HONG KONG, THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN

Hong Kong is adjacent to Guangdong province in southeast China, 40 miles east of Macau. It includes Hong Kong Island, the Kowloon peninsula and adjoining New Territories, and a number of offshore islands. Long a target of Western colonization efforts, it was administered by Britain from 1842 until 1997, when it became a special administrative region of China. The population is 95 percent ethnic Chinese.

The Church in Colonial Hong Kong. Almost immediately after China ceded Hong Kong to Great Britain in 1842, Protestant chaplaincies were established to minister the British colonists and soldiers and to evangelize the Chinese people. Baptist, Congregationalist and Basel missionaries formed congregations, and as early as 1849 the Anglicans constructed St. John's Cathedral. Schools, charity centers, and dispensaries soon followed up. In 1887, the London Missionary Society opened the first Christian hospital.

In 1841, the Holy See made Hong Kong into a prefecture apostolic independent from the diocese of Macau. The following year, Catholic missionaries began to build their first church dedicated to the Immaculate Conception. The first Catholic school for Chinese boys opened in 1843. Missionaries societies and orders also cared for foundlings, the sick, and old people. The Paris Foreign Missions Society came in 1847 and the Foreign Missions of Milan (PIME) took over the charge of the prefecture in 1867. In 1874, Hong Kong became a vicariate apostolic.

After the First World War, Hong Kong, like the rest of China, experienced great turmoil. In the midst of the Sino-Japanese war (1937-1945) and as a consequence of the civil war between Communist and Nationalist forces, Hong Kong was flooded with refugees. During the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong (1941-1945), most foreign missionaries were forced to flee or were interned. The Chinese clergy, however, proved to be self-reliant

administratively, financially, and pastorally. In 1946, Hong Kong was elevated to a diocese, and its first bishop, Henricus Valtorta, was officially installed in 1948. The first Chinese Catholic bishop, Francis Hsu, was installed in 1969.

The Communist victory in 1949 was destined to make a notable impact on the ecclesiastical scene in Hong Kong. Refugees flowed from mainland China en masse in the 1950s and 1960s. As a result, emergency social work, temporary housing, and makeshift educational facilities were in great demand. The churches, Protestant and Catholic alike, rose to meet the challenge. They raised needed funds for relief services from abroad. They also set about opening much-needed regular schools and started educational services for children and young adults with learning disabilities and special needs.

The churches became pioneers in social services, sometimes encouraging the government to take on welfare programs, sometimes working with the government's social welfare department to provide social services. Caritas Centers, a network of social service centers organized by the Catholic Church with generous donations from abroad, became an important church-sponsored social service institution. The Protestant counterpart, the Hong Kong Christian Service, operated some 50 social service centers offering a wide spectrum of services and was an equally important church-related organization. By the end of the 20th century, 40 percent of Hong Kong's schools and 60 percent of social welfare services were administered by Church affiliated institutions. With 20 percent of the hospitals under their administration, the Churches performed important and innovative medical services. But most of the grass-roots health care services for the sick poor were performed in their community clinics.

Post-Colonial Development. On July 1, 1997, Hong Kong ceased to be a British Crown colony and reverted to Chinese sovereignty as a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. Under the "one country, two systems" formula, and the Basic Law that serves as Hong Kong's unofficial constitution, freedom of religion was guaranteed to all Hong Kong residents.

The Catholic Church, with its 56 parishes, was the largest Christian denomination in Hong Kong. Although many Catholics emigrated to foreign countries just before and after the 1997 handover, their number was replaced by over 2,000 adult converts and over 2,000 children baptized each year. With the increasing number of Filipino migrant workers, mostly women serving as domestic helpers, Filipino Catholics numbered about one-third of Catholics in Hong Kong. John B. Wu Cheng-chung was installed bishop of the diocese in 1975 and made cardinal in 1988. Beginning in 1996 he was assisted by a coadjutor, Bishop Joseph Zen Ze-kiun and an auxiliary, Bishop John Tong Hon. The Hong Kong Catholic Church is still dependent on foreign mission clergy, with locally born clergy constituting only about 40 percent of the total Catholic clergy. Catholic schools, ranging from kindergarten to colleges and vocational schools, maintain a reputation for scholastic excellence. The Catholic Church also operates a healthcare network comprising six hospitals and numerous clinics, nursing homes, hospices and secondary care facilities.

The diocese supports two weekly newspapers. The Chinese-language Kung Kao Po was established in 1928; the Sunday Examiner began publication in English in 1946. In addition, two major Catholic journals are published in Hong Kong. Beginning in 1980 Tripod was published four times a year in Chinese and in English by the Holy Spirit Centre, focusing mainly on the Church in the Chinese mainland. It became a biannual in 2001. Spirit was established in 1989 as a quarterly review for Catholic theology and spirituality. The Union of Catholic Asian News (UCA News ), has its headquarters and an office in Hong Kong. The Catholic Institute for Religion and Society runs workshops and publishes literature on the interaction of modern society and Christian living for Hong Kong people as well as those on the mainland.

Ecumenical Relations. Among the Protestants, the Baptists form the largest denomination, followed by the Lutherans, Adventists, Anglicans, Methodists, Pentecostal, the Christian and Missionary Alliance, and the Church of Christ in China. With their emphasis on youth work, many congregations contain a high proportion of young people. Protestant churches also operate three tertiary education institutions: Chung Chi College at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Baptist University, and Lingnan University, as well as 13 theological colleges, seminaries and Bible institutes. Like the Catholic Church, they also have an extensive network of educational and healthcare facilities, with many kindergartens, elementary and high schools, hospitals, clinics and other medical facilities. The Christian Weekly and the Christian Times are the two principal vehicles for disseminating news of interest to Chinese Protestant communities.

Two ecumenical bodies facilitate cooperative work among the Protestant denominations. The Hong Kong Chinese Christian Churches Union, established in 1915, has a membership of 275 congregations. It coordinates

evangelistic activities and encourages Christians to play an active part in the development of Hong Kong society through a wide range of auxiliaries agencies. Another interdenominational body, the Hong Kong Christian Council was organized in 1954 to promote unity of witness and outreach by the mainline Churches to the people of Hong Kong. It coordinates their social services and maintain relationships with churches in China and overseas. The Catholic Church has not entered into any formal ecumenical links with the Protestant Churches, but collaborates in the areas of social services and audio-visual communication. Few of the Protestant independent churches that have developed in recent years are ecumenical-minded.

The Protestant and Catholic churches of the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong maintain close ties with their counterparts on mainland China and assist them in materials and other ways. They interact according to the principles of mutual respect and mutual assistance but do not interfere with each other.

Bibliography: s blyth and i. wotherspoon, Hong Kong Remembers (Hong Kong 1996). Catholic Hong Kong: A Hundred Years of Missionary Activity (Hong Kong 1958). Christianity Today Magazine 1999-2000. Hong Kong Catholic Church Directory, published annually. Hong Kong in a New Era: A Review of 1997 (Hong Kong 1998). "Hong Kong in Transition," Tripod March–April 1997. "Hong Kong: Between Optimism and Pessimism," Tripod May-June 1997. "Hong Kong: New Challenges and Identity," Tripod January-February 1997. c. k. lee, Studies in the History of the Church in Hong Kong (in Chinese) (Hong Kong 1987). r. malek, ed. Hong Kong, Kirche und Gesellschaft in Übergang: Materialen und Dokumente (Sank Augustin, Germany 1997). Papers of the International Conference on the Transition of HKSARPRC. Held at Hong Kong Baptist University, The University of Hong Kong, and The Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, July 7–9, 1997. People's Republic of China Year Book, published biennially. t. ryan, Catholic Guide to Hong Kong (Hong Kong 1962). s. ticozzi, Historical Documents of the Hong Kong Catholic Church (Hong Kong 1997).

[j.-p. wiest]