HONG KONG (SE): The Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers request prayers for the repose of Father John Cioppa, who passed away on September 26, at the assisted living unit at Maryknoll, New York. He was 91-years-old and had been a Maryknoll priest for 64 years. Wake services are scheduled for October 2, at the Holy Spirit Chapel and the Queen of Apostles Chapel at the Maryknoll Society Centre, New York. Mass of Christian Burial is to follow at 11:00am and is to be celebrated in the Queen of Apostles Chapel. He is to be buried at the Maryknoll Society Cemetery.
Father Cioppa worked at the Holy Spirit Study Centre for many years, was the first supervisor of the Kwun Tong Maryknoll College [founded in 1971], and was assistant parish priest at St. Patrick’s Parish, Wang Tau Hom, until his retirement and return to the United States in 2016.
He was born in born in Green Island, New York, on 14 June 1932, he entered the Maryknoll Seminary in Ossining, New York, in 1949, and was ordained to the priesthood on 13, June 1959 at the seminary. Immediately afterward he was assigned to Hong Kong.
After language studies he taught high school and did parish and relief work at the Bishop Ford Centre. In 1963 he opened the Bishop Walsh Primary School in Kowloon City, for 2,000 local children. Returning to the US in 1965, Father Cioppa worked for a time in Chicago’s Chinatown and upon returning to Hong Kong was assigned to St. John the Baptist parish, Kwun Tong. He worked on plans for a pastoral centre and boy’s high school, both of which opened in 1972.
In 1973, he was elected regional superior for the Maryknoll Fathers and oversaw the turning over of many of the Maryknoll schools and mission works to the diocese. In 1978 he was granted a visa for China became the first Maryknoll priest to re-enter the Mainland since 1949. Soon afterwards he was able to visit the priests and sisters of Jiangmen, Maryknoll’s first mission in China.
1978 Father Cioppa attended the Seventh General Chapter at Maryknoll, New York, and was elected an Assistant General of the Society. During his six-year term on the general council he was liaison for all of Maryknoll’s Regions and Units in Asia. Following some brief studies at the University of Hawaii, Father Cioppa returned to Hong Kong in 1987 and became assistant parish priest at St. Patrick’s Parish.
At this time of John Baptist Cardinal Wu Cheng-chung, asked him to be projects director at the Holy Spirit Study Centre. In 2008 Father Cioppa was elected the superior for Hong Kong.
After serving in Hong Kong for 50 years, Father Cioppa returned to Maryknoll in 2016. Of his time in Hong Kong, being so closely involved in the Maryknoll response to China he called it a high point in his missionary career. “It was both a challenge and most rewarding for a Westerner to live and work with the Chinese people,” he remarked.
May he rest in peace.
