CHINA, December 13, 2007 — Bibles printed by the Amity Printing Company (APC) will be provided to participants in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. The Director General of China State Administration for Religious Affairs, Minister Ye Xiaowen, made this announcement at a day of celebrations in Nanjing on Saturday, December 8.
The celebrations acclaimed the production of the 50 millionth Bible by APC since it began production in October 1987 and the signing of an official agreement extending the joint venture between Amity Development Company (ADC) and United Bible Societies (UBS) in APC which made the printing of Bibles possible. It also provided a preview of the press APC will start running in May 2008, which will have a capacity double that of the present press.
To a traditional Chinese welcome of firecrackers and drumming, UBS representatives, Chinese Church leaders, leaders of churches in Hong Kong, and national and provincial officials, gathered to celebrate the achievement so far and to witness the signing of an agreement to extend the partnership between ADC and UBS until 2018.
Such is the speed of Bible production at APC that when the 50 millionth Bible came off the presses in September, it was less than two years since the celebration held to mark 40 million Bibles. The third event of the celebration was a visit by guests to APC’s new facility which can produce 12 million Bibles per year.
APC began operating in 1987 and became a joint venture between Amity Printing Press and UBS the following year. Some of those who pioneered its Bible-printing ministry were present at the celebration. As they made their way towards the venue, some of them were eagerly looking out for once-familiar landmarks which have now become unrecognisable or have vanished completely under the huge, fast-paced development of Nanjing.
The UBS Asia Pacific Area Secretary, David Thorne, was heavily involved in many aspects ofsetting up the press, from selecting the site, to planning the layout of the press, buying the equipment and training the workers. On Saturday he vividly recalled some of the challenges encountered in the early days. At the start, he said, APC had to hire and train technicians from the rural areas who really only knew about tractors. Today, the company can boast of at least 350 employees who include some of the best trained technicians in the printing business.
The arrival of the UBS visitors prompted loud applause and on entering the hall the guests were awed by the artistic skill of the Rev Dr Chow Lien Hwa, the APC Board Vice-Chairman, as he used his calligrapher’s brush to display four large-scale characters which translated, simply and powerfully, as ‘Working for the Lord’.
Qiu Zhonghui, General Secretary of Amity Foundation and Chairman of APC, viewed the extension of the cooperation with UBS as of great importance. It was the 20-year relationship between the two, he said, that made Bishop Ting’s original dream of Bible printing by the Chinese for the Chinese into reality. He affirmed his strong belief in the extended agreement and promised a continuing effort by APC to serve the Church in China and overseas.
The Rev Dr Miller Milloy, General Secretary of UBS, said that in addition to what had already been achieved, more work was still required, especially in the areas of Scripture translation, printing and distribution. This, he said, was the motivation behind UBS’s collaboration with partners such as APC. He was proud of the work done by churches in China and believed that the extension of the joint venture would greatly extend the Bible ministry and that in turn will greatly benefit coming generations.
The speeches over, the two General Secretaries signed the agreement, shook hands, exchanged documents and smiled while the cameras flashed.
In a final prayer, Bishop Rune Backlund, UBS Global Board representative, gave glory to God and entrusted the future partnership, the churches, the leaders and the workers to him.
Celebrating 50 million Bibles
After the signing ceremony at APC, guests attended the celebration marking the completion of the 50 million Bibles. Organised by the National Committee of the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) of the Protestant Churches in China and the China Christian Council (CCC), and hosted by Amity Foundation, this was held in the Fengze Hall, in the Shuixiu Garden Hotel.
Appropriately, since the printing of Bibles in China was an unlikely-seeming idea that came to Bishop Ting more than 20 years ago, the first speech given was his – read out for him by Mr Qiu. He said it was the cooperation between the central and provincial government, UBS, Chinese churches, Amity Printing Company and donors all around the world that had made his dream come true and the speed at which it had happened had provided solid evidence of the Government’s reform and religious freedom policy.
The Rev Cao Shengjie, President of the China Christian Council, compared what had been achieved in 2007 with the situation in the early 1980s, when the TSPM/CCC started printing just three million bibles in Shanghai, Jiangsu and Fujian.
Dr Milloy recalled the beginnings of Bible ministry in 1985 when UBS came into contact with Amity Foundation and he commended the Foundation for its social ministries. He said the TSPM was successful in leading the Chinese churches and the expansion of the Bible ministry that was benefitting many young people. And he cited the example of Han Duan, the leading striker of the China women’s national football team, whose testimony was recently featured in a Gospel Portion. He also recalled a conversation with Minister Ye Xiaowen, the Director General of the State Administration for Religious Affairs. When they were talking about everyone in the world having something from China, Minister Ye said, “Why not Bibles?”
Minister Ye himself began by quoting Psalm 133:1: ‘How wonderful it is, how pleasant, for God’s people to live together in harmony!’ He commended those responsible for the remarkable achievement of 50 million Bibles, thanked UBS and friends both at home and abroad for their support and assured his hearers that the Chinese government would continue to support Bible printing by means such as tax exemption on printing and distribution, and measures which kept the price low in comparison to other similar books. The recent exhibition about China’s Bible ministry, which was held in New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Cologne, had, he said, helped to convey accurate information about the accessibility of the Bible to Chinese people.
Free, high-quality Bibles would be made available to participants in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, he said. Rev Cao Shengje, President of CCC, said in her speech earlier, that the Games would be a great opportunity for sharing between Chinese Christians and Christians around the world. And, developing Bishop Ting’s well known remark, “The Bible unites us,” Minister Ye said, “The local production of Bibles not only unites us but also delights us!”
Starting the new press
The press at the new APC facility, which is due to open officially next year, is a British-made Timson T32 high-speed web press. Costing 32 million yuan (about US$4.3 million), it is capable of printing 18,800 pages per hour. The new facility will double the annual output of the present press to 12 million Bibles per year.
After lunch, the guests visited the 37,000 sq m first phase of the new facility and David Thorne and Li Chunnong, Acting General Manager of APC, were jointly invited to inaugurate the new web press and the two men duly pushed the button – an act packed with hope for the future.
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