After deadly typhoon, Episcopal ministry rescues Filipino seafarers

From the Episcopal Journal
January 2014 edition, Vol. IV, No. 1
By Jerry Hames

Chaplain James Kollin, center, with seafarers

Loggan, a Filipino seafarer on a Bahamas-registered cargo ship, had been at sea for four weeks, desperately anxious to get news about his family. After finally speaking with them and watching videos on his phone, posted by friends, that showed that they had survived, he asked for a few moments of quiet and then prayers for his family.

That scene played out in major ports across the world in November and December as anxious seafarers sought to learn about conditions at home after Typhoon Haiyan roared through the Philippines with sustaining winds of 190 miles per hour, making it stronger than all but three tropical cyclones in recorded history.

More than 5,000 deaths were caused by the devastating storm that affected an estimated 160,000 Filipino seafarers and their families. Maritime welfare agencies, many associated with Anglican and Episcopal churches, immediately sprang into action.

The U.K.–based Mission to Seafarers (formerly Mission to Seamen), which operates in many British Commonwealth countries, and the Seamen’s Church Institute (SCI), founded in 1847 by the Episcopal Church and supporting chaplaincies in the major ports of New York, New Jersey, and Oakland, Calif., responded instantly.

“The destructive typhoon that laid waste to the Philippines impacted millions of lives,” said the Rev. David Rider, president and executive director of the Seamen’s Church Institute (SCI) from his New York office. He said each seafarer from the Philippines received a free phone card from chaplains or ship visitors. “Both our coastal centers provided free Wi-Fi, which seafarers used to send messages or make calls via webcams where possible.”

The task of one SCI intern at the Newark, N.J. port — Ryan Bruns, 22 — is to pick up seafarers who have visas and are allowed to leave their ship and drive them to and from a local shopping mall. One day he noticed a Filipino seafarer had returned empty handed.

“When I asked him why, he told me that he was saving money because his house was devastated by the typhoon, and he didn’t have money to buy anything,” Bruns, a college graduate from Cleveland, recalled.

On another occasion, Bruns and fellow intern Michelle McWilliams learned from a chief cook on a cargo vessel that his house in the Philippines had been destroyed. “The cook explained that he had put in a request to leave ship before his contract was finished, which the ship’s agent had approved,” Bruns said. “Anxious to get home to his family, he wanted to make sure they were really okay and to begin rebuilding their life together.”

One of the most inspiring stories, according to an account from Oliver Brewer, SCI’s director of information, came from Port Newark chaplain James Kollin who met a seafarer named Edito. The typhoon destroyed Edito’s house, the product of ten years of saving, and forced his wife and two-year-old son to flee. Five days after the storm hit, Edito finally reached his wife by phone.

“When I went to the ship, Edito told me about his property being devastated by the typhoon,” Kollin recounted to Episcopal Journal. “He came from ground zero of the typhoon. His family was safe, they moved to a relative’s house in a safer area, but his house and property was destroyed,” he said.

Kollin, 50, who was ordained in the Episcopal Diocese of the North Central Philippines, came to the United States 13 years ago and began as an intern with SCI in 1997-98. Because he is proficient in Tagalog, one of the two major languages in the Philippines (the other is English), he is a valuable resource for the Port Newark maritime ministry.

Ordinary Seaman Edito, who has the lowest among ranks, expressed to SCI his appreciation for his job as a seafarer—work that enables him to sustain his family, to help his neighbors and to someday build another house, the chaplain said.

According to maritime records, Filipinos serving in the global shipping fleet (close to 364,000 seafarers) make up 28 percent of the crews of all ocean-going vessels.

In California, Adrienne Yee, who herself served for eight years as an officer on an ocean-going vessel, is now director of SCI’s International Maritime Center in Oakland. Like the SCI centers on the East Coast, the Oakland facility is an agent for a money-transfer system that enables seafarers to send money home.

“They have been coming in from the very beginning when the typhoon hit,” Yee said in December. “Some were unable to connect because of communications being down. On one occasion guys huddled around one seafarer who had not heard from [his family] … and on Facebook he saw a posting of them.

“That brought on a lot of cheers and smiles … we see the anticipation, we see the anxiety.”

The inability to connect with loved ones at home often leads to a call for a chaplain. “We are very sensitive to their issues,” Yee said. “We talk to them, ask questions, ask whether they want counselling or pastoral care. I have spoken with many over the past several days,” she said in an interview on Dec. 5, “and things are just beginning to settle down.”

The West Coast maritime ministry has three full-time chaplains supplemented by lay Eucharistic ministers. The team also includes an intern from the Episcopal Young Adult Service Corps, Charles Ledbetter from Southern California.

“We are ecumenical,” said Yee. “We have many different denominations under one roof, including a Roman Catholic priest, a Korean Presbyterian and a retired Lutheran pastor. But for all of us, we have one goal—and that is to service the seafarers.”

Adrienne Yee, director of the SCI's International Marine Center in Oakland, Calif., at the Port of Oakland with seafarers from the container ship William Shakespeare.

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Jerry Hames is a senior correspondent for Episcopal Journal.
Top photo courtesy of James Kollin/SCI Newark.
Bottom photo courtesy of Adrienne Yee/SCI Oakland.


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