the problem of evil

As a victim of the incident, Jan Ruff-O'Hearn testimonied to the U.S. House of Congress, "Many stories have been told about the horrors, brutalities, suffering and starvation of Dutch women in Japanese prison camps. But one story was never told, the most shameful story of the worst human rights abuse committed by the Japanese during World War II: The story of the “Comfort Women”, the jugun ianfu, and how these women were forcibly seized against their will, to provide sexual services for the Japanese Imperial Army. In the so-called “Comfort Station” I was systematically beaten and raped day and night. Even the Japanese doctor raped me each time he visited the brothel to examine us for veneral disease

My experience as a woman in war is one of utter degradation, humiliation and unbearable suffering. During World War II, I was forced to be a so-called “Comfort Woman” for the Japanese military, a euphemism for sex slave.

But there was one thing that they could never take away from me. It was my religious faith and love for God. This was mine and nobody could take that away from me. It was my deep Faith that helped me survive all that the Japanese did to me. I have forgiven the Japanese for what they did to me, but I can never forget. For fifty years, the “Comfort Women” maintained silence; they lived with a terrible shame, of feeling soiled and dirty. It has taken 50 years for these women’s ruined lives to become a human rights issue. The war never ended for the “Comfort Women”. We still have the nightmares. After the war I needed major surgery to restore my body.

THE GIRL WITH THE SHORN BROWN HAIR (From the book Of War & Other Things © J. Dempsey Australia

Over six decades have passed since the end of World War II, yet the atrocities of the Japanese Imperial Army still remain as grief and sorrow in the heart of each individual; the wounds of the victims are yet to be healed. It has been almost 15 years since we began to pay attention to the long-concealed history of sex slavery by the Japanese Imperial Army. Stripped of their dignity and robbed of their honor even in their home countries, surviving Comfort Women were forced for many years to live their lives under the veil of shame, silently shouldering the burden of their horrific experience.

‘If God is alive and His power is everywhere present, then where are His followers; where are His Christians? Where are His real disciples? Where are the martyrs? Where is the “oomph” of Christianity - its mystery, its mysticism, its power?’