The Federation of Asian Bishops' Conference (FABC) will celebrate its 50th anniversary during its general conference which kicks off in Thailand today with 270 Catholic prelates and invited guests from different countries attending.
The meeting is taking place until Oct 30 at Baan Phu Waan Pastoral Training Centre at Baan Phuwan in Sam Phran district of Nakhon Pathom, which is adjacent to Bangkok. Seventeen cardinals and 200 bishops from 29 member countries across the region will attend.
FABC members are Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kazakhstan, Korea, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Taiwan, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Timor-Leste, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Thailand, China and its special administrative regions -- Macao and Hong Kong.
The meeting's overall objective is to reaffirm, renew and revitalise the Catholic Church in Asia under the theme: Journeying Together As Peoples of Asia, which is inspired by the scripture "then they went another way".
Cardinal Charles Muang Bo, FABC president will preside over the conference while Thailand's Minister of Culture Itthiphol Kunplome, Archbishop of Bangkok Cardinal Francis Xavier Kriengsak Kovitvanich and Bishop Joseph Chusak Sirisuth, president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Thailand, will give welcome speeches. The conference will discuss religion amid Asia's social climate with an aim to create a new vision for the Catholic Church in Asia to build a more peaceful society in each country.
In 1970, 180 Asian Catholic bishops gathered in Manila for a week with St Pope Paul VI being present for the latter part of the meeting. The FABC was initiated at that meeting with their desire to strengthen the collegiality among them and a need to define and articulate what it means to be the "Church in Asia" in the spirit of Vatican II.