ASIA/CHINA-In the few years of his episcopal ministry, Bishop Lu gave a lot to the Diocese, working hard and without attracting attention

Rome (Agenzia Fides) - On 30 April, S.E.Mgr. Francis Lu Shouwang, Bishop of the Diocese of Yichang (Ichang), in Hubei province (China) died at the hospital of Tongji in Wuhan, where he was hospitalized last September for acute pancreatitis.
The Prelate was 45 years old. He was born on February 26, 1966 in a Catholic family for generations, where two ancestors were priests. He grew up with his grandmother, he received a Christian education from her and had in the meantime become a catechist in the parish. In 1985 he entered the seminary in Wuhan to study philosophy and theology and was ordained a priest on May 19, 1991. After a year of pastoral work as assistant pastor of Chanyang he was transferred to the regional seminar of Wuhan as a prosecutor and as a teacher of Sacred Scripture and Fundamental Theology. In August 1999 he returned to his diocese, and was soon appointed General Vicar, he dealt with the diocesan administration: in this task, according to his elderly Bishop predecessor, he obtained good results. It was approved by the Holy See for the office of Coadjutor of Yichang in January 2002 and the civil authorities gave permission for his episcopal consecration on November 30, 2007.
Those who knew him remember him as a very capable priest, intelligent, loyal and had a good pastoral sense. A man of prayer, he had always given good example of priestly life to the faithful. A diocesan priest from Yichang said that in the few years of episcopal ministry, Mgr. Lu gave much to the Diocese, working hard and without attracting the people`s attention. The news of his death has saddened the community for the young age of the Catholic prelate and for his brief episcopate, during which he gave evidence and testimony of faith and obedience to the Holy Father.
The funeral, presided over by S.E. Mgr.Joseph Li Shan, Archbishop of Beijing, took place in the Cathedral of St. Francis on the morning of May 3 in the presence of 500 Catholics and various civil authorities. Other five Bishops concelebrated the Eucharist Bishops, four of whom were Mgr. Lu`s seminarian classmates .
The city of Yichang is located in the western part of the province of Hubei, a few dozen kilometers from the great Three Gorges Dam, recently built on the Blu River. The diocese, which covers mostly a mountainous territory, currently has 24 priests, 12 nuns and 30,000 Catholics. (Agenzia Fides 05/07/2011)