Non-local mums giving birth in Hong Kong

Dear Readers,
You have not clicked the wrong button. It is I, Alex Kwok, writing, for the first time, on a controversial current issue in Hong Kong, the banning of non-local mothers coming into Hong Kong. Am I not supposed to be writing about the Bible? Yes I am. However, if we found the Bible irrelevant to our daily life, we had better dumped it into the dust-bin.
Do you support banning non-local expectant women coming to Hong Kong to give birth? No, I don't support the ban. I know that my position is not the popular position. But if I did not speak up for the non-local mums, I had better given up my identity as a Catholic and stopped teaching ethics.

The issue should not have become one in the first place. First of all, it is a basic human right to build up a family and have children. People have the freedom to give birth to children. It is a human instinct. Freedom to travelling is also a basic human right. Therefore, it is not right to restrict people coming into Hong Kong. Of course, some groups of people, such as terrorists and spies, are persona non grata because they threaten the security of a place. So, many politicians in Hong Kong take advantage of the fear and selfishness of Hongkongers and claim that these mainlanders, especially the "double non-local (parents)", swarm onto Hong Kong like locusts, to suck dry our resources. This is unfair because Hong Kong is supposed to be a city that subscribes to the philosophy of Free Market. Anybody can enter this market freely if they can afford to pay the price. Indeed, mainland mothers are heading West to give birth (Feb 7, SCMP).

Hong Kong has reached a certain level of affluence. She experiences the lowest birth rate in the world. As a result, many primary schools and maternity wards are closed down and the effect is spreading into the secondary level. I am not going to criticize the short-sightedness of government policies but the government has to take the blame. Back in 1999, the SAR government sought interpretation of the Basic Law to overturn the verdict of the Court of Final Appeal, thus denying the right of abode of mainland children whose parents were Hongkongers and depriving Hong Kong of children who could fill up places in primary schools, thus saving them from folding up. Of course, the government has raised the fee for non-local expectant women to give birth in Hong Kong. She can take further steps to stamp the flow. But changing the Basic Law or seeking interpretation again so as to ban the inflow should not be an option.

More than a decade ago, when it was cheap to have a mistress in mainland China, many Taiwanese and Hong Kong business men took that advantage to enjoy the sweetness of two or more families. Nowadays, when China becomes more affluent and keeping a mistress in the mainland is more expensive, the fashion fades away. When China no longer supplies cheap labour to manufacture, many businesses invest elsewhere. Let the non-local expectant mothers come. When it is no longer attractive to give birth in Hong Kong, who would come to suck up our resources? To save our primary schools and maternity wards, should we not allow non-local mothers to give birth here?

In the Bible readings today, we read of the rule stipulated in Leviticus to exclude lepers from the community (Leviticus 13:46). The Leviticus law also forbid people to touch lepers, thus making themselves unclean (Leviticus 5:3). Leprosy is infectious and threatens the health of all members of the community. Therefore, when medical knowledge was not advanced, it was a prudent law to segregate them and to forbid touching them otherwise, many more people would catch the disease. However, in the gospel, we read of the story about Jesus touching a leper out of compassion to heal him, thus breaking the Leviticus law (Mark 1:41). Of course, we can defend Jesus by saying that with his divine power, Jesus had already cleansed the leper before his hand touched him. Jesus is God and is immune to uncleanliness. We are human. How can we protect ourselves except by excluding them, banning them? In reality, without reaching out to lepers, we would not be able to come up with the medicines to eradicate leprosy on earth. Though we are not as holy as Jesus, we still have a heart of compassion to break ourselves away from selfishness. We can still help ourselves by reaching out to lepers and non-local mothers who after all are less life-threatening than lepers. Who knows? Perhaps they are sent by God to save us from unforeseeable future troubles. No matter what, being selfish is not a good. We should be cautious but fear is definitely irrational.
The leper knew his problem. He sought help from Jesus. Do we see our problem of selfishness? Do do see the problems in our society? If not, we will not seek help and there will be no hope of a cure. Compassion for the needy is a good prescription.

Dear Lord, have compassion on my sins. Open my heart to acknowledge them and thus obtain forgiveness. Strengthen my soul not to commit them anymore. Amen.