The 90-year-old cardinal has been an outspoken defender of human rights and democracy in Hong Kong and strongly critical of Beijing for its suppression of fundamental freedoms in the city.

The pope recorded the messages in the spur-of-the-moment when he received the new bishop of Hong Kong, Bishop Stephen Chow Sau Yan, S.J., in a private audience at the papal library in the Vatican’s apostolic palace.

The newly installed Catholic bishop of Hong Kong promised action to heal Catholics and the wider society, divided because of the Chinese action to suppress a two-year-long protest seeking democratic freedoms.

Dialogue is always preferable to confrontation, Cardinal Dolan said. ”[But] my gut also tells me that you can’t negotiate with these people. It could be extraordinarily counterproductive.”

Father Tong succeeds the current provincial, Stephen Chow, S.J., whom Pope Francis appointed as the new bishop of Hong Kong on May 17.

It was 100 years ago—on Sept. 12, 1921—when the Maryknoll Sisters assigned its first group of sisters to China, the order’s first mission.