Cutline: In addition to bringing rice and noodles to a parish in Ca Mau province of South Vietnam in 2019, Sister Rose Hang Vu (right) gave 300 people, including these two women, red envelopes with $5.

In addition to bringing rice and noodles to a parish in Ca Mau province of South Vietnam in 2019, Sister Rose Hang Vu (right) gave 300 people, including these two women, red envelopes with $5. COURTESY SISTER CHAU TRAN

Following the official end of the Vietnam War April 30, 1975, more than 750,000 refugees from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos resettled in the United States.

Minnesota was among a handful of states receiving the largest number of Southeast Asian refugees. Among them was Sister Rose Hang Vu, who arrived in St. Paul in August 1975 at age 25.

“A week before the fall of Vietnam, the Sisters of the Good Shepherd were told that they had to leave the country,” said Sister Rose, a member of the order. “The sisters told me, ‘If you want to continue your vocation, you will have to leave; if you stay behind, you will no longer be a sister.’”

Sister Rose made a very difficult decision. “I had to leave my family behind, my parents and seven brothers and sisters, knowing I may never see them again,” she said. “I prayed to the Lord, our Father, that wherever I go, I will serve.”

“When I made the decision to leave Vietnam, our mother foundress told me that I should embrace the whole new world with courage, and go forth to save souls,” said Sister Rose, now 71.

That dedication to serving others, highlighted in the Sisters of the Good Shepherd’s charism of affirming the dignity and value of all people, has guided Sister Rose’s work over her lifetime, in particular her support for the people of Vietnam, her homeland.

Her Friends of the Poor nonprofit organization, which is supported by the Center for Mission in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, is devoted to helping people in Vietnam become self-sufficient so they can have a brighter future. The nonprofit provides financial assistance to educate children and unwed mothers who want to keep their newborns, as well as aiding people living with poverty, malnutrition, lack of basic health care and access to safe water.

Following her relocation to St. Paul, Sister Rose embarked on years of education and service. She enrolled in international Montessori training at St. Joseph Academy in St. Paul, and went on to earn degrees in human services at Metro State University in St. Paul, pastoral study at Loyola University in Chicago, and doctoral ministry at the Graduate Theological Foundation, originally founded in Indiana and now located in Oklahoma City.

Her lifetime of service includes working with unwed mothers in Korea, helping with a battered women’s program in Chicago and opening daycares in poor villages in Thailand.
But it was her return to Vietnam in the summer of 1988 that triggered Sister Rose’s passion to “save souls.”

“I saw the horrible conditions . . . people waiting for rain for drinking water, which they got from the very dirty river,” she said. “My father had been an army officer, and after the fall of Vietnam, they took our house. People were living in bamboo houses in the jungle with no water or electricity. My parents and sister were so sick.”

“They allowed 21 of my family members to come to the U.S. They’ve been here since 1989, healthy and safe with religious freedom,” Sister Rose said. “But my heart was aching and my soul was restless . . . What would happen to all the people left behind? The children who can’t go to school, the elderly who can’t get needed medications?”

While working at a women’s homeless shelter on Grand Avenue in St. Paul, Sister Rose began collecting aluminum cans to raise money to help those in need in Vietnam.

“I did that for a long time, earning the nickname ‘Sister Can,’ before establishing Friends of the Poor as a nonprofit in 2010,” Sister Rose said.

With funds from Friends of the Poor, Sister Rose travels to Vietnam every year, visiting parishes and villages, giving money to families to buy rice and noodles, paying teacher salaries and purchasing books for students, helping to build water systems and chapels, and more.

“Everything we do is because of God. He sends the benefactors to us, because I can’t do enough with just the cans,” said Sister Rose.

She lives in a senior apartment next to St. John the Baptist in New Brighton, where she can walk to Mass and experience community.

“They live the faith, and I have met many benefactors who help me a lot,” she said. “Now with COVID I can’t travel to Vietnam, but I can send money over there as the needs are greater than ever right now.”

Sister Rose recently spoke about her ministry at four parishes in the archdiocese — St. Patrick/St. Catherine in Jordan, St Patrick in Edina, St. Bridget of Sweden in Lindstrom and St. John the Baptist in Excelsior — as part of the Center for Mission’s Missionary Cooperation Plan with parishes.

“I have an accent, so I always pray to the Holy Spirit that people can understand what I say,” she said. “I’m so grateful, and God has shown me he’s present through the benefactors.”

“One time I did a presentation at St. John Neumann in Eagan and met a wonderful man who continues to help me,” she said. “He told me, ‘You know, Sister, I only go to church once or twice a year, but I was there when you did the mission appeal. God is calling me to journey with you.’”

“That’s very powerful,” she said, “and I am thankful that the Lord has shown me a way to help my people who are suffering, to speak the voice of the voiceless.”