wfn.org | Host Churches Welcome LWF Assembly to Hong Kong

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Host Churches Welcome LWF Assembly

HONG KONG, July 25, 1997 (lwi) - The Host Churches of the Ninth Assembly of
the Lutheran World Federation welcomed participants with a festive banquet
at Hong Kong's Ocean Palace Restaurant July 10. The five member churches of
the Hong Kong Lutheran Federation introduced themselves to Assembly
participants through a colorful and varied evening of drama, dance, video,
song and story telling. The five churches have a total of about 41,170
members in 142 congregations and come from three different backgrounds. 

The Chinese Rhenish Church, Hong Kong Synod, was founded by missionaries
from the Barman Mission in Germany who worked among the Cantonese-speaking
people, while the Tsung-Tsin Mission, Hong Kong, was founded by those from
the Basel Mission in Switzerland who labored among the Hakka-speaking
natives. This work began in Guangdong and Hong Kong in 1846, in response to
an appeal from the first Lutheran missionary, Karl F. Guttzlaff who arrived
in Hong Kong in 1831.

Because of civil war in China around 1950, more than one million refugees
flooded into Hong Kong. Work among the refugees resulted in the Evangelical
Lutheran Church of Hong Kong (ELCHK), founded in 1954. In 1968 the Hong
Kong and Macau Lutheran Church was formed when the Norwegian Lutheran
Mission left ELCHK because of controversies concerning ordination.

The Lutheran Church, Hong Kong Synod, was established by missionaries of
the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod who had labored in Hupei, China. They
worked among the refugees from China, independently of the other Lutheran
groups.

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