February 26, 2002

Valentine’s Day

Dear Friends,

A group of students on campus swept by with their arms loaded with roses. They hadn’t been this excited since the holidays. Each flower was a work of art, very much like a thin long-stemmed corsage. Each was slipped into a plastic tube to keep it fresh, tied with a bow, often adorned with a tiny stuffed animal or greeting card. Valentine’s Day is a gold mine for the flower markets in Thailand. Roses sell for ten times as much as they do two days on either side of February 14.

Probably no country in the world celebrates Valentine’s Day with as much enthusiasm as Thailand. It’s that way on every college campus in the country. "The day of love," it’s called by those who have difficulty pronouncing the word Valentine and who probably don’t remember the loveable saint who had such a soft place in his heart for lovers.

But Valentine’s Day in Thailand is like the red roses in their plastic tubes, rootless. Cut off from its cultural origins, the day is vulnerable. The students are casual about its meaning and creative with its symbols. It is overwhelmingly a day of excessive sentimentality, as is a lot of young love.

In this nation where Christians constitute a tiny fraction of the population there are only a few opportunities like this to tell a Christian story replete with Christian values. And what concept is richer in theological and emotional significance than love? Those of us who are in student ministry are rushing to keep up with our enthusiastic students. At Christian University we have the advantage of being able to use the weekly assembly and campus media to talk about love. We are grateful to the United Bible Societies for producing attractive materials for Valentine’s Day, and to churches in the community who hold worship services and parties for college and vocational school students.

Sometimes, though, we wonder if it’s really worth the time and resources to insert our Christian "two-cents worth" into this party the young people are having. Does anybody notice? Do they remember? Some do.

I had a call the other day from a student who was distressed about a collapsing romance. He circled vaguely around the issue of suicide a couple of times before declaring himself relieved. He called our ministry because he knew we were sincere about love. He had seen it, he said, last Valentine’s Day.

Yours,

Kenneth Dobson

The 2001 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 163