Retired Archbishop Joseph Ti-Kang of Taipei (Photo: MEP)
A China-born archbishop, who led the Taiwanese archdiocese of Taipei for 15 years, died on Dec. 29 because of a cerebral hemorrhage, church sources said. He was 94.
Retired Archbishop Joseph Ti-Kang went through surgery and died following a blood clot in his brain.
The prelate, who was born in Xiuwu in Henan, a province in central China’s Yellow River Valley, has been a bishop in Taiwan for 29 years.
When the archbishop was born in 1928, Taiwan was under Japanese colonial rule.
Archbishop Ti-Kang had his initial seminary training at the regional seminary of Kaifeng in Henan, and moved to Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome for his theology studies. He was ordained a priest in Rome in 1953.
He moved to Germany for higher studies and obtained a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Munich in 1965.
He was appointed Rector of St. Joseph's Seminary in Taipei in 1965 and then became the vicar general of the Archdiocese of Taipei until 1975.
He became the Bishop of Kiayi in 1975. Ten years later in 1985, he was appointed the Coadjutor Archbishop of Taipei.
He became the Archbishop of Taipei in 1989 and continued in office until January 2004, when he resigned.
The years he led the dioceses of Kiayi and Taipei coincided with a period of profound political and social change in the Taiwanese island, local Church media reported.
Bishop Ti-Kang was also Secretary General of the Chinese Regional Episcopal Conference, the official name of the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Taiwan, from 1971 to 1975.
He was also the president of the Episcopal Commission for the Laity of the Archdiocese of Taipei (from 1975), and president of the Federation of Asian Bishops' Conferences’ office of the laity from 1981 to 1993.
He was also a member of the Pontifical Council for the Laity from 1984 to 1988, as well as of the Pontifical Cor Unum Council for Human and Christian Promotion after 1994. He also served as President of the Catholic University of Fu Jen from 1993 to 1999.