The Church Under the Cross: Hong Kong: The Cross of Colonialism

Since the first edition of this book was published, I have kept in touch with colleagues and events in Hong Kong over the last eleven years. I was also privileged to participate in the last service in Union Church Hong Kong's old building in 2017. Although for a time it seemed as though progress in the ministry of the church and in the quest for democracy and human rights in Hong Kong was being made, and that the cross that my colleagues had to bear for many years was growing lighter, at the time of writing, the People's Republic of China has quashed all hope for the maintenance of Hong Kong as a free and vibrant city. This turn of events has not only impacted the life of the people of Hong Kong, but has affected the ministry and mission of the church there as well.

In order to chronicle this on-going story, besides the corrections made to the text of the first edition, 73 additional pages of text and 70 new photographs have been added to "The Cross of Colonialism: Mission in Hong Kong," which is now published as a volume in its own right.

This work was originally six years in the making. It began with an invitation in September 2003 by the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy to participate in a December conference on human rights and to receive an award for my involvement in the democracy and human rights struggle of the Taiwanese people during my missionary days there in the early 1970s. In preparation for this conference, I was asked to write a memoir of my experiences during what had become known as the 'White Terror' period in Taiwan's history. A number of people who read that memoir encouraged me to write about my subsequent experiences in Hong Kong, China, and Indonesia as well. It happened that I was called to minister in those places at critical times in their histories-times of turmoil that proved to be times of testing for the churches there. Thus, the common thread that runs throughout the books-the church under the cross. Although this memoir includes my story, it focuses as well on the wider church I served as my colleagues and the Christians for whom they were responsible struggled to come to terms with the sometimes terrible challenges they faced.

My goal in setting down my experiences, observations, and conclusions was to produce an account that was informative, interesting, and inspirational. Even today, I find that many people do not know much about many of the events recorded in this work. My hope is that this account will help fill those gaps. I also hope that readers will not fall asleep while plodding through these pages, but will find this account interesting, stimulating, and at times even humorous. My further hope is that readers will be as inspired as I was when I encountered the courageous Christians described in these pages as they faithfully practiced their faith and prophetically challenged 'the powers.'