03/03/2017
DOMINICAN JUBILEE 800 ENDS IN MACAU
The 800 jubilee celebrations in the Hong Kong Macau-China Area will formally end on 22 December 2016, with a Solemn Thanksgiving Mass at the historic Church of São Domingos in Macau. The Eucharistic celebration will be presided by His Excellency, Stephen Lee Bun San, Bishop of Macau as the Dominican men and women in the region will gather to celebrate, to thank God for the gift of preaching, and to beg strength from the Him, to face the new challenges ahead. At the same time, it wants to be a manifestation of gratitude of the Order to the Church in Macau for her continued support and hospitality to the brethren.
On 7 November 2015, the inauguration of the Jubilee year began the year long celebrations worldwide and at the local level. The choice of Macau to culminate the celebrations in the region and in the Church of São Domingos, is not only to relive the fact of the many challenges faced by the founders when they came to the Far East, but also our commitment to serve the Church in the missions, specifically the Church in China which is intimately linked in the long and glorious history of the Dominican Province of Our Lady of the Rosary.
The project of Dominic de Guzmán
It should be recalled that a providential trip to Southern France enabled S. Dominic de Guzmán (1170-1221), then a Canon Regular of the Diocese of Osma (Castille), to open his horizon to contemplate the challenge of the Church in his time: the threat of heresy and error, the reform of the clergy and the need of revitalizing the Church through preaching and instruction. Though he collaborated with the preaching work with Papal legates and other clerics, in the end, he was left alone to assume the responsibility in continuing the work of preaching and reconciling sinners and heretics. Thus the idea of a religious institution fully dedicated to the work of preaching. He first organized a community of contemplative women who supported the work of the preachers through their prayers and sacrifices. This would later evolved into the contemplative nuns of the Order. Then he organized the clerics and recruited new members into his project, organizing themselves as clerics living in common and sharing the same mission of preaching. Lastly, lay persons who continue to live in their particular states of life, support and collaborate in the work of the Order. This would later become what is known as the “Lay Dominicans”.
On the occasion of the IV Lateran Council (1215), Dominic was able to present his project to the Pontiff, Innocent III, who though giving tacit permission for the foundation, demanded some clarifications and requirements as stipulated by the recently concluded Council.
The official written confirmation of the foundation of the Order was published by Pope Honorius III on 22 December 1216, entitled “Religiosam Vitam”, recognizing the establishment of Dominic and his companions as a religious Order with all the rights and privileges it shall assume. Further bulls and Papal letters published henceforth would begin to delineate the charism, specificity and mission of the “new” Order of Preachers. By the Summer of 1217, as he gathered the friars to celebrate the great Marian feast of the Assumption, he dispersed the brethren throughout Christendom, sending them to urban centers and university cities as well as locales of frontier mission. This not only facilitated the friars in the preaching ministry, but also their access to formal education and formation and seek sources for vocational recruitment. And since then, throughout eight hundred years, the Order continues to serve the Church around the world.
Dominicans in Macau
The Order of Preachers arrived in Macau on 1 September, 1587; the founders were part of the first group of Friars who were tasked to found a Province in the Far East in order to evangelize the “Empire of China and surrounding kingdoms”. The three founders were Castillians who came by way of México. On the basis of a donation of some properties near the Chinese bazar, the friars were able to begin conventual life and ministry on 23 October 1587, and the community was officially known as the House of Our Lady of the Rosary, the first house of the Order in Chinese soil. Due to the political climate and the animosity between Spain and Portugal, the founders were ordered to leave the enclave and sent home via Portuguese India; and in their place, the Portuguese Dominicans from India came to assume the foundation and presence till the suppression of the religious Orders in 1835. The beautiful Church of São Domingos (rebuilt few years before the suppression) stands as the mute testament of a florid presence of the friars in Macau.
Macau had to wait till the 1950’s, specifically after the “Liberation” of China, that the Dominican Missionaries of the Holy Rosary came to Macau to work in the Diocese. The sisters began their presence as housekeepers for the Diocesan Seminary and later assumed work in medical aid, education and care for orphans. They were followed by the American Maryknoll Sisters who began to assume interesting ministries in the territory a tradition they continue till this day.
At the invitation of Msgr. Domingos Lam, Bishop of Macau, the Dominican friars returned to the territory a few years prior to the handover. The brethren came to assume the work of administering the Diocesan owned “Escola São Paolo” and collaborate in some parochial ministries. By 2006, it was decided that the Students’ Community and House of Studies be established in Macau and by 2008, the House was raised into the category of a Convent. Today the Macau community is one of the biggest communities of the Province of Our Lady of the Rosary in the Far East where future missionaries are being formed.
Looking forward
Despite the many challenges, the Order continues to be optimistic with the future. While various missions in the area need new blood to continue the missionary work as well as reorganization, new presences in other emerging Churches continue: in Myanmar where the Order has three communities and in the recently established presence at Timor Leste.
