Well, He IS a Bishop

Jimmy Lai has embraced his destiny. Last Wednesday the founder of one of Hong Kong’s most popular newspapers, Apple Daily, was arrested on ginned-up fraud charges. On Thursday he was clapped into jail as a national security risk. Thus did a man who started the week a Hong Kong billionaire end it a Chinese dissident.

Mr. Lai’s jailing has provoked condemnation from figures as diverse as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Soviet refusenik Natan Sharansky and New York Rep. Eliot Engel. They have been joined by journalists, activists and politicians such as the Labour Party’s Sarah Champion and other members of Parliament who on Monday raised Mr. Lai’s plight in Britain’s House of Commons.

 But there is one place where China’s bullying elicits only silence: the Vatican. Which is strange, because Jimmy Lai is not only Hong Kong’s most well-known champion of democracy; he is also its most prominent Catholic layman. At a moment when he and his family most need their shepherd, Pope Francis is MIA.

The silence might be understandable if Pope Francis were in the tradition of pontiffs who hold themselves aloof from worldly affairs. But Pope Francis is a man who readily weighs in on outrages wherever he finds them, whether it be modern air conditioning, American capitalism or Catholic moms who breed “like rabbits.”

 

 But on China . . . silence. It’s the deliberate consequence of the Vatican’s 2018 agreement with Beijing, just recently renewed, that gives the Communist state extraordinary say over the selection of Catholic bishops—and whose terms Rome insists on keeping secret. The Vatican defends the deal as the means for carving out protections for the church’s continued presence in China. Unfortunately, rather than herald a thaw in China’s hostility toward religion, persecution has increased—and not only against Catholics.

“China is one of the world’s worst abusers of religious liberty,” says William Mumma, CEO of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. “What makes China’s repression especially repugnant is the heavy involvement of the highest levels of government. Whether it is Christians, Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong or Uighur Muslims, the government attacks religious freedom in pursuit of absolute power. No religious believer, no religious leader, can in good conscience turn their gaze away from this repression.”

But this is precisely what Pope Francis is doing. Hong Kong’s Cardinal Joseph Zen notes it is not a recent development, that Hong Kong hearts have been “broken” by the lack of encouragement from the pope amid the protests and mass arrests that have marked their continuing struggle with Beijing. “It has been 1½ years that we are waiting for a word from Pope Francis,” he says, “but there is none.”

 

They Sent Us a Virus and We Volunteered to Close Churches

CNA Staff, Apr 30, 2020 / 02:00 pm MT (CNA).- As the Chinese government makes progress containing the COVID-19 pandemic, authorities have resumed action to remove crosses from buildings and crackdown on religious practice.

The latest round of enforcement actions have included the removal of crosses from buildings belonging to the state-run churches. According to a report from UCA News, priests say they are cooperating in the removal of exterior crosses in hopes that entire church buildings will not be demolished or converted into a building for secular use.  

According to a parishioner in the Chinese province of Anhui named John, Chinese officials cut down the cross from the top of Our Lady of the Rosary Church on April 18. Our Lady of the Rosary belongs to the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (CPCA, the Catholic Church officially sanctioned by the Chinese Communist Party and operating both in communion with Rome and under state control.  

The bishops of the CPCA, who were in many cases illicitly consecrated and under official excommunication, were received into full communion with Rome as part of the Vatican’s 2018 provisional agreement with China. The full terms of the China deal were not released to the public but have been reported to include the right of state authorities to propose and veto candidates for the episcopacy in China.

The Rudderless Ship

The Vatican and China said yesterday they had signed a historic agreement on the appointment of Roman Catholic bishops, a breakthrough on an issue that for decades fuelled tensions between the Holy See and Beijing and thwarted efforts toward diplomatic relations.

The provisional agreement, which was signed in Beijing by deputy foreign ministers from both sides, was described by the Vatican as “the fruit of a gradual and reciprocal rapprochement”, following a long process of careful negotiation, and subject to periodic review.

 “It concerns the nomination of bishops, a question of great importance for the life of the church, and creates the conditions for greater collaboration,” the Vatican said.

In Beijing, the foreign ministry put out a statement saying: “China and the Vatican will continue to maintain communications and push forward the process of improving relations between the two sides.”

But the deal was denounced by critics as a sellout to the communist government. “They’re [sending] the flock into the mouths of the wolves. It’s an incredible betrayal,” Cardinal Joseph Zen, the former archbishop of Hong Kong who has led the opposition to the deal, told Reuters.

So how is it working out?

 
Christian funerals have been banned in some areas of China as the communist government begins to enforce a set of repressive regulations on religious practices.

In the eastern province of Zhejiang, the government has put in force a set of Regulations on Centralized Funeral Arrangement, which bans priests from attending funeral prayers outside a religious place.

The government claims the new rules aim to “get rid of bad funeral customs and establish a scientific, civilized and economical way of funerals.”

“Clerical personnel are not allowed to participate in funerals” at homes and “no more than 10 family members of the deceased are allowed to read scriptures or sing hymns in a low voice," the rules state. 

The new rules began to take effect recently, although enacted on Dec. 1, said a Catholic in Wenzhou Diocese in Zhejiang.
The regulations strictly ban “religious activities outside religious places, so the priest will not be able to hold funeral prayers outside the church,” he told UCA News. Huang Jian, also of Wenzhou, said that after the new regulations were announced, “priests are not attending religious funeral ceremonies.”

Things in Motion Tend to Stay in Motion

Macau, China, Oct 4, 2019 / 07:01 pm (CNA).- A diocese in southern China expressed disappointment Wednesday regarding a patriotic light-show that had been projected on the remains of a famous Catholic church.

For three consecutive nights beginning Sept. 29, the Macau Government Tourism Office projected government principles and symbols onto the Ruins of St. Paul’s, located at Freguesia de Santo António on the western side of the Macau peninsula.

The event was named the “Glorious Splendor in Celebration of the 70th anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China.” It projected pro-government statements, including Macau’s integration into China 20 years ago, and Chinese symbols, such as the country’s flag. 

Boy, I bet the Pope is angry about this! Oh...wait...

The Giant Bus

The Vatican said this past weekend that it had reached an agreement with China on the process of constructing the “largest, most biggest ever” bus to throw Chinese Catholics under.
The deal paves the way for bishops and laity who have been faithful to the Rome to be “royally screwed for their loyalty,” while rewarding bishops created without papal approval.
“For Pope Francis, the construction of the mega bus has been one of his most ambitious ventures to date,” says Ben Tammany, senior adviser to the Vatican. “It’s an effort to broaden the appeal of the Church no matter what the cost.”

Francis has drawn criticism from many Catholic opponents, who say the Church shouldn’t “screw over people who have been faithful to the Pope” with this joint venture with an atheist country that has targeted and harassed Catholics with surveillance and persecution. Others, though, say that it is of the utmost importance to Catholicism in the region to “screw over people who have been faithful to the Pope” with this joint venture with an atheist country that has targeted and harassed Catholics with surveillance and persecution.

I Can't Wait Until Nancy Pelosi Gets to Pick Bishops!

In four brief statements issued yesterday, the Vatican announced two developments with respect to the People’s Republic of China:
Beijing and the Holy See have signed an agreement on the protocol for the appointment of Catholic bishops in the PRC. The Vatican gave no information on what the protocol is.
Pope Francis “has decided to readmit to full ecclesial communion” eight bishops (one of them deceased) who had been approved by Beijing but not by Rome. That means that now all of China’s 75 (by my count) active bishops are in communion with the pope.

Fifteen of those 75 are “underground” bishops. That is, they’re not recognized by the Chinese government. It’s natural to speculate that Beijing will, in a quid pro quo, recognize them eventually. If it does, that might please the Vatican, but as for the bishops themselves, and for many of the faithful they pastor, Beijing’s “blessing” is exactly what they seek to avoid. They consider the government’s presence in the life of the Church to be pernicious.
The more plausible outcome for Chinese Catholics who reject government interference in the Church is that the “underground” character of their communities will be dissolved in a gradual, indirect manner, one that would be in the style of both the Vatican and the Chinese government. Already four of the underground bishops are well past the official retirement age of 75, and all 15 will have reached that milestone by 2038. As each one retires, Rome and Beijing can simply replace him with a bishop who belongs to the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (PCA), the organization that was established, in the 1950s, as the legal, government-controlled alternative to the Church, which had been effectively banned after the Communist takeover in 1949.
Further on in  the article:
From speaking with Catholics who know the Church in China firsthand and, for the sake of Church unity, favor Vatican concessions to Beijing, I gather that they see underground diehards much as many mainstream Catholics in America regard Latin Mass traditionalists: as cranky and disagreeable, disruptive and dissident. Many Catholics who only want to build up the Church in the challenging environment that is the PRC consider the underground holdouts, not the Chinese government, to be the primary obstacle to their objective.
The last high-profile demonstration of underground resistance was in 2012, when Thaddeus Ma Daquin, whom both Rome and Beijing had approved as an auxiliary bishop of Shanghai, renounced the PCA at his ordination. He was disappeared after the ceremony. Three years later, under house arrest, he recanted. For that he was praised, last year in La Civilità Cattolica, a Jesuit publication out of Rome, as “a Chinese bishop with a healthy realism. . . . Even if he is currently under house arrest, he is trying to engage positively with his government.”

Prepare to be Saddened

Crises and scandals have gathered at the Vatican in the past month. This pontificate is spreading chaos and confusion. 

We are all familiar with parody Twitter accounts; someone called Donald J. Trump has a really rather good one going at the moment. When I read the words of a senior Vatican official recently, on the Twitter feed of the Catholic Herald, it seemed just so obvious. A Bishop Marcelo Sánchez Sorando, according to the report, the chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences — it sounds like a job of soul-destroying tedium but is in fact a rather significant position — had described the one country in the world that, in the bishop’s words, was “best implementing the social doctrine of the Church.” That would be the People’s Republic of China. 

 China is the country that had a remarkably successful try at enforcing a one-child policy, promoting massive abortion (a figure of more than 300 million has been suggested) — sex-selective, with boys highly favored for birth, girls for elimination — enforced sterilization, and execution of criminals. And, of course, the one-party state persecutes the Church and imprisons human-rights advocates. Bishop Sánchez, who said he had been to China and seen all this good work in person, so it must be true, probably wouldn’t agree with Cardinal Joseph Zen, the bishop emeritus of Hong Kong, who recently protested the imminent decision of the Vatican to recognize the government-sponsored, quisling “Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association.” That move would be at the expense of the members of the “underground” Catholic Church, which has stayed loyal to the Vatican and suffered persecution for decades. Zen said that the Vatican, and by that he means Pope Francis, was “ready to surrender to the Chinese Communist Party” — again, perfectly fine if it excelled at implementing the social doctrine of the Church.

Read the whole thing. Here's the final paragraph:

You can hide the rubbish in the streets only for so long. Eventually it overflows, out into the open. When the Church should be speaking with a clear and direct voice, it is instead spreading confusion, misunderstanding, and scandal. Francis famously called for the people to make a “mess” in the Church. To youth in Rio de Janeiro, he said in January 2013, “I want a mess. . . . I want trouble in the dioceses.” It seems, for now, he has got his wish.

George Weigel Takes the Vatican To The Woodshed (it's about China)

 

Negotiating with the Devil has never been the long suit of Vatican diplomacy. The “examination of conscience” is an important part of Catholic spirituality, which always precedes confession but is ideally practiced at the end of each day: a review of what one got wrong, and what right, as preparation for an act of contrition and a prayer of thanksgiving for graces received. And while there are obvious and important differences between individual Catholics examining their conscience and Vatican diplomats reviewing the Church’s successes and failures in the thorny, dense thickets of world politics, one might have thought that this spiritual discipline would have some bearing on the diplomacy of the Holy See, if only as a reality check.

But if you thought that, you’d be hard pressed to find evidence for it in the history of Vatican diplomacy’s dealing with totalitarian regimes.
Read more at the link about the 1929 Lateran Accord with Italy, the 1933 Reich Concordiat, and...

Then came the Ostpolitik of the late 1960s and 1970s. Faced with what he once described as the “frozen swamp” of Communist repression behind the iron curtain, Pope Paul VI’s chief diplomatic agent, Archbishop Agostino Casaroli, began to negotiate a series of agreements with Communist governments. Those agreements were intended to provide for the sacramental life of the Church by facilitating the appointment of bishops, who could ordain priests, who could celebrate Mass and hear confessions, thereby preserving some minimal form of Catholic survival until Communism “changed.” And another disaster ensue.

Pope Francis, Chairman Mao, and a Meme Walk Into a Bar

If you don't get it, read this.

Here's the original meme

 

Trust, But Verify

The Holy See has reportedly asked two Chinese bishops to stand aside to make way for illicitly ordained, Chinese government-backed counterparts.

A Vatican delegation asked Bishop Peter Zhuang of Shantou and Bishop Jospeh Guo Xijin of Mindong to retire or accept demotion in order to smooth relations with the Chinese government.
Asia News, the outlet of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions, reports that 88-year-old Bishop Zhuang received a letter dated 26 October asking him to resign to make way for the government-backed Bishop Huang Bingzhang.

Bishop Huang Bingzhang.

 Bishop Huang was excommunicated in 2011 after being consecrated without Vatican approval. He is also a member of the National People’s Congress, the Chinese parliament.

Asia News reports that Bishop Zhuang was escorted to Beijing, where he met Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli, former president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, who told him to retire – but with the proviso that he could nominate three priests, one of whom Bishop Huang would appoint as his vicar general.

I agree with National Review's Michael Brendan Dougherty:


 ... I find it difficult to trust the Chinese government given its history. I worry that a deal will give diplomatic cover to renew the persecution of non-conforming members of the underground Church, and heighten the policy of Sinicization. I also worry that Vatican officials, having invested so much in this approach will be slow to take offense if the Chinese government again promotes its own men against the wishes of the Church. A friend of mine who grew up in Hong Kong, and believed himself growing up as a witness to a Chinese Catholic vanguard lamented to me, “Everybody, and I mean everybody, knows somebody who was murdered, or tortured, or imprisoned or disappeared to defend the principle that was just abandoned.”

The Mission Temple Fireworks Stand Guy was Right!

" He said, "Fireworks are dangerous, they can blow up in your face
So you better read the instructions, light the fuse and get away
These things are made in China, so it's easy to see
How a man who worships Buddha ain't got no guarantee"

China was responsible for the most ocean plastic pollution per year with an estimated 2.4 million tons, about 30 percent of the global total, followed by Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Egypt, Malaysia, Nigeria and Bangladesh.

The United States was the only rich industrialized nation in the top 20, and it ranked No. 20. Coastal EU nations combined would rank 18th.