DECR representative takes part in Sinology conference in Poland
September 10-15, 2015 – the 9th European Catholic China Colloquium took place under the theme ‘Challenges of Evangelisation – China and Europe’ at the Konstancin-Jeziorna Mission Animation Center near Warsaw, Poland. It is a representative reflection-action forum of missionaries and sinologists, which has been held since 1992. The colloquium was organized by the German China-Zentrum and the Polish association ‘Sinicum’ named after the Catholic Jesuit missionary Michael Boym.
At the opening of the conference, the participants were greeted by Fr. Antoni Koszorz, Director of Sinicum; Cardinal Kazimierz Nycz, Archbishop of Warsaw; Bishop Erzy Mazur, head of the mission commission, Polish Bishops’ Conference; and Fr. Martin Welling Director of the Catholic China-Zentrum.
Among the speakers were Catholic clergy and scholars from the Vatican, China, Germany, Poland, Sweden, USA, Italy, France, Ireland and Belgium. They dealt with such topics as experience of evangelization in China and Europe, church-state relations, challenges and needs of church communities in China, training of Chinese clergy and students in Europe, enculturation of the Christian preaching, mass media, art, and importance of the efforts of European missionaries for Christian communities in China in the past and present.
With the blessing of Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate department for external church relations (DECR), D. Petrovsky, a DECR staffer, took part in the conference. He spoke about the efforts made by the Russian Orthodox Church to help normalize the situation of the Chinese Autonomous Orthodox Church and to organize pastoral work with Chinese migrants in Russia.
As part of the conference program, visits were made to Warsaw, Czestochowa and Krakow.
DECR Communication Service