A life lived in Christ for others: Fr. Anthony Chan On Dong, 1926-2009

On July 21st, 1996, Fr. Anthony Chan On Dong baptized me and confirmed me in the Catholic faith.

Last Saturday I received news that he died earlier that morning after a long and intense battle with cancer. In our last conversation several months before, he had told me how grateful he was that God had given him a sign of his imminent death: a growing lump on his shoulder which his doctor said indicated the final stages of cancer. “Many people leave suddenly, without preparation,” he said his thick Chinese accent, “but God has given me this sign so that I can prepare for death. I am so blessed.”

Everyone who has faith of some degree cannot escape the realization that we owe that to someone. At the wake yesterday and the funeral Mass today I became more aware than ever of the great debt of faith which I owe to Fr. Anthony. Had it not been for him, I might never have found the apostolic faith—or kept it. In an earlier post several months ago I recalled perhaps the most important lesson I learned from this priest:

Several weeks before my baptism, Fr. Anthony requested a brief meeting with me. During our time together, he asked me why I wished to be baptized. I gave the standard catechumen’s answer.

“Because I want to follow Jesus Christ and do what He has commanded,” I said a bit sheepishly, wondering I’d said the correct words in the correct order.

He smiled, and said to me, “Good. Then it is for Jesus Christ that you are doing this. There will come a day when someone in the Church will disappoint you, or perhaps even hurt you.  Maybe it’ll even be me. Maybe I’ll run off with some woman and leave the priesthood. But you must remember your answer. You are doing this for Jesus Christ, and while everyone else in the Church might disappoint you, He won’t. So don’t leave Him.”

The picture albums that were set out during the wake and the packed church at his funeral Mass today were powerful reminders to me of the fruitfulness of a life lived for others. Even in his old age, he would go places in his scooter to visit parishioners and administer the sacraments. Having left his homeland of China as a young seminarian, he frequently expressed his wish to return to his village to celebrate Mass and give alms there—a dream which his friends helped him realize at the end of last year. The video footage showed him, all smiles, giving out ang pows (red packets filled with money) to dozens of people at a dinner he’d organized for them. Even on his deathbed, Fr. Anthony told my godfather that there were people he wished he could see so he could talk to them about Jesus Christ.

A life lived in Christ for others. This, it seems to me, is how Fr. Anthony’s life should be summed up. And what a crucial and refreshing contrast this pattern is against the frenetic quest for self-actualization and self-fulfillment that has become staple for our world and, unfortunately, for us Christians.

“Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies….” Fr. Anthony died to so much while he was alive, and because he did I owe him this life I have in Christ. Now that he has passed through the veil into the Age to Come, I count on his prayers more than ever before and hope to receive at least a fraction of that life-giving generosity that so marked his days with us.