Even after reading their story many times, poring over the treatment and the first draft of our script, it still touches my heart. I wept as I heard Vivian speak at this event. Here is a copy of her speech and a we will add link to our YouTube channel to watch the full speech.
The System is the Problem
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"I was living in a system where injustice and misfortune are skewed as justice, where the conscience is fooled, and where even educators have to resort to lying." - Ji Seong-ho (a defector and human-rights advocate) |
I read this quote in the book North Korea’s Hidden Revolution: How the Information Underground Is Transforming a Closed Society as the author Jieun Baek describes how punishment, propaganda, and control of information distorts reality. The more I learn about North Korea, the more I realize that the system is the problem with this society, and no one seems to know how to reverse it.* The elite class is living well and does not have an incentive to 'rock the boat,' and even if they did want to make a change, the risks of speaking up are enormous. The middle and lower classes are powerless because any small act of disloyalty is immediately squashed through brutality that most of us cannot even imagine.
When you consider the relationship between China and North Korea, how defectors are hunted/repatriated, my heart breaks for those caught in this oppressive system. The economic and social structure creates behaviors that many societies would regard as unacceptable like bribery, corruption, deception, exploitation, informant activity, and other moral compromises likely required for self-preservation. For example, when Jake and Vivian began dating, obtaining travel permits from local authorities were required, as they lived in different cities. Such permits were secured through 'informal payments' (aka, bribery). For these officials, whose salaries are insufficient to support their families, these payments became an accepted means of subsistence. Is this corruption, or a form of survival?
Why Care About North Korea?
North Korea is easy to ignore. It is far away. Closed off. Politically complex. Dangerous.
For many of us living in the West, North Korea feels distant, not just geographically, but culturally, and politically. It seems like an issue reserved for diplomats, analysts, or historians. I would argue that for people of faith, the realities of North Korea raise questions that are deeply human and profoundly moral. To repeat the words of Pastor Jeff Long, who I met on a humanitarian trip in the Philippines in 2010, "[w]e are not here for the poor, they are here the rest of us."
This is not merely a geopolitical concern. At its heart are ordinary people: parents raising children, families trying to stay together, individuals carrying quiet hopes, fears, and longings that look remarkably like our own, but navigating life under extraordinary conditions. Regardless of one’s political views, there are enduring spiritual and ethical reasons why the subject deserves our attention.
If you haven't met Jake and Vivian and their beautiful boys, I'd invite you to meet them. I can arrange it.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere"- Martin Luther King Jr., from "Letter from Birmingham Jail" (1963). |
We live with freedoms so constant we rarely consider them.
We gather for worship without fear. We speak, travel, read, question, and believe with little thought about the cost. These liberties fade into the background of normal life.
And yet, there are places where such things are not normal. Where belief can be dangerous. Where information is scarce. Where leaving is not a choice. Awareness of this contrast does something uncomfortable but important...it reminds us that what feels guaranteed is, in fact, fragile and rare.
Most religious traditions teach some version of the same unsettling idea:
- Care about others. Maybe equally with our own families.
- See the suffering of strangers.
- Refuse the comfort of “not my problem.”
We may not be able to change the realities of North Korea (immediately). We may disagree about policies and solutions. Taking empathic action does not require expertise or political certainty. It requires only the recognition that other lives matter as much as our own.
Why Paying Attention Matters.
In a world saturated with crises, the greatest risk is that we will stop feeling. When distant suffering becomes normal background noise, something essential is lost. Not in global affairs, but in us.
To remain aware is to resist that drift towards indifference.
To care is to affirm a simple, stubborn truth: that human dignity is not defined by geography, and that unseen neighbors are still neighbors.
Peace, Stability, and Shared Consequences.
North Korea is also part of broader global concerns about security and stability. Tensions in any region carry human implications that ripple outward — affecting families, economies, and futures far beyond borders.
For individuals shaped by traditions that prize peace, reconciliation, and the preservation of life, instability anywhere can feel morally relevant.
A Call To Action
Concern for North Korea need not be political to be meaningful. It can take many forms:
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Thoughtful awareness
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Prayer or meditation
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Support for humanitarian efforts
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Learning from survivor and defector stories
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Conversations about freedom and dignity
- Support the production a movie about Jake and Vivian's escape
“Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility.”
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer (German Lutheran pastor & theologian)
**YOU CAN JOIN ME**
I will not stop so long as God grants me the means, health, and breath. Amazing things are happening already. I cannot explain them, but it is simply a fact that we feel. Those of us connected to this cause know that this matters, even if we don't know exactly how.
Ultimately, North Korea is not only a topic about a state or a system. It is about people who we can love...individuals living lives as textured, fragile, and valuable as our own.
We may never meet the people whose lives unfold inside North Korea. But I believe that with God's help, if we care enough, ask for His help, and take action, we will.
Gratefully Yours,
Erik Felsted
* In a conversation I had with Retired General Mark Milley last year, his opinion on the North Korea issue is that we have to wait it out and let it die on its own. I believe everyone thought that, as the Iron Curtain, North and South Korea would eventually come together, just as East and West Germany did.
