HONG KONG (SE): A chance meeting between a parish priest from Warrnambool in Australia and a tourist from Hong Kong, who was paying a chance visit to his stately blue stone church, resulted in a return meeting at the cathedral in Hong Kong.
 
Connie Chan Lai-sheung, a pastoral officer at the Diocesan Commission for Marriage and the Family, was holidaying at the beachside town in Victoria when she dropped the old line to her host for the moment, “If you are ever in Hong Kong give me a call.”
 

HONG KONG (SE): Father Stephen Sau-yan Chow SJ has been appointed the next provincial of the Chinese Jesuit Province. He assumed office on January 1, succeeding Father John Lee Hua sj, who has served as the provincial for the last six years.
 
Father Chow comes from Hong Kong and is a seasoned educator. Before entering the Society of Jesus in 1984 in Dublin, Ireland, Father Chow had a bachelor’s degree in philosophical psychology and a master’s in educational psychology from the University of Minnesota in the United States of America.

HONG KONG (SE): Bishop Michael Yeung Ming-cheung offered a Mass on Christmas Day at Stanley Prison as part of his pastoral outreach to those of his diocese who were spending the festive season behind bars.
 
A press release put out by the Correctional Services Department says that it arranged the opportunity for Bishop Yeung in his first Christmas as the bishop of the diocese.
 

HONG KONG (UCAN): As the #me too campaign sweeps the globe, Hong Kong celebrities who have to date disclosed stories about sexual abuse they have been subjected to have been both criticised and praised.
 
Hurdling champion, Vera Lui Lai-yiu, revealed on her Facebook page that she was sexually abused by her coach when she was a teenager, saying said she made the revelation on her 23rd birthday in an attempt to graduate from being a victim to becoming a survivor.
 

An issue of the Sunday Examiner goes out and in the words of poet, John Kelly, “… the word, released, rooted and roaming now, God knows what streets, hearts, homes...” And it cannot be taken back.
 
However, today, it is not just the paper going out, but the editor as well. After 15 years at the desk fresh blood is coming in to fill the position and take up the challenge of putting out Hong Kong’s Catholic News of the Week.
 

Hong Kong (SE): Claretian Father Josekutty Mathew will be taking on the position of deputy-editor-in-chief of the Sunday Examiner.
 
Father Jose—as he likes to be called—was born in Kerala, India, and was ordained to the priesthood in 2003. 
 
He arrived in Hong Kong in 2009 and after Cantonese study became the parish priest of Mui Wo on Lantau.

HONG KONG (SE): As the Hong Kong Football Association is being fined for a second time over the behaviour of some fans during the playing of the Chinese national anthem prior to international soccer matches in the city, an evening seminar organised by three Church groups on December 14 said it does not believe that people are booing the country of China itself, but rather its system of governance.
 

HONG KONG (SE): The Diocesan Youth Commission of Hong Kong will launch a series of activities in response to the Year of Youth launched by the diocese as a complement to the 2018 Synod on Young People, Faith and Vocational Discernment.
 
The Year of Youth, which began on the first Sunday of Advent, December 3, will end on the Solemnity of Christ the King, November 25 next year.
 

HONG KONG (SE): On the titular feast of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Hong Kong, the diocese paid tribute to 41 priests and religious celebrating their 25th, 50th, 60th and 70th anniversaries of ordination or religious profession.
 

HONG KONG (SE): At a retreat day organised by the Diocesan Pastoral Centre for the Disabled, parents or caretakers of children with special needs were encouraged to think of ways to seek real happiness without the dampening effect of past experience or materialistic dreams.
 
Held at St. Andrew’s parish in Tseung Kwan O on November 30, the gathering heard Sister Laura Watt Shuk-mee say that parents or caretakers of children with special needs easily become more sensitive or emotional due to fatigue from the struggle they face on a daily basis.