Agenzia Fides

Hai Kou (Agenzia Fides) - On March 9, the old restored church in the city of Hai Kou of the Diocese of Hai Nan was consecrated and opened. According to reports from Faith of Hei Bei, the church dedicated to St. Joseph was the only church in the city before 17 May 2012, the day in which the new church dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus was consecrated.
According to the pastor, "the opening of the new church has allowed us to have more space to accommodate the growing number of faithful, but we have not abandoned their strong ties to the old church, which is part of our history. So after a few months of work with the offerings of the faithful, here is the old and the new House of God. We encouraged the faithful to follow the footsteps of the Patron Saint Joseph: To serve the Lord with great humility."
The Diocese of Hai Nan was separated from the Apostolic Vicariate of Pakhoi in 1920, the Apostolic Prefecture of Hai Nan was erected in 1936. Up to thirty years ago, the Diocese of Hai Nan had only one priest, a nun and had only a place of worship of a church. Today the faithful are about 6,000, mostly ethnic Han, as well as some indigenous minorities. (NZ) (Agenzia Fides 13/03/2013)