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RELIGION AND CUSTOM
Church on Garden Road and the present Cathedral on Caine Road, and brought to Hong Kong the La Salle Brothers who established St Joseph's College in 1875.
The cultural life of the Church took a big step forward in 1928 when Kung Kao Po, the Chinese Catholic weekly, was started. Ricci Hall, the Catholic hostel of the University of Hong Kong was opened in 1929 and the Catholic Truth Society was founded in 1933 to publish Chinese literature.
After the second World War much rebuilding of church premises was needed. The Catholic Centre, was started initially to provide a reception and information centre for the Liberation forces and old residents returning to the Colony. It now houses the Catholic Press Bureau with its three weeklies (Kung Kao Po, Sunday Examiner and Adveniat), the Catholic Truth Society, the Catholic Club, a lending library, a book centre and a chapel.
In 1946, the Vicariate of Hong Kong was raised to the status of a diocese by Pope Pius XII, with Msgr Henry Valtorta, PIME as the first diocesan Bishop. He was succeeded in 1951 by Msgr Lawrence Bianchi, PIME. Under his administration, the Catholic community in Hong Kong has risen from some 43,000 to 241,986 today. Over 90 per cent of them are Chinese, spread out in 25 parishes on Hong Kong Island and Kowloon and in 14 rural districts of the New Territories.
During 1967, the first Chinese priest of Hong Kong was raised to the episcopacy. Father Francis Hsu, for many years official spokesman of the Roman Catholic Church, was consecrated Auxi- liary Bishop on October 7.
In the field of education, there has been notable expansion. In September, Sin To Primary School in the crowded Li Cheng Uk Resettlement estate opened its new wing of 24 classrooms. In the same month the new cathedral parish school was completed and in October, Notre Dame secondary school, in Ma Tau Wei, was opened.
Social services have also expanded. This year saw the opening of a spacious youth centre, converted from the ex-seminary, on Pok- fulam Road; a 40-bed students' hostel, named after St Albert, in
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