- Ignatius Kung Pin-Mei
Ignatius Pin-Mei Cardinal Kung (
Simplified Chinese : 龚品梅;Traditional Chinese : 龔品梅;Hanyu Pinyin : Gōng Pǐnméi;Wade-Giles : Kung P'in-mei) (August 2 ,1901 –March 12 ,2000 ) was theRoman Catholic bishop of Shanghai inChina from 1950 until his death, spending 30 years in Chinese prisons for defying attempts by China's communist government to controlRoman Catholic s through the state control.Kung was secretly named a Cardinal in the
consistory of 1979 byPope John Paul II , while serving a life sentence forcounter-revolutionary activities. After he was released in 1986, he was kept underhouse arrest until 1988. Until 1991, his membership in theCollege of Cardinals was kept secret, or "in pectore "; this is a formula that has been used when the pope wants to name a cardinal in a country where the Church is oppressed, to protect the safety of the cardinal and his congregation. Cardinal Kung himself didn't know until he had a private meeting with Pope John Paul inVatican City in 1988; by then, he had passed the age limit for participating in a conclave.He died in 2000, aged 98, from stomach cancer in
Stamford, Connecticut . His funeral was held at St. John the Evangelist Church in Stamford with CardinalJames Francis Stafford , President of thePontifical Council for the Laity , presiding. Cardinal Kung's body was then transported to Star of the Sea Church inSan Francisco, California , for aLow Mass and rosary service, with CardinalPaul Shan Kuo-hsi ofTaiwan presiding. A burialPontifical High Mass using the Tridentine Liturgy in Latin was said the following day at Five Wounds Parish inSan Jose, California , with Cardinal Shan again presiding. Cardinal Kung is interred next toDominic Tang ,S.J. (Archbishop of Canton, China) atMission Santa Clara de Asís inSanta Clara, California .cite web | url=http://www.cardinalkungfoundation.org/cardinal/fnd-funeral.html | title="The Funeral" | publisher=The Cardinal Kung Foundation | accessdate=2007-06-02 ]References
External links
* [http://www.google.co.uk/gwt/n?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cardinalkungfoundation.org%2Fpress%2F000312.html&_gwt_no
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* [http://www.cardinalkungfoundation.org/ Cardinal Kung Pin Mei Foundation, website]
* [http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/bishop/bkupm.html Profile on "Catholic hierarchy"]
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