THAI BINH, Vietnam (UCAN) - The selfless dedication of a Catholic couple to serve people with leprosy in northern Vietnam has inspired those suffering from Hansen's disease as well as many other people.

The couple, Joseph Nguyen Tat Thanh and Marie Tran Thi Luyen, has been living with and serving people with leprosy for 10 years in the Van Phong Center for People with Leprosy, northern Vietnam's largest leprosarium.

Thanh, 32, cooks meals there for about 500 people with Hansen's disease, including 147 who are Catholics, and Luyen grows rice and bananas, and raises poultry in the compound of the 60-hectare leprosarium. They have two children. The state-run center, founded by foreign missioners more than a century ago, is in Vu Van village, Vu Thu district, Thai Binh province, 100 kilometers southeast of Ha Noi.

Many patients living at the center and others who know the couple have told UCA News that, despite the poverty of Thanh and Luyen, their selfless service has been an inspiration. They buy food for the patients, wash their clothes, provide them with transport and bury those who have died.

One patient, an 80-year-old woman who lost her arms due to the illness, said that the couple comes around every week to visit and encourage her, clean her room, wash her clothes and bring her water. The old woman added that other patients also depend on Luyen to buy their food because they cannot walk.

Marie Bui Thi Dung, 52, observed that Thanh visits patients who are dying whenever a priest is unavailable. He encourages them to pray and repent so as to die in peace and helps bury them when they pass away, Dung said.

Thanh explained to UCA News that he just wants to be faithful to God and devote his life to serving poor leprosy patients. He added that because of this desire, he has refused an offer to become a Communist Party member.

Luyen said that despite their poverty, she and her husband willingly give poor patients money and rice. Thanh's salary is 550,000 dong (US$36.70) a month, while she makes money selling rice, bananas and poultry, she added.

Luyen admitted that she initially was afraid to live among people with leprosy and is surprised that no one in her family has yet caught the disease. All that she and her husband do, she said, is help the patients to pray, live their faith, and accept their illness and sufferings.

Thanh, whose own parents also have leprosy and live at the leprosarium, is also a lay leader of Van Mon subparish. Marie Tran Thi Hoi, the subparish council head, told UCA News Luyen is involved in many sub-parish associations, including the Catholic Mothers Association and the choir. Hoi, 50, added that she also teaches catechism and dances dedicated to the Blessed Mother in May.

According to Hoi, Thanh encourages other parishioners to pray, share God's word, and attend Mass and benedictions. She said he recently asked the local government for permission to repair the church and to build a Marian shrine at the leprosarium.

Father Joseph Mai Tran Huynh, 56, the leprosarium chaplain, also praises the couple. He told UCA News that Thanh and Luyen are courageous to live at the center and are enthusiastic in their work for the community. He commends them as "efficient collaborators" in the subparish and at three other parishes that he administers. "I appreciate their active collaboration," Father Huynh said.

Tran Chung Suc, a 60-year-old leprosy patient abandoned by his family, told UCA News he greatly appreciates Thanh for twice giving him a free ride on his motorbike to visit relatives in Thai Nguyen province, 200 kilometers away.

Perhaps Marie Bui Thi Thu, a former leprosy patient, best sums up how people regard the couple when she says all that Thanh and Luyen are doing is just living their Christian faith, by "journeying with us, the abandoned."

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