On 8th February 2026, 89-year-old Kim Yongja Susana (1937-2026) – a long time Columban supporter – died very peacefully at her home in Seoul, writes Fr Donal O’Keeffe in Korea.
Born in 1937, Susana’s father was a carpenter who worked with the Columbans building the cathedral in Chuncheon, Korea. Growing up around the church she had vivid memories of the missionaries who worked there in the late 1940s and early 1950s. She had a special place in her heart for Bishop Thomas Quinlan. At times when rice was scarce, she recalls him calling in her mother after the dawn Mass to give her some rice.
Another deeply touching and unbreakable bond with the Columbans came through her brother, Gabriel Kim Kyung-ho. Gabriel served the Church as assistant to Columban priest Fr Tony Collier, who was appointed in January 1950 as the first pastor of a new parish in Chuncheon city.
Fr Tony Collier and some Catholics in Korea on 28th May 1950.
On the morning of 27th June 1950 just after the outbreak of the Korean War, Fr Tony and Gabriel were walking across the city to the Cathedral when North Korean soldiers stopped them, bound them together and shot them. As the shots were fired Fr Tony pulled Gabriel toward himself and fell on top of him.
Fr Tony was killed instantly, but the bullets struck Gabriel only in the shoulder and neck, knocking him unconscious. Believing them to be dead the soldiers left them, but Gabriel survived and told the story.
Today, Fr Tony is honoured not only as a martyr for the faith, but as a man whose last action was an act of love: giving his life so another might live.
Growing up in post war Korea, Susana had a dream of studying literature but like so many in that era, particularly the women, she did not have the opportunity then to follow that path. She worked in a bank, got married and for years was busy raising a family.
But later in life after her husband died, she returned to night school and graduated from university majoring in Korean Literature. It was a new life for Susana – she joined various groups, became a member of the Korean Poets Association and published two volumes of poetry.
Susana visiting Soyangno parish where Columban martyr Fr Tony Collier and her brother Gabriel were serving in 1950.
Around that time, she moved to Donam Dong parish and reconnected with the Columbans. I first met her then, when she became a benefactor and a regular presence at Columban events.
Her daughter Helena has special needs and has an exceptional gift for music. Susana devoted immense time and resources to nurturing that talent, and today Helen plays the piano and organ at our Benefactors’ Masses, at Donam Parish as well as other venues.
During the last year declining health meant that Susana was not able to attend the monthly Benefactors’ Mass. Her last visit to the Columban House was to meet with the family of Fr Tony Collier who visited Korea in May of 2025. It was a special moment for Susana and the Collier family. She was meeting with the family of the man who had saved her elder brother, and they were meeting with the sister of the man who was with their uncle when he was killed.
Susana’s funeral was held at her local Donam-dong parish, the first church built by the Columbans in Seoul. Despite being a bitterly cold morning on 11th February 2026, the church was full for the 6am Mass.
Columban Kwon Tae-moon John and I attended, along with some of our benefactors and staff, as well as Fr Jeon Jae-Geon Martino of the Korean Foreign Mission Society. The gathering bore witness to how Susana’s missionary zeal, nurtured in her Chuncheon days, reached far beyond the Columbans.
With Rachel Collier in May 2025.
To end with the opening lines from one of her poems entitled [I write Poetry]:
To meet the self that lives within,
I write a poem.
Yes!
Another self emerges –
unfamiliar, abundant.
How sacred it feels.
Susana indeed sensed that the ordinary things of life were sacred, and she lived each day with purpose and presence.
May she rest in peace.
