I thought it was just me, but it transpires there are fewer Christmas decorations in Hong Kong this year than in previous years. A colleague confirmed, under orders from China, Hong Kong had been instructed to tone down the outward manifestations of the Christmas festivities this year.
I often find myself in Hong Kong in the run up to Christmas and in years gone past, the Christmas light show on both sides of the harbour, but especially on the island side has been dazzling. All the major buildings in Hong Kong are festooned with lights which can be programmed to convey seasonal images such as on the Chinese New Year and at Christmas. The lights are always spectacular, but at Christmas we have been treated to Father Christmas climbing up vast towers and even appearing to jump between buildings on the island side. Reindeer float from building to building and, while not ostensibly Christian, it is as Christmassy as Santa’s grotto.
Let there be (fewer) lights
On the Kowloon side, where there are not many truly high-rise buildings, the ICC (International Commercial Centre) which houses some major financial institutions and the Ritz Carlton hotel with its spectacular Ozone bar, the highest bar in the word at 480 metres, dominates. Normally it provides a good show at this time of year but on a visit to Ozone this week I looked up to see, well, nothing much. Looking across the island from Ozone, the light show was as usual but barely Christmas themed at all.
My colleague, who had just returned from mainland China also said that the authorities in China had banned Christmas celebrations this year. I tried to confirm this with a mainland colleague, a Chinese social media influencer. Using a carefully chosen series of emojis on WeChat to avoid detection by a Sinobot and getting him into trouble he said that it did not appear to be the case as, in his words, “Shanghai has loads of Christmas vibes”.
Santa (but with clauses)
Google turned up an article in Asia Media Centre titled ‘Even Santa is political – China’s battle over festivals’. It transpires, while the central Government has not banned Christmas this year in China, certain provincial governments are clamping down. The problem for the Chinese authorities at central and provincial levels is, despite China being officially an atheist state, Chinese people love Christmas. Even more than the people, businesses love Christmas as, among the many festivals and holidays at which China excels, Christmas offers yet another reason to sell goods. It seems that the worship of mammon really has replaced the worship of God.
Of course, there are Christians in China and, occasionally, I meet some. They never declare their faith in a large group. Wherever two or three are gathered together in China, you can rest assured that one of them will be a member of the Chinese Communist Party. But now and then I’ll be asked on an individual basis if I am a Christian, which I am, and they will tell me about their faith. And their struggles.
There are churches in mainland China and many universities such as Peking Union Medical College were established in pre-Communist times by missionaries. The surviving churches, marked by large red fluorescent light crosses (until now, more of which later), usually belong to American evangelical groups such as the Church of Christ, also active in Taiwan and Thailand. Seventh Day Adventists also function here; they run the prestigious Sir Run Run Shaw private hospital in Hangzhou.
Religious rites (are wrong)
Presumably, these denominations have agreed to comply with the restrictions placed on them by the Chinese Government. Essentially, their activities need to be controlled by the Government, and they are prohibited from proselytising. Such restrictions long prevented the Roman Catholic Church – the one in Communion with Rome – from operating other than underground in China. Rome traditionally refused to comply with the Chinese insistence that they should have a say in the appointment of clergy.
However, much to the anger of former Hong Kong Roman Catholic Cardinal Joseph Zen, Rome reached an agreement with the Chinese Government, recently extended, whereby Rome would continue to select bishops in China but that their appointments would have to be approved by the Government. Cardinal Zen’s outspokenness has, periodically, landed him in prison in Hong Kong. To the consternation of many Roman Catholics – your correspondent included – the agreement was renewed despite a reported violation by the Chinese Government when China appointed a bishop in Shanghai without reference to the Vatican.
Concerns about Christmas in China and in its special administrative region of Hong Kong naturally raise concerns about the survival of Christianity and Christians in China. Before long, Hong Kong will effectively be China, as the border and the full force of Chinese law extends to include the current Hong Kong border. The Roman Catholic Church, which thrives in Hong Kong, is of particular concern mainly due to its allegiance to Rome.
I went to a vigil mass in a huge modern church in the New Territories of Hong Kong on Saturday and it was standing room only for late arrivals. I have been to the same church on a Sunday morning, and it is similarly packed. Catholic Churches in the U.K. can only dream of such congregations.
Oh bug(ger)
All the signs are that China is beginning to clamp down even further than it has traditionally done. This year the Chinese Government ordered the removal of crosses from churches and the replacement of sacred images – usually only a feature of Catholic and Orthodox Churches – in favour of images of Blessed President Xi Jinping.
There are fears in Hong Kong, once the Chinese Communist Party is fully at the helm, that Roman Catholic confessionals where penitents speak in absolute confidence to a priest will be bugged. Roman Catholic Priests take a vow “even on pain of death” not to divulge the contents of confessions. After all, if the FBI in the USA can bug confessionals – and it has – then nobody is safe.
Which brings us to “Maomas“, which is not something I made up. This is what the Chinese Government is encouraging Chinese citizens to celebrate at the end of the year. After all, they say, Saint Chairman Mao was the real saviour of China, not Jesus Christ.
The prospects for the Catholic Church in our former colony cannot be good. There are nearly 400,000 baptised Catholics of many nationalities over 51 parishes in Hong Kong, most of whom seem to go to mass. Currently, they are not under the control of the Chinese Communist Party. That situation will be intolerable once China assumes full control. There has never been a time when ‘watch (this space) and pray’ can have been more apposite.
Whether you worship Mao, mammon or our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, a Happy Christmas from the MacNab household.
John MacNab teaches at a university in Hong Kong.
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During Covid there seemed to be state control of the newspapers only it was the pernicious British government via the advertising spend.
Indeed – which is worse? Hard to say. The British government doesn’t appear to be acting on behalf of the British people and appears to be “follow” directives from “foreign” or “global” entities.
Also what about the BBC? That seems pretty foreign to me, in that it doesn’t share values with me and a lot of others. It’s also controlled by a government.
Well that’s cleared things up.
Foreign states will not be allowed to take over British news organisations but Foreign organisations are allowed to take over the British government.
Nice and tidy.
Chinese sponsorship of UK newspaper will probably also still be allowed. Makes one wonder if the UAE guy perhaps failed to grease the right wheels.
Brown envelopes? British government? Heaven forbid!
Not forgetting all the foreign nationals (aka illegal immigrants) taking over British hotels and holiday camps.
But foreign individuals will still be able to shower them with cash a la Dr Gates presumably.
Can anyone in Scotland attest to this? You have ‘Hate Crime Reporting Centres’ moonlighting as sex shops? WTF is this??
”The Scottish Government has created walk-in snitching centres in every major Scottish city where people can report ‘hate crimes’ under the new Hate Crime and Public Order Act and the one in Glasgow is in a sex shop!
Welcome to Humza Yousaf’s Scotland, where you can go shopping for a dildo and report a ‘hate crime’ at the same time.”
https://twitter.com/toadmeister/status/1767852719761445249
Condoming innocent people…
I would read between the lines. They obviously see a certain pathway ahead that they aren’t speaking about and they are trying to be a step ahead. It would be nice to think that their strategems represent a well-informed attempt to save our future but it is far from this. Just look at the events of the last five years. You can see the level of capture, which has necessitated a level of ineptitude. The strange spectacle of Joe Biden. At first I was a little perplexed why they even let him out in public. And then it was obvious. He is meant to look that way for a number of reasons foremost among them being the tacit cry for help of the Western mythos. Then you had the mad dog theory of war, look it up. And then the arrrogance of victory of the corporate state showing you what they can get away with. Just soberly look at it all. People with huge fibrous growths in their veins and they don’t seem too troubled about it at all. Surely this suggests a lack of vitality and a fatalism resigned to death of our culture.
State ownership or funding of British news organisations (whether they’re foreign states or our own) should be banned. That includes the state funding of the BBC.
There are cliches like ‘the breakdown of the rule of law’. This doesn’t even come close to what is coming. It will come via fifth dimensional warfare on one hand and deepening lassitude among the general public on the other. It might be demoralisation or it might be ill-health and the two will merge into one. You could easily look at the status quo and think that it isn’t even worth bothering with. But that is to give in to the force we oppose. The violinist Jascha Haifetz broke one of his strings during a performance and carried on playing until the end with three strings. Afterwards somebody asked him why he carried on and he said that it is our duty to carry on and try to make something beautiful even with just three strings. Anything less means that you have capitulated.
The whole discussion is ludicrous given the takeover of local radio in the mid 1990s. Local radio was very important largely because ir was decentralised. We weren’t all born under a Chrstmas tree and as Milan Kunera said, the power of man over tyranny is the power of memory over forgetting,
But Foreign Ownership of UK transport, energy, water supplies, steel industry, care homes, government computer systems, supermarkets, and vast tracts of British land, for example, are fine. Well that’s a relief.