On trying to serve two masters

My kindergarten was at a convent school, and I eventually studied at a Jesuit university; in between, I was an altar boy and became (or realized I was) an atheist. But even if you weren’t blessed with a Catholic upbringing, do read British human rights advocate and devout RC Benedict Rogers on Carrie Lam’s betrayal of her faith

A Catholic should be ready to genuflect, bow, kneel or prost[r]ate oneself before God alone, but a Catholic should never kowtow or kneel before a dictator, a tyrant, a criminal or before evil.

…At Saturday’s Mass to consecrate and install Hong Kong’s Bishop Stephen Chow Sau-yan, SJ, it was noticeable that the administration’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, who has presided over the dismantling of the city’s freedoms and autonomy over the past four years, sat in the front row*. It was also very noticeable that she left just before Holy Communion.

…She needs to decide where her primary loyalties lie — to God, her Church and the people of Hong Kong or to the brutal Chinese Communist Party regime whose dirty work she has so eagerly done for her masters in Beijing. Ultimately, no person can serve two masters.

Carrie is also now rejecting ‘Western-style’ democracy, blaming the pursuit of it for Hong Kong’s economic imbalance and ineffective governance – both of which must surely be due to Beijing’s choice of local leaders since 1997. 

Security Secretary PK Tang is denouncing exiled activist Nathan Law as ‘despicable’ for speaking at Joe Biden’s democracy summit (and don’t forget ‘coward’ and ‘traitor’). And Hong Kong and Macau Affairs boss Xia Baolong urges Hongkongers to cast their ‘sacred’ ballots to show their confidence in ‘One Country, Two Systems’. But they don’t claim to follow the teachings of Christ (unless Tang does – not sure). Perhaps the answer to the question ‘what does Carrie believe?’ is simply ‘whatever she is told to’.

On when not to accept Holy Communion, a word from the experts…

If we are in the state of mortal sin, it is better to abstain from receiving Our Lord. 

* I remember hearing that when new Governor David Wilson first attended Sunday service at the Anglican cathedral, the colony’s aristocrats were horrified that he took a pew at the back with the amahs.

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14 Responses to On trying to serve two masters

  1. Chinese Netizen says:

    “If we are in the state of mortal sin, it is better to abstain from receiving Our Lord.”

    Perhaps then this is a coded cry out from Lamb Curry that she’s being forced to do all her despicable acts *against her will*. Even being prevented from quitting with a gun to her son & hubby’s heads.

    https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/national-lampoon-magazine-jan-1973-ll-1920873658

  2. Jesuit says:

    “Luca Brasi held a gun to his head, and my father assured him that either his brains or his signature would be on the contract” – Mario Puza, The Godfather.

    It’s going to be tremendously entertaining next year when Curry Lamb is told to run for CE to be handed a whopping defeat by C.Y. Leung (who would never have said he was “considering running” if he wasn’t already assured of his victory). But the CCP will torture her for a few more years yet, by appointing her to various bodies with lots of Cs, Pc and Ns in their acronyms. Selling your soul is a one-way street…

  3. so says:

    1 Corinthians 10:21

  4. Stanley Leiber says:

    “…the colony’s aristocrats…”

    Ha! Ha! Ha!

  5. Joe Blow says:

    I hope that the DAB will win each and every seat in the new and improved Legco. That way there will be no ambiguity in regard to the nature of the “democratic” elections. Let the whole world see that a front organization of the CCP won fair and square in Hong Kong with a turn-out of 9%.

  6. HKJC Regular says:

    When I was an altar boy, it was said that leaving Mass just before communion was akin to what Judas did at the Last Supper.

  7. Toph says:

    I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s no real point in speculating about what goes on in Carrie Lam’s head. It doesn’t matter whether she’s an enthusiastic collaborator, a mindless careerist, or something more like a hostage. The result is the same, and also irrelevant.

    Though I can’t imagine why CY Leung (or anyone else) wants to be CE when the job description has clearly been downgraded to choreographed performing monkey. Surely more money can be made elsewhere.

  8. where's my jet plane says:

    I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s no real point in speculating about what goes on in Carrie Lam’s head

    Also remember she’s a failed social worker – couldn’t cope with dealing with people.

  9. Bloody Well Right says:

    Unfortunately, David Wilson has spent the last decade (longer?) serving as apologist for CCP aristocrats.

  10. donkey says:

    Best thing about all the noise that the CCP regime is making about failures of democracy and the use case of true, substantive democracy like the CCP “practices” is that it keeps drawing attention to the absolute hypocrisy of the regime. The US is destroying the world with its democracy but China will fix everything by eliminating democracy and forcing people to vote for things that they cannot choose. It also has the added benefit of driving home the message, though unintended of course, that maybe people may not want to actually vote in this thing.

  11. Toph says:

    @jet plane: I wouldn’t be any good as a social work either, but she seems to have come out of that stint with a contempt for people, social work, and the concept of compassion in general. She doesn’t seem to have beliefs so much as a general attitude of superiority. Again, not that it matters. She’s not the one making the decisions.

  12. Penny says:

    It seems to me that CL behaviour is a practical example of Hannah Arendt’s concept of the banality of evil – not on the Eichmann level granted but banal and evil, nevertheless.

  13. Mary Melville says:

    The role of social workers has been increasingly denigrated over the years. One has only to look at how the rank and file wages have stagnated while the bosses often earn more than their equivalent in the administration. Now that we have no genuine trade unions left to support the workers this trend will escalate.
    Of course some NGOs are more equal than others and continue to enjoy iron rice bowl, these are the ones that can always be relied on to support policy measures, even when they have a negative impact on their own personnel.

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