Hong Kong: A bridge to China

“We are so happy for this honour for John Cardinal Tong himself, but mainly for the Church in China, and the whole of China, because Cardinal Tong is himself Chinese and in the last 30 years he has worked for the whole nation”, says Msgr. Dominic Chan, Vicar general of the diocese of Hong Kong, commenting on Pope Benedict XVI’s appointment of the diocesan Bishop, John Tong Hon, to the College of Cardinals. Listen to his full interview with Emer McCarthy:


“I think is the sign that the Holy Father and the Vatican is very concerned for the Church in China. You may say that Hong Kong is the biggest Chinese diocese in the world, not only from the geographical and numerical point of view but also from the view of communications with the mainland . So we also feel an even greater duty to mission among us especially in communicating with mainland China and in fostering the Gospel spirit in society”.

Msgr. Chan recently oversaw the drawing up of the first Catholic Directory for Hong Kong since its establishment in 1954. The survey revealed a steady growth in the number of Catholics on the island, but at the same time a change in the priests/laity ratio, with just one priest to serve almost 2 thousand believers. The Church is home to an estimated 530 thousand Catholics with two thirds locally baptised, one third Catholics from immigrant communities mainly Filipinos, Indonesians, Vietnamese and South Koreans.

“We are not concerned with the quantity, but we are concerned about the quality”, says Msgr. Chan. He notes that in the past, particularly during the 1950’s and ‘60’s many poor people were drawn to the Church because of its pastoral care for the needy. “Now we concentrate on the formation of baptismal candidates, and they must undergo a year of preparation for the Sacrament. We do not doubt the good intentions of people seeking to become part of the Church but we must ensure that their good intentions are followed by a real commitment”.

“We had about 300 adults baptised last year, about 6,000 infants. This is the result of a pastoral program that we launched about 8 years ago on evangelisation. We encouraged all faithful to do something more, to introduce and share our faith with other people”.

But challenges remain. Msgr Chan speaks of “contradictions” that have crept into the fabric of society in the past decade. He says since the island returned to China in 1997, the role of the Church is increasingly to be a peacemaker and promote greater solidarity in society. “This year we will elect our next Chief Executive. We as Church need to learn how to introduce our Church Doctrine to society, how to influence society in Hong Kong to become more humane and just. Then another major challenge is local vocations, the average age for a priest in Hong Kong is 66, this is also our crisis. We still have a lot of missionaries from all over the world, but we need local vocations”.