Father Benedict Chao, the worldʼs oldest Trappist monk and the last survivor of the community that suffered communist persecution in China, died at the age of 108 on July 31 in Lantau, Hong Kong.
The Order of Cistercians of Strict Observance reported that Chao was born in 1918 in Chengting, Hebei Province, China. He entered the monastery in Hebei in 1941, made his solemn profession in 1947, and was ordained a priest in 1949.
He lived as a monk for 79 years and as a priest for 77. His funeral is scheduled for Aug. 14.
According to AsiaNews, Chao also served for more than 20 years as superior of the Trappist community on Lantau.
Persecuted by communists
In 1941, at the age of 23, Chau entered the Abbey of Our Lady of Joy, also known by its French name, “Liesse,” meaning “jubilation.”
According to AsiaNews, the monastery was occupied by Japanese troops in 1937 and several monks were imprisoned and killed.
However, the worst was yet to come when the Chinese dictator Mao Zedong took control of the region.
In 1947, the same year Chao made his solemn vows, the Abbey of Our Lady of Consolation in Yangjiaping was attacked. The monks were tortured and forced to leave the monastery.
A year later, six monks were executed by firing squad following a peopleʼs trial. Among them was 29-year-old Father Chrysostom Chang, the communityʼs sub-prior.
Those who were killed during the persecution are commemorated as the 33 martyrs of Yangjiaping, comprising 30 Chinese monks and three foreign religious, according to AsiaNews.
Exile and new monastery in Hong Kong
The Liesse community, where the young Chao was living, also came under attack, leaving the monks no choice but to seek refuge in another city.
As the persecution intensified, some monks were sent out of China. Among them was Chao, who arrived at the monastery of Notre-Dame-des-Prairies in Manitoba, Canada.
In 1951, the Xindu community also had to close due to communist persecution. The monks who had managed to leave China then began preparing to rebuild their community in Hong Kong.
With the support of the then-bishop of Hong Kong, Enrico Valtorta, a missionary of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions, the monks were granted a plot of land in the highlands of Lantau Island.
There, eight monks built the new monastery, which was inaugurated in 1956.
In 1999, the Cistercian order recognized the Lantau community as an autonomous abbey, and in January 2000, it reclaimed the name Abbey of Our Lady of Joy, the same name the community had in Hebei.
With Chao’s passing, the abbey bids farewell to the last survivor of that generation of Trappist monks who were persecuted by Mao but managed to reestablish a monastery in Hong Kong.
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, the Spanish-language sister service of EWTN News. It has been translated and adapted by EWTN News English.