Son’s Presence Was All Mom Asked

For one parishioner at Orange County’s Crystal Cathedral, Christmas finally came about 10:30 Monday morning, and the unlikely setting was the inside of the Garden Grove Police Department.

It was there that Wei Ping, a frantic Rowland Heights mother, was reunited with her 15-year-old son, Peter Wong. Peter, who is mentally retarded, wandered away from a midnight service at the cathedral Sunday and disappeared into the night.

The Rev. Robert H. Schuller issued a public call for help, and a senior pastor organized an all-night prayer circle.

Their prayers were answered when the boy managed to call his mother about 8 a.m. from a pay phone at Ball Road and State College Boulevard in Anaheim.

Anaheim police picked up the boy a short time later, after a gas station attendant called them and said a youth hanging out in the parking lot looked lost.

Anaheim Police Sgt. Jim Moser said the boy was calm but quiet when he got there Monday. Moser waited with the boy while Garden Grove police came to pick him up and take him back to the station, where his mother was waiting.

Moser said the boy did not offer an explanation of where he had been, and Moser did not ask.

“You’re just so glad that the parents and this kid are reunited,” Moser said. “That’s the best part.”

Dale Walters, head of security for Crystal Cathedral, said he thinks the boy was walking around all night, and finally was able to find someone to help him call his mother.

He said the boy, whose first language is Chinese, speaks very little English, and so police were not able to figure out how he had passed the early morning hours. Peter did not look tired, Walters said, just happy to see his mother.

“They smiled at each other, and the mother embraced her son,” said Walters, who spent most of the night comforting Wei as they searched for the boy. “I’m just very thankful that prayer was answered, the family reunited and Christmas is going on for everyone.”