Interior of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Hong Kong / Adobe Stock
The Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong has again sidestepped questions about whether it will revive its longstanding tradition of holding a Mass to commemorate the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre — a practice the diocese discontinued in 2022.
In a May 30 email to the Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP), diocesan officials responded not by addressing the inquiry directly but by highlighting that Cardinal Stephen Chow had presided over a Solemn Mass on May 24 at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, UCA News reported.
That liturgy, they noted, was devoted to Mary Help of Christians and prayers for the Church in China, aligning with the Vatican-designated World Day of Prayer for the Church in China.
This response is a repetition of the one the diocese gave last year when asked whether it would resume the memorial tradition, according to HKFP.
The annual Tiananmen memorial Mass had been a fixture in Hong Kong for more than three decades, UCA News reported. Held at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, the Mass had been offered in remembrance of the victims of the 1989 massacre, where Chinese military forces killed thousands of civilians when they stormed Tiananmen Square to suppress pro-democracy protests.
Since the massacre, public commemorations of the event have been banned on the mainland and are now facing increasing suppression in Hong Kong under Beijing’s tightened control, according to UCA News.
The memorial Mass was canceled in 2022 amid concerns that it might violate Hong Kong’s national security law, which Beijing imposed in 2020 following widespread pro-democracy protests. The law targets crimes such as “secession, subversion, terrorism, and collusion with foreign forces” and has led to the arrest of nearly 300 people, including many prominent activists and members of civil society.
In 2024, Cardinal Chow alluded to the massacre in a prayer, writing that only through forgiveness could people heal from what happened “35 years ago in the capital city” — thought by many to be a subtle but notable reference to the events at Tiananmen. Yet the diocese has offered no indication that public Masses explicitly commemorating the victims will return.
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