HONG KONG: 30 May 2011 -- With a Mass of
Thanksgiving to God, May 30, 2011, Salesian Missionary
House, Shau Kei Wan, Hong Kong (China) commemorates the 80th
anniversary (1931-2011) of the priestly ordination of the
first 10 graduates of the formation community of the China
Province. Their ordination took place in the Hong Kong
Cathedral at the hands of Bishop Enrico Valtorta PIME on
Saturday, May 30, 1931.
All 10 newly ordained were faithful to
the end to their human, Christian, religious, and priestly
vocation. All of them died Salesian priests. These 10 new
priests belonged to the first batch of young Salesians who
had received their whole initial formation in the China
Province, from Novitiate to Priestly Ordination. Before
them, all the missionaries arriving in China were already
priests or brothers or professed candidates for the
priesthood.
The fidelity of these 10 is all the more
striking since they lived through the most turbulent times
in the history of the China Province: the first civil war of
Republican China during the Northern Expedition, the
Japanese invasion of China, the Second World War, the second
civil war of Republican China resulting in the Communist
take over, and the crisis of faith in the aftermath of the
Second Vatican Council.
The faithful 10 were an international
group: one Irishman, a German, and eight Italians. In order
of date of death, the ten are: David Hourigan
(10-07-1943), Mario Calvi (20-03-1972), Michele Suppo
(13-11-1972), Natale Giuseppe Avalle (23-11-1974), Riccardo
Musso (12-10-1978), Wilhelm Schutzdeller (01-11-1985),
Pietro Pomati (27-03-1994), Mario Rassiga
( 02-01-1999), Mario Acquistapace
(25-09-2002), and Ercole Tiberi (04-04-2004).
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