Oral History Project
Candler School of Theology
Sample Life Stories
SOOMEE KIM— Student Life and Campus Ministry, Claremont School of Theology, California
Presentation on 5 February 2001, Candler School of Theology, Women in Theology and Ministry Covenant Dinner [Narrative is lightly edited for a written manuscript.]
"I was born and raised in Seoul Korea, and my family was Buddhist. My parents are still claiming to be Buddhist. I remember when I was young. My birthday happened to fall on a very special day in the Buddhist calendar, so I remember Mom waking me up early in the morning and taking me to the temple. Temples are usually in the mountains, so going there took a couple of hours on the bus, and then we got off the bus about the time the sun was getting up and we walked up the hill to go to temple. I guarded my mother's shoes because people have to take their shoes off to go to the sort of sanctuary where they worship. . .
"I went to Sunday school once in my life. There was a new church opening in our neighborhood and one of my friends said, 'If we go to that church, we will get cookies.' And I thought, 'Free cookies, okay!' So we did go. . . I don't remember exactly what they taught us, but we had to sit through this time, and they showed us a film. I remember there was a man who came out of a tomb, and there was a lot of celebration, and then we got our cookies. That was the extent of my Sunday school experience.
"Then I went to Ewha Girl's High School. This was the school founded by Methodist missionaries in the late 1800's, and that was during the time when, in Korea, public schools were reserved for boys and girls from rich families, who had their own private tutors. They didn't have school for ordinary girls from regular families, so these missionaries came, and they started opening schools. The school started with one girl actually so, when they write the name of the school in English, they say Ewha Girl's School because they wanted to honor that first student.
"Anyway, I went to Ewha, not because I was interested in Christianity or in Methodism, but because this school, by the time I was ready to go in the '70s, was famous for bringing up women leaders. The first woman lawyer from Korea came out of this school. There were a lot of women who came out of this school, and I wanted to be the first woman something. But we had mandatory Bible classes, and we had mandatory chapel times. I rebelled in my teenage years, and I told my chaplain that I am an atheist so don't try to convert me to Christianity. But there were some things I picked up in names and ideas, mostly because the spirit of this school was love, peace and freedom. Those were the school mottos. And they tried to live by these mottos.
"After graduating from high school, I came to the United States and struggled to adjust and learn the language and all that. About three years later, I met Christ. . . and I became a Christian. I knew I was a Christian, and then, as I was beginning to get into the Christian learning, I realized that all those things they had talked about in high school really started making sense. So the seed that was planted in high school was beginning to bloom and beginning to bear fruit. After about ten years of that, I was called to go to seminary. To make a long story short, I was ordained in '93, and I was an Associate Pastor for about five years, and then I was ready to go to a church on my own. I told my District Superintendent, 'Now I'm ready; I can do a good job, so just give me a church and let me do the work.'
"I don't know how many of you are Methodist, but you usually get the phone call about ten o'clock in the evening from your district superintendent. This was about ten-thirty. He called me and said, 'Well, the Bishop is appointing you to go to First United Church of San Fernando.' I got the Journal and looked it up. The church was about fifteen miles away. He explained about the church and all that. So that evening, after I hung up the phone, my husband and I talked about going there, and then we decided to drive out to San Fernando and check out this church. It was almost midnight by then, and we drove out and found that the neighborhood was not as pleasant as, you know, the present church. There were these iron fences and lots of liquor stores, and there was this billboard and they were all in Spanish and I didn't know any word in Spanish. How am I gonna pastor in this church? And I got sick.
"As a Methodist pastor, you agree to go wherever the Bishop sends you, but this was not the neighborhood I wanted to be, and I was very, very sick. But I did go because, through prayer, God convinced me that that's where God wanted me to go. The cabinet did not make a mistake; they heard God correctly. I tried to figure out what is God wanting me to do in this church? This was a very big Anglo church, predominantly Anglo, in the '70s. Now the church was shrinking, and has about a 200 membership. The neighborhood has changed, and is in a very Hispanic neighborhood. What is a Korean woman going to do in this church?
"A few weeks into the church I started researching, and I found that this church was the first Methodist church founded in the valley. The valley is sort of the north part of Los Angeles. The first founder was somebody named Dr. Maclay. Dr. Maclay was one of the five Maclay boys who were all Methodist pastors, and one of them, Robert Maclay, started a school of theology, Maclay School of Theology, which became Claremont School of Theology. So Claremont School of Theology was born in that church on Third Street. And then I also found out that Dr. Maclay was the leader of missions in Asian countries. Dr. Maclay led the first group to China, and then he was the first [modern missionary] who actually put foot on Korean soil. The man who had started the school for boys in Korean, and Mrs. Scranton, who started Ewha High School, my alma mater, were his assistants.
"So I was looking at the history and thinking about how God had nurtured me through the high school, where I didn't know about Christianity. Talk about prevenient grace! That was right there. And then there was the church that sent the first missionaries. . . I was called back to that church to pastor. I was the first woman and the first ethnic minority in their 122 years history. Talk about connectionalism and the big circle! Somehow, when I was ready to open to God's leading, God lead me back to where the mission started, the Methodist church. This is my fourth year there. We are opening our doors to the neighbors. We have a school where children come. We have up to fifth and sixth grade. I do chapel time with them, so my training in the public school is sort of helping that side of ministry. Because I am a different color, people who are yellow and brown colors feel comfortable, and they have started coming to our church."