went on to her school and when her classes were over, she took me home and we were alone in the evenings.

In those days, government sponsored militias roamed the streets and would often break into homes of those deemed to be enemies of the state. There was no police presence as we have in the United States. Mao was a master at mobilizing the masses of revolutionaries to perform the work of the communist party, and his utilization of the militia was very effective. By 1959 there were over 100 million militia members and thousands of militia units across the country. Their mission was to ‘dig out subversives’ within the country. They received arms and training from the Chinese army and operated independent of the military. In short, they were given autonomy to deal with enemies of the party in whatever manner they deemed necessary.

It was common for them to attack houses late at night when most people were sound asleep. They would pound on our door and there was often loud music being played outside. The music was intended to amplify the terror of the people asleep in their beds and incite the mob to a frenzy. It was quite effective in achieving both.

When my father had been taken and only my mother remained, they would beat on the front door late at night and scream until she allowed them into the house. They went from room to room searching for any anti-revolutionary material. They also checked the IDs of all that lived in the house. Much like the Jews in Nazi Germany, people of questionable loyalty to the communist party were required to maintain identification cards.

When we heard them pounding on our door, my sister and I huddled in the corner of our bedroom hoping these angry men would not hurt us. They entered each room, shining flashlights in our faces, and counting the number of people in the house to ensure we were not protecting other enemies of the state. I learned to lay in my bed and stare up at the ceiling during unannounced searches. It was a way of taking my mind away from the terror. The ceiling became my best friend.

Those moments at night after my mother was taken were the most frightening times of my life. Every breath I took, every conscious thought I had, was of pure terror and fear. There were evenings when we could hear the militia approaching. There was loud screaming and sometimes they shot guns into the air. My sister and I would wrap our arms around each other for protection and close our eyes and pray. Though our parents were atheists and we had not been taught about God, we prayed to the heavens that we would be protected and spared from the violence. We slept together in the same bed in the evenings. This somehow gave us a heightened sense of security. My sister kept a pair of my mother’s sewing scissors beneath her pillow. Neither of us knew what we would do with the scissors if the militia broke in and tried to harm us. But having it within arms’ reach somehow gave us comfort.

Once darkness fell, the militia came out and roamed the streets. The black of night held our greatest fear. My sister and I began going to sleep as early as seven each evening.  Sleep was our only escape from the terror. It was only then that our minds could go to another place and our fear would subside. We would fold ourselves into the bed and pull blankets over our heads for protection from the perils of what lay outside our home.

I missed my mother terribly when she was away. My sister did the best she could to support me, but she was a child herself with her own psychological needs. I sat in school each day worrying about what they may be doing to my mother while she was held captive. I was an extremely introverted child who rarely spoke. It was in those days that I first became aware of my depression. It was an immense darkness that sucked the very life from me, leaving me paralyzed in fear all the time. I didn’t know at the time the darkness would remain with me for the rest of my life.

I don’t know what I would have done or how I would have survived if my sister had not been there to protect me. God often uses other people to lift us up and progress us along our journey toward Him. In those two years when my parents were away, my sister was one of those people. I know without a doubt the Lord gave her the strength and courage to get us through those times.

During this period in the larger cities, public beatings were common. Dissidents or counter revolutionaries were paraded onto elevated stages or onto city squares and beaten by militia or communist party members as a visible deterrent to others. Citizens who lived in the area were required to come out of their homes and witness this brutality. No one could hide from the violence. I remember seeing my mother’s cousin drug out onto the stage and I watched as he was beaten with a stick. It was a common practice to push the victim to their knees then militia members would grasp their wrists and pull their arms back while the victims screamed in pain. Their arms were either broken or their shoulders dislocated. My mother’s cousin survived the beating that day but was left with two broken arms.

My mother also had a colleague from the university, a fellow professor, who was always holding her right arm tightly against her side. I asked my mother one day what had happened to her, and she told me her friend had been put out on the stage and beaten by the militia. They pulled her arms harshly behind her, permanently injuring one arm. This was often referred to as the ‘airplane gesture’, based on the way the victims’ arms were lifted back like wings on an airplane.

My mother never had to suffer the pain or humiliation of those beatings, but my father was not as fortunate. On one occasion, my father was taken and thrown onto a wooden podium and beaten.

My sister was with him at the time and was forced to watch. I am grateful that I was spared that day from seeing him endure the pain and humiliation.

Suicides were quite common, especially for the groups that had been targeted by the Mao regime. A colleague of my fathers from the university committed suicide by hanging himself. A Math professor he worked with beat his head against a stone wall until he was unconscious. We also had a family friend my parents’ age, who purposely leaped headfirst off a pier into a shallow pond, breaking his neck. Another family member, a school principal, committed suicide after being ostracized and beaten by militia members. While my father was being held in the reeducation camp, I wondered each day if he would reach the end of his rope and kill himself. I lived in constant fear for his safety.

Two years after my father was first taken to the reeducation facility, he and my mother were allowed to return to our home. For a short period of time, we became a family again, living under the same roof in our apartment in Beijing. But soon, the government required us to pack bags and board a train that would take us a thousand miles south to a work camp. We would spend the next three years there as prisoners of the state.

THE END OF EXCERPT ONE

Bob Blundell’s book is available on Amazon.