Pages

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Kind of a Chinese St. Thomas More


I think I've found a new role model. His name is Wu Jingxiong, a.k.a. John C.H. Wu. John was a lawyer and writer from China who had served in the Kuomintang government prior to its collapse at the hands of the ChiComs and Mao Zedong in 1949. After leaving/escaping China, John would become a long time professor at the University of Hawaii and Seton Hall University.

A couple of additional noteworthy things about John was that he was the principal author of the constitution for the Republic of China (more commonly known as Taiwan), and he was apparently somewhat of a pen pal with former U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Oliver Wendell Holmes. His correspondence with and interest in Justice Holmes was such that John would end up writing a scholarly examination of Holmes' jurisprudence.

John was also a Catholic, who converted to the faith during his adult years at the inspiration of St. Therese of Lisieux. The admiration John had for the Little Flower was such that he wrote a short pamphlet about her teachings that you can read online here.

For more biographical information about John C.H. Wu, click through here (it's where I got almost all of the above). Like the author of the linked to blog post, I'm hoping at least one of the Catholic publishers like Our Sunday Visitor and Ignatius Press reprint John's written religious works. It'd be icing on the cake for me if some publishing company would reprint his legal/law writings.

1 comment:

Pauli said...

Roger, this man sounds truly amazing. I skimmed the writings on the St. Therese website; his obvious erudition doesn't hamper the poetic melody of his writing. He writes from his heart with humility and love. Thanks.