“I have gone from shepherding robots to shepherding people,” said James Hwang ’87, pastor of the Clear Lake Chinese Church in Webster.
In 2001, he began his new faith odyssey by leaving a successful career in space robotics for the pulpit when the pastor of the church he attended called him into his office one day to announce he had been called to a larger church in New York. He suggested Hwang become the pastor.
“I was shocked,” Hwang said. “I said I didn’t have the experience to pastor. I felt confident as an engineer – to design things, to do project management – those were my strengths.”
During the next few months, however, “I began to feel stronger and stronger that God was telling me that it was his timing.” In August, he accepted the pastorate.
“It’s a small church – a very cozy one,” he said. Of its 200 members, about 60 participate in the early English-language service. One of the church’s ministries is teaching Chinese to second- and third-generation Chinese-Americans, helping them keep a practical and valuable skill, Hwang said.
He finds the church’s 80 children an exciting part of the ministry. “Not only are there a lot of children, we’re still growing by birth,” he said. “Right now, we have six expectant mothers, and, two years ago, we had 12 at one time. That’s a most joyful time for a pastor, holding newborn babies.”
Hwang came to Lamar from Taiwan in the early 1980s to fulfill a dream. Lamar had offered him a scholarship plus transportation expenses. During the next five years, he earned a doctorate in engineering with an emphasis on robotics and electrical engineering.
While at Lamar, he taught robotics courses one year at what was then Lamar’s Orange campus (now Lamar State College-Orange), then taught three years in the university’s technical arts program (now Lamar Institute of Technology). He met Berling, his wife of 20 years and a pharmacist, at First Baptist Church in Beaumont. The couple has three daughters, ages 19, 17 and 15.
After receiving his doctorate, he took a job in robotics simulation and automation with Lockheed at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. He began working in the Astronaut Training Building during the post-Challenger accident “Return to Fly” program.
There, in JSC’s cavernous Building 9, Hwang helped recreate the space shuttle’s giant robotic arm. While the space-certified robotic arm built by SPAR Canada is used to launch satellites from the cargo bay and perform other tasks in zero gravity, accurately replicating its operation and tremendous reach within the pull of Earth’s gravity required high-powered hydraulics and other adaptations.
The Americans, Europeans and Japanese all see robotics as a good way to perform many tasks on the International Space Station (ISS). A 65-foot long robotic arm – called the Space Station Remote Manipulator System (SSRMS) – is used by NASA. The Europeans and Japanese are developing similar robotics for their portions of the ISS.
Hwang helped develop a robotic lab to simulate handling orbital replacement units for the International Space Station, certifying that the ORUs could be manipulated successfully by the robotic arm and then training astronauts in the task.
“There are a number of units outside the pressurized areas that can be replaced and maintained in orbit,” he said. “You can either do the job with an astronaut – a space walk or extravehicular activity – or use a robot so there’s less risk.”
While the robotic arms Hwang helped support at NASA have played a huge role in the success of both the shuttle and ISS programs, he is equally proud of the division’s work on a joint NASA-Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency project to design an anthropomorphic robot. The man-like robot is controlled by an astronaut wearing a virtual-reality helmet containing LCD displays which project the “vision” of the robot’s eyes. Sensors in the astronaut’s gloves and suit track hand and arm movements, which the robot replicates precisely.
“Hopefully, in the future, we’ll be able to use this kind of robot in space,” he said.
The subject of robotics in space recently came to the attention of the nation with debate on the best approach to save the aging Hubble satellite: either accept the risks of multiple manned missions to rescue the craft, or accept the technical risks of using robotics to make the needed updates and repairs.
“A lot of study is going on,” Hwang said. “Hopefully, we can use robots to maintain it.”
One major challenge is that the Hubble was not designed to be maintained by robots. Tolerances are tight, requiring degrees of precision, dexterity and strength that robotics are only now on the threshold of achieving.
Robotics are not only likely candidates for saving the Hubble, but they are also the best choice for paving the way in future exploration. “Robotic missions are always the first step, even if you have manned missions planned,” Hwang said. “As the first explorers, robots can establish the environment and make it possible to send astronauts.”
In a way, Hwang is exploring new territory too. But it isn’t the first time he’s charted new directions. In 1997, he left Lockheed after a eight-year career to begin Roboteq Consulting Co., a move that gave him the flexibility to pursue personal interests.
With a seven-year contract with his former employer and projects from other corporate clients, Hwang found plenty to keep his attention. But at the same time, he wanted to enrich his Bible-teaching abilities – he taught Sunday school classes and was a deacon in the church – so he began work on a master of biblical studies degree through Dallas Theological Seminary’s Houston extension.
Hwang’s work toward the degree was nearly done when his pastor broke the news about his move to New York.
“My original goal was just to teach better,” Hwang said. “I thought I might someday get a Ph.D. in theology, then teach at a college or university after I had seen my three daughters through college.”
He credits his willingness to make the career change to his heritage of faith, a heritage that extends five generations. His great-great-grandmother was the youngest of 10 children, and, when she was 12, both parents died. Her older siblings abandoned her, but she was accepted at a boarding school for girls begun by American missionaries. There, she thrived and continued her education through the junior-college level. “She came to know Christ in that way,” Hwang said. “So, her abandonment by her family was a blessing in disguise.”
When she graduated, a missionary introduced her to a young man from the boy’s boarding school, a young man she would later marry and then join in ministry as he became the first pastor in Hwang’s family history. “I’m very, very thankful for such a special blessing,” Hwang said. “Because of this heritage, I got to know Christ when I was very young.” In Taiwan, less than 2 percent of the population identifies with Christianity.
Hwang’s father and mother had emigrated to Formosa (later called Taiwan) in 1948 and 1949, respectively, as Chiang Kai-Shek’s Kuomintang lost political control of mainland China to Mao Zedong’s communist forces. They met and married there, and Hwang was born in Taiwan in 1955. He earned both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering from Tatung University in 1977 and 1979.
Hwang’s passion for his faith surpasses even his zeal for robotics. He has traveled to the Far East many times to train Bible teachers, serves as a radio host for Houston-area broadcasts on Saturdays and has been a visiting speaker for the China ministry of Far East Broadcasting Co., Chino, Calif. Earlier this year, he and Berling traveled to Israel on a tour of biblical sites hosted by the Dallas Theological Seminary.
From celebrating with a young couple in the birth of a child to being with a family around an elderly parent’s deathbed, Hwang marvels at how completely his congregation has allowed him into their lives.
“Robots are very predictable. People are unpredictable. To be a pastor is to deal with people,” Hwang said of the new job, which might mean heading to the hospital in the middle of the night to be with a member who has been in an auto accident or dropping his agenda to help someone in crisis. He smiles broadly when he says he wouldn’t have it any other way.
