The Bishop of Hong Kong made another “bridge-building” trip to dioceses in mainland China, a year after his historic visit to Beijing on a similar mission.
Cardinal Stephen Chow SJ led a delegation to three regions in Guangdong province in southern China on 22-26 April.
The diocesan Sunday Examiner reported that the visit was not publicised as it was “only intended to bring the dioceses in South China closer together”. They visited the Dioceses of Guangzhou and Shantou, and the Church in Shenzhen in Guangdong.
The ten representatives from Hong Kong’s clergy and laity included the diocese’s auxiliary Bishop Joseph Ha Chi-shing and its three vicar generals, Fr Peter Choy Wai-man, Fr Paul Kam Po-wai, and Fr Joseph Chan Wing-chiu.
Their visit followed Chow’s visit to Beijing last April and the reciprocal visit to Hong Kong of Archbishop Li Shan of Beijing in November.
The delegation discussed family issues, youth ministry, and environmental protection among other subjects with their counterparts. Bishop Ha said the visits offered opportunities to cultivate and deepen the relationship between dioceses. Chow said that the Church in Guangdong is like the Church in Vietnam, which he visited earlier in April, both operating under communist rule.
He also commemorated Matteo Ricci, an Italian missionary and pioneer of the Jesuit missions in China, saying his work demonstrated the importance of dialogue with and respect for the culture of local people in China.
“We must acknowledge and respect the culture and customs of others while still maintaining our faith in God,” said Chow.
On 23 April at Guangzhou’s Cathedral of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the cardinal concelebrated a Mass with three Chinese bishops.
“I think we all have a clear feeling that we belong to one family in Church, and we feel so joyful,” he said, and urged lay Catholics to participate in the bridge-building process.
“I encourage Hong Kong people to invite their brothers and sisters there to gather in Hong Kong,” he said. “Let’s visit one another and create more chances to meet: this is a sign of a family.” Fr Kam announced a plan for a joint youth programme at a formation centre in the Diocese of Shantou.
The Vatican is set to resume biennial negotiations with China over the summer on the renewal of its 2018 provisional agreement on Church governance.
The secret text, which has twice been renewed, is understood to give both parties a role in the appointment of bishops, but Beijing has sometimes ignored the Vatican’s role.
There is wider scrutiny of Hong Kong’s treatment of political dissent, as the authorities there continue to detain and prosecute the Catholic entrepreneur and democracy campaigner Jimmy Lai on national security charges.
The authorities there have rejected international protests at their conduct, including from Catholic bishops, insisting Lai’s trial is an internal matter. In the US, the Archbishop of San Francisco said he would lead a Holy Hour for him at the diocesan seminary on 8 May.
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone – whose city has the largest proportion of Chinese Americans in the country – said that Lai had stayed in Hong Kong to face trial “for the sake of the freedom of his people, or better yet, to be a living sign of their oppression”.
The Hong Kong authorities condemned a proposal by two US Congressmen to rename the street in Washington, DC where its Economic Trade Office is located after Lai, demanding that the US “respect the basic norms governing international relations”.
Introducing their bill to rename part of Washington’s 18th Street “Jimmy Lai Way”, Representative Chris Smith of New Jersey and Representative Tom Suozzi of New York said Lai was “a man of faith and conviction…who fervently believed that Hong Kong's prosperity and vitality were built on the rights promised to its citizens”.
The charges against him were “fabricated” and “politically motivated”, Smith said.
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