HONG KONG (SE): Reverend Yuen Tin-yau, the former chairperson of the Hong Kong Christian Council and former president of the Methodist Church, passed away on July 15 at the age of 71. A statement from the Methodist Church said “Yuen was taken to Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital on Saturday after he suffered a stroke, and he died at 8.00am in the company of family members.”
A university graduate with a degree in Chemistry, Yuen taught secondary school for a time before studying theology at Chung Chi College’s Divinity School. He joined the Methodist Church in 1978 and retired at the beginning of 2016 after serving as president of the Church from 2012 to 2015 while concurrently chairperson of the Hong Kong Christian Council from 2011 to 2015.
In an interview with the Christian Times published on July 17, Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Ha Chi-shing paid tribute to Reverend Yuen and said he had no idea that Yuen was suffering from cancer as he had continued to preach and write articles despite his illness. He expressed his appreciation for Yuen’s perseverance as he followed St. Paul the Apostle, who ran his race to the end.
During the 2019 extradition bill protests, Reverend Yuen, together with Bishop Ha, crossed a police cordon and entered the campus of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, which was fortified as a last-stand bastion during the 2019 protests and visited the besieged students and brought several of them out.
Bishop Ha recalled that he did not have much contact with Reverend Yuen before the incident, and he was introduced by a mutual acquiantance. He recalled that at the Polytechnic University, they worked together to serve the students, and did not talk much about other things.
Yuen arrived at the scene in the middle of the night, spoke and listened to the students to understand their situation and invited them to leave, showing his love and concern.
Bishop Ha said that Reverend Yuen’s strong determination in the face of changes in the social environment in recent years is worthy admiration. “We are people of faith, and it is our faith that sustains us. Circumstances may change, but it is our state of mind before the Lord that counts,” he said.
