Light a Candle: Encounters and Friendship with China: Festschrift in Honor of Angelo Lazzarotto P.I.M.E. ed. by Roman Malek and Gianni Criveller (review)

While this impressive book cannot be understood outside its church context, just like the light of a candle, its impact extends beyond this ambit. To those involved in the study of Christianity in China in general, not only does Angelo Lazzarotto (of the Pontifical Institute of Milan) need no introduction but also the fact that a festschrift has been written for him is no surprise either. In some ways, a reader can wonder why it has not happened before. Thankfully, as the result of conversations at a church history conference in Hong Kong in 2007, such a work has now seen the light.

Lazzarotto has been a priest and scholar for sixty-five years and for many of those years has served the church in China, either through his academic work at the Holy Spirit Study Centre of Hong Kong (of which he was a founding member), or in Europe, as a promoter of greater appreciation of China and its church situation. Much of this work occurred as a result of his various responsibilities to his missionary institute (for twelve years he was on its international leadership committee) and to the church more broadly, as the rector of a large college in Rome, and as an appointee of the Italian Bishops’ Conference as their expert on Asia. These positions enabled Lazzarotto to sponsor projects, organize conferences, and animate younger academics (both secular and confessional). One can only imagine how much more Lazzarotto could have done were he not involved in administration.

Nevertheless, there is no evidence of a reduced productivity during his work, as shown by the bibliography compiled by Gianni Criveller, of the same religious institute (and coeditor with Roman Malek, a Society of the Divine Word priest and academic). Between 1950 and 2010, Lazzarotto wrote articles and book chapters as well as gave interviews in journals and newspapers throughout the world. He consistently encouraged others to reflect upon the realities of China’s Christian past, whether from a missiological, sociological, historical, or historiographical point of view. At all times, Lazzarotto’s encouragement was inspiring and beneficial.

For the purposes of this review, an important question remains: Can a festchrift about such varied activities, which was deliberately designed as a celebration of one priest’s contributions, count as an academic work? In the main the answer is mixed: yes, maybe not, and does it matter? That is, while most of the articles are indeed examples of well-grounded and fascinating research, some are not, but then that’s likely because those pieces are either true instances of homage or personal reflections.

Specialist readers who wish to know about aspects of Chinese Catholic Christian history or its present reality will not be disappointed by the offerings here, while the general reader has a wide range of articles and items from which to choose. An impressive aspect is the compilation’s breadth, in terms of both the years covered and the disciplinary fields of the authors. The contributing scholars (who all had met and worked with Lazzarotto) likewise come from all quarters of the globe. The articles appear in their original English, in translation, or in Chinese.

The book is structured into five parts: articles on traditional China, work on archival material about the history of Christianity in China, considerations of the place of the Catholic Church within modern China, two articles from a Hong Kong perspective (important, given Lazzarotto’s long involvement there), and reflections on more contemporary themes. Thus, one can find a survey and bibliography of monastic literature in China (written by Matteo Nicolini-Zani), a piece about the quest for the real Cathay (written by Paolo de Troia), an examination of the attempts to introduce Aristotelian thought to...