Gary Stephens has several hundred children. He also has many more mothers than is usually considered necessary. In acquiring this eccentrically extended family, he has greatly enriched himself in friendships, in Hong Kong, and in many places around the world where people live whose lives have been changed, and in some cases certainly saved, by his work and that of his colleagues.
On a wooded slope between Kennedy and Borrett Roads on Hong Kong Island, beneath the towering skyscrapers of the Mid-Levels and Central district, a white three-storey house lies hidden. You cannot see the house from the road; only after you have stepped away from the on-going traffic, and climbed the steps, edged with moss, for a while, does the house appear amidst the dappled shade. In this house - Montgomery House - is located "Mother’s Choice", the home for young Hong Kong girls facing crisis pregnancies, set up by Gary Stephens.
Gary Stephens began life on a farm in a small town in Colorado which is perhaps as inconspicuous as Montgomery House is now. It was, in many ways, an idyllic childhood where as a boy, the young Stephens busied himself with farm chores - gathering eggs, milking cows, feeding lambs. As he worked in nature and with nature, he also received his first instruction in religious beliefs from his parents especially his mother. And as he accompanied his mother to buy groceries for the poor and needy of the town, Gary Stephens began to glimpse what it meant to care for those who did not enjoy the advantages he had in his parents' love and family support.
At the University of Colorado, Gary Stephens became involved with Youth With A Mission, a Christian service organisation which is multinational and trans-denominational, with 15,000 full-time staff worldwide, all non-salaried, and more than a hundred thousand part-time volunteers. In his junior year, he took an eight-month break to go overseas with Youth With A Mission, thinking he was only going abroad for a short while. However, his life took a very different turn when he met his wife, Helen, in a Christian training school in Switzerland.
Shortly afterwards, in 1971, they were married, and instead of returning to the United States, Gary and Helen Stephens continued to work with Youth With A Mission centres in India and Afghanistan, until eventually, in late 1979, they arrived in Hong Kong. From the time of his arrival, for twenty three years in Hong Kong, Gary Stephens has worked quietly but tirelessly to offer and organize Youth With A Mission’s services to the Hong Kong community: in spreading the message of charity and social concern, in working with churches to promote ethical values, and in ministering to the poor and the needy.
Hong Kong in 1979 was reeling from the shock of the floods of Vietnamese refugees which rushed its shores. The Jubilee Camp in Lai Chi Kok which housed several thousands of these refugees had little by way of facilities; nor did the government at that time find it possible or necessary to offer more to those whom it considered unwelcome arrivals. Gary Stephens went into Jubilee Camp to see what he and his organization could do for the refugees, many of whom were battered by the violence of years of war and the perilous sea passage, and traumatized by the loss of family, home, and country.
Together with his team of volunteers, Mr Stephens set about to improve the conditions of the camp so that it could become a place the refugees could live in in some dignity if not exactly comfort. This began with manual work in improving sanitation and shelter facilities, and as the months and years passed, it extended to the provision of medical personnel, education, and recreation. To this day, Mr Pro-Chancellor, when Jubilee Camp has receded into the dim mist of Hong Kong's collective memory, Gary Stephens is remembered by those who were once in the camp as someone who cared for them and offered them warmth in the chill of their hostile reception and near despair. They had indeed been in a kind of prison, and Gary Stephens and his friends not only visited them, but helped with everything from unblocking the drains to setting up schools for the children. For practical purpose, Youth With A Mission ran the Jubilee Camp, a humanising presence in a dehumanised environment.
In the late n1980s, Gary Stephens became drawn to the plight of teenage girls in Hong Kong with crisis pregnancies who were crossing the border for late trimester abortions. In co-operation with Ranjan and Phyllis Marwah, he founded "Mother's Choice" which began as a home for these young girls, offering them temporary shelter until after delivery, and counselling to them and their families. As nature took its course, Gary Stephens and his co-workers soon found that they had much more on their hands, so to speak. "Mother's Choice" quickly grew into a care-centre for new-born infants, and a fostering programme offering for adoption babies whom their mothers could not bring up on their own. Official wariness about "Mother's Choice" when the project was first mooted with the Social Welfare Department was soon replaced by a recognition that there was a serious need for the creative initiative and organisational energy of a non-governmental charity worker like Gary Stephens.
Now in its fourteenth year, "Mother's Choice" offers services for pregnant girls, a baby care home, a "Wee Care" home for special needs children, three small group homes, and the adoption and fostering services. Gary and Helen Stephens continue to work unpaid. Mr Pro-Chancellor, the success of "Mother's Choice" is recognized not only in Hong Kong but also in mainland China. In 1991, at the invitation of the provincial government of Guangxi Autonomous Region, "Mothers Love", a joint venture project began in Nanning. "Mothers Love" is an orphanage that provides care for up to three hundred babies a year. It has become a model for orphanages throughout China, and since it was set up, has trained close to one thousand workers from all over the country. Volunteers who worked in "Mother's Choice" in Hong Kong have also set up similar projects in other countries; among these projects is "Mothers Hope" in Nagaland, India.
The refusal to turn away from those in distress, the determination to help the hopeless and despairing to regain faith in themselves, and above all, the unswerving belief in the right of the individual, and especially the child, to be loved – Gary Stephens has shown in his work how these cardinal principles of the good Christian can be practised so as to live a good life and serve humanity. Not only charitable in himself, he has also been a conduit and an encouragement for the charity of others, including all those generous members of the Hong Kong community who help to make his work possible.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, it is my pleasure to present Gary Stephens for the award of the degree of Doctor of Social Sciences, honoris causa.
Royalty is a career for which the qualifications are unambiguous. Throughout history, the possessors of royalty have been in a position to do outstanding good and catastrophic harm. Many branches of learning, from mathematics (by way of astrology) to political science and rhetoric, had their origins in the understandable anxiety of the learned that princes should be enabled, advised and encouraged to exercise their powers for the good of their people. In many different cultures, a theory developed around the figure of the virtuous prince, who would look upon the fortune of birthright not just as a mandate to rule, but rather as a responsibility to serve. Mr Pro-Chancellor, in modern times the nature and function of royalty has changed, but it is safe to say that it has not become any easier. But in Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, we see how fortune and virtue work together in harmony for the good of the people of Thailand.
Born in 1955, Her Royal Highness is the third child of Their Majesties King Bhumibol Adulyadej and Queen Sirikit of Thailand. From the very beginning of her education, Her Royal Highness showed an excellent aptitude for learning which continued to manifest itself in her academic progress through school to university. After distinguishing herself at school, she went on to achieve First Class Honours in History at Chulalongkorn University. Her scholarly brilliance extends beyond History to languages and other disciplines. In 1979, she received her MA in Oriental Epigraphy, and in 1981, an MA in Pali-Sanskrit. After conducting her doctoral research at the Graduate School, Srinakharinwirot University, she received the degree of Doctor of Education in Development Education in 1986. These accomplishments do indeed bring her close to the courtly ideal of both East and West - the scholar prince.
In her pursuit of learning, Her Royal Highness is guided by her own nature to explore and seek knowledge for the benefit of her people. Her own passion for Thai traditional culture has led her to study Thai music and dance, art and craft, and this passion has inspired enthusiasm and motivated support, both in Thailand and abroad, for her country’s rich and multi-faceted cultural heritage. The Princess is the eloquent spokesperson of her own country, a role no doubt enhanced by her ability with languages - she is knowledgeable in English, French, German, Chinese, Khmer, Pali, Sanskrit and Latin - and her accomplishments as writer, poet, and painter.
Learned and scholarly, cultured and creative, Her Royal Highness would have been admired and esteemed in her own right. As a member of the Royal Family of Thailand, she has always put her self, her knowledge, and achievements in the service of her nation. Since her early youth, she has accompanied her parents to the remote and rural areas to offer help and succour to the people there. To improve the standard of living in these areas requires a wide range of knowledge, and in her own wide-ranging academic pursuits, she has ensured that what she learns can be applied to bring benefits to the people. This can be clearly seen from the projects she has initiated or inspired, such as the nutritional and educational plan for schools in remote areas, plant genetic preservation and gene-bank projects. She has also focused on providing help for the handicapped, especially in training them in information technology so that they can live independent lives. Some of these projects, begun more than two decades ago when Her Royal Highness was in her twenties, continue to this day, and from their early beginnings in the northern border provinces, they have been extended to other provincial areas where there is need. Since 1990, she has led assistance projects in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.
Thailand, like other countries in the region, is struggling with the problem of reconciling the unprecedented opportunities of technological modernity with the need to nurture and honour what is best in traditional culture, and to help those people who are least equipped to deal with change. In these circumstances, a princess who is also a scholar and an activist is something of a national treasure.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, with those among us present today who work in universities, Her Royal Highness might be said to have a special bond. She is a university teacher herself, from 1979 when she started teaching General Education at Chulalongkorn University. A year later, she joined the Department of Law and Social Sciences, in the Academic Division of Chulachomklao Royal Military Academy. At present, she is Director of the Department of History at the Academy, and - it seems hard to imagine royalty doing this - plays an active role in curriculum reform. She also supervises the Thai Music Club of the Academy, lectures at other institutions, and attends academic conferences and seminars both inside and outside of Thailand. As a prolific writer, Her Royal Highness has published on literature, Buddhism, geography, history, archaeology, Khmer inscriptions, education, rural development, nutrition, remote sensing and information technology. In teaching, research, and service to the community, Her Royal Highness is the model par excellence to all teaching staff of this university.
She is revered in Thailand, and much honoured and admired abroad. Those who have followed the Princess’s life and work agree that it is her love of learning, quest for knowledge, and passion to fulfill herself and promote the well-being of others which truly exemplify the royalty of her birth. Mr Pro-Chancellor, I call upon you to confer upon Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn the degree of Doctor of Letters honoris causa.
Citation written and delivered by Dr Elaine Ho Yee Lin, the Public Orator.
