Father holung biography

Our History

OUR FOUNDER: FR. RICHARD HO LUNG

Fr. Richard Ho Lung, founder of the Missionaries of the Poor and the present Father General, is a Jamaican, born to Chinese parents on September 17, 1939 in Richmond, St Mary.

His father and mother were born in Hong Kong, but came over to Jamaica as immigrants.

Father ho lung jamaica

His family was so poor that as a child he remembers one small cup of rice being passed around for dinner to be shared by him, his parents and his two sisters and brother.

He was educated by the Franciscan sisters in Kingston and then by the Jesuits at St.

George’s College. After completing his studies at St. George’s, on August 15, 1959, he joined the Society of Jesus, the most respected of religious orders and certainly the most intellectually acclaimed in the Roman Catholic Church.

He was ordained to the priesthood on July 4, 1971 and diligently studied, earning Master’s degrees in Philosophy, English Literature and Theology, along with a Licentiate in Theology and a Docto