After six months of preparation, United States Culture Regeneration Research Society (U.S. CRRS) concluded their annual fund-raising dinner banquet on Sept. 5 and Sept. 7 at Silicon Valley and Los Angeles in California. Around 800 ministers and co-workers, brothers and sisters participated, and the total donation reached $100,000 USD.
At the beginning of the dinner held in Silicon Valley, the hosts arranged for a Cantonese musical performance which sang of the hopes for the blood-related kin to come to know the gospel.
Following the performance, the CRRS staffs gave a report of the fruitful progress and shared the cries of the impoverished students in China longing for love and care. Dr. Thomas Leung, founder and president of CRRS, shared from the bottom of his heart of the long-term implications and meaning of supporting the impoverished students in China to continue their education; not only are they helping to change the destinies of the students living in poverty, but they are also giving them true love and compassion, which influences them to have a correct outlook on life and sets of values by loving the society and others.
Coming from Canada, Dr. Leung served as the speaker for the night. In his sharing, he described a touching memory that remained in his heart when he went to Sichuan disaster-relief zone. He saw a nurse working strenuously to care for the wounded, and the nurse so happened to be one of the students that they’ve supported. A few years ago, the family of this girl has told her several times to drop-out from school despite her earnestness to study. Because of her good grades, her teacher could not see her drop-out, so he supported her education from his meager salary of $700 Yuan per month. This young girl luckily entered an excellent medical university, but was going to give up because of the inability to cover for high-cost tuition. At that time, Dr. Leung heard of her story and decided to support her in continuing her education. Soon afterwards, a doctor specializing in Chinese medicine heard of this story and told Leung that he would contribute since he has more money. Then, another doctor who practices western medicine took over the sponsorship because he said he earns more money than the former doctor.
Lastly, although Leung and the CRRS staffs did not preach the gospel to this girl, she took the initiative in becoming a Christian. She said, “Because seeing what you have done and your love, I know that this faith is good. I’m willing to believe.”
After the Sichuan earthquake, Leung was very touched when he saw she as a hospital intern is paying full attention to care for the wounded.
“Seeing the love that we gave out has become the power of his life….when we give them unconditional love, they will also learn to love others,” said president of CRRS.
As a Chinese, Leung shared how whenever he thinks of the recent Chinese history of shame he would feel very sorrowful. He would ask if there is anything that he can do for China.
While growing up in Hong Kong, one of Leung’s biggest dreams is to do something for China that has received so much suffering in the last century. He called for healing for China. After living overseas and living the best lives, he realized that always criticizing China would do any good for the Chinese. We should give out with this heart of love and face the mistakes made in history with this embracing heart of forgiveness.
In 1993, Leung said that he felt the calling to save China. Instead of always criticizing China, he should go into China and experience the sufferings and difficulties. With this inspiration, he founded CRRS. To save China, you have to first save her spirit, her culture, and her soul. As China is going through tremendous development, we are bringing love, morality, and consciences into this nation.
When CRRS first started out, they began by interacting with the universities, then the villages, and they researched about the difficulties of the village farmers and city workers. That was when they started fund-raising to support the education tuition of the less fortunate, giving hope to the hopeless and allowing them to build their own future. They went deep into the mountains and walked along with the poor and the city workers. They told them that they love them unconditionally, where they don’t need to repay them. If they want to repay, then they should repay the country, their own kin, and their families. If they learn to love others, then that was repayment.
Seeing the poor students growing up one by one and learning to love others, Leung is very joyful. He said that they have setup their determination to be a person with morals, to be an anti-corruption public official, and to be a CEO with conscience. For them to make the decisions to be different from the majority and to be a good person, this is CRRS’s mission, planting love into the Chinese people. Even though what we do may be insignificant in size, where only around several thousand students have been helped, we have raised several thousand people with conscience and morals.
“I’m very happy that there are many brothers and sisters starting to come together with us to sacrifice for them, to help China with the heart of love. We have participated during this very important time of China’s development. We are participating in a very great history. Before, I was so much in sorrow, but today, I am exceedingly joyful, because there is a heart of love igniting inside of my heart and seeing the results of the ministry. Each time that I think of that there are many people who are waiting for our help, I still feel very sorrowful, but when I think about the fruits, there is also joy. I hope to share with everyone this sorrow but also this joy,” exhorted Dr. Leung.
On Sept. 28, Canada CRRS will hold their annual fund-raising dinner banquet with the theme of “Igniting the Dream, Spreading Compassion” in Vancouver.
[Editor's note: reporter Ruth Wong in San Francisco contributed to this report.]
