Left-behind Elderly Parents: the Theology and Social Role of Christian Organizations in Supporting Older Adults in Hong Kong whose Adult Children Migrated through the British National (Overseas) Visa Scheme

Since the announcement of the British National (Overseas) (BNO) visa on 22 July 2020, many young Hong Kong families, aiming for a different lifestyle, education, and opportunities, moved to Britain. However, for various reasons (language barriers, cultural differences, and lack of community), the elderly parents of these young couples remained in Hong Kong. Various organisations have since released statistical analyses of increasing cases of loneliness, family disconnection, and suicide in the older adult population. Social identity and belonging to social groups provide meaning to an individual’s life (Haslam, Jetten, Postmes, and Haslam, 2009), and the identity as a parent and grandparent is an important one to older adults. How do they reconcile with this loss of social relationships, and how can their social identity as a member of a religious community support them in the midst of this transition?

Many of Hong Kong’s non-profit organisations have religious affiliations, because Hong Kong, as a British crown colony before 1997, had many Christian social welfare programs. While the Hong Kong SAR government has a well-developed social welfare department, due to historic reasons, Protestant Christian social services continue to be an integral part of Hong Kong society. The social identity as a Christian is often a central one (Cameron, 2004), and this paper explores how such self-identification of membership can be crucial to these older adults.

The aim of this paper is to determine how Christian social services and churches can facilitate the flourishing of older adults in midst of the loss they face in the migration of their adult children and grandchildren. This paper aims to answer three key questions: (1) How do left-behind elderly parents understand their relationship with God? (2) How do Hong Kong Christian organisations support these left-behind elderly parents? (3) How do left-behind elderly parents understand their social identity, and the loss of such?

This paper aims to facilitate the construction of an original framework to understand the loss of social identity elderly parents of Hong Kong BNO visa migrants face in the midst of their adult children’s migration. Capturing the experiences and struggles of their left-behind elderly parents, as well as how Christian organisations can support them through this phase, will facilitate future policy making, such as how to care for and provide support to older adults who live by themselves in Hong Kong.