The 2025 East Asian Youth Taize Meeting in Hong Kong 

The 2025 Taizé East Asian Youth Meeting in Hong Kong, hosted by the Community of Taizé, Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui, and the Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong, took place from May 2nd to 5th, 2025. The meeting included common prayer, silence, Bible reflection, fellowship, and themed workshops. It was part of the Jubilee 2025 celebrations and aimed to foster hope and solidarity among young people from across East Asia.

Here’s a more detailed look at the event:

  • Theme: “Hope beyond all hope”. 
  • Venue: All Saints’ Cathedral, Wah Yan College (Kowloon), and St. Ignatius Chapel. 
  • Participants: Approximately 300 young people from various churches in East Asia. 
  • Activities:
    • Common prayer, silence, Bible reflection, and fellowship. 
    • Theme workshops. 
    • Evening prayer with leaders and Christians from different churches. 
    • Cultural celebration and festive lunch. 
    • Opportunities for sharing, reflection, and spiritual growth. 
  • Purpose: To encourage young people to draw closer to God, support one another, and find hope in Christ, especially in a time of growing challenges in modern life. 

The above introduction is taken from the google AI of the event host in Hong Kong. The youth mainly from various provinces of China. A Korean Group is the 2nd stronger one, some from Taiwan, Japan, French and Italian.

We welcomed 7 young women from mainland China 1 from Canton, 6 from ShanXi Tai Yuen. Among these 2 religious sisters (Franciscan Order?) accompanied 4 youngsters for this event.

Everyday morning and evening prayer at 9am and 8p.m respectively, chanting with Taizé short refrains accompanied with verses from the Psalms, the homily given either from Bishop Ha, Angelica Church or Angelica Bishop. The youth they love this kind of prayer, fully participate into the singing.

The Bible Sharing taken place after the morning prayer for an hour. Though I did not participate, in the exchange with a Franciscan Sisters, the youth employ the modern utilities expressed in their spiritual experiences such as softener, vitamins.

Every evening 2 sisters from the community will join the evening prayer. Similar to the morning prayer, except there was a moment of for the youth to pray personally before the Cross of St. Francis, (a symbol of Taizé Community) in adoration. And for those who would meet the Priest or Pastor for their spiritual guidance or reconciliation. The young are very simple and spontaneously in their movement.

On the last day, the program is the same in the morning, during the lunch hour, I was able to converse with few youth from Canton province they had been candidates fro certain religious congregation. Due to the visa problem could not join, one even had joined the Good Shepherd Congregation and stayed 4 years as aspirant in South Korea. Come to the problem of visa, she was being abandoned due to the question of longer term stay!

To conclude the event, regional groups sharing. There were 60 Hong Kong Youth enrolled but only 20 were presented. The points of sharing were very much animated. They all appreciated this kind of event, emphasized of enrich friendship with other nations, appreciate the moment alone with Jesus supported by the community background. Personally, it is a very nice prayer session with the youth. To create an atmosphere of prayer session a team collaboration is important!

Written By : Sr. Cecilia Emmanuel (Sheung Shui)