Posted on 06/24/2011 3:05:16 PM PDT by NYer
China's state-controlled Catholic church says it wants to quickly ordain at least 40 bishops, a move likely to further aggravate tensions with the Vatican.
The official Xinhua news agency quoted Yang Yu, spokesman for the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, as saying more than 40 of the country's 97 dioceses were without a bishop.
The report said Church leaders agreed at a recent meeting that the church would strive to select and ordain bishops at those diocese without delay.
Tensions between Beijing and the Vatican have been high since an official church gathering in December which, the Vatican says, bishops and priests were forced to attend. The Vatican also protested the ordination of a bishop in Chengde in November without its approval.
Pope Benedict said last month that he hopes the bishops' loyalty to the Vatican will prove stronger than the temptation to give in to Chinese authorities.
China's officially-sanctioned Catholic Church, has between five and six million members, while an underground church loyal to Rome with has many as 10 million followers
Ping!
Who cares about religious freedom when we can get toasters for $10?
The Chinese leadership are plagued by the demons of history.
When they looked out over the crowded Tiananmen Square, they did not see democrats wanting more liberty. In their minds’ eye, those students were no different than the students of the Red Guard a generation before. And many of today’s Chinese leaders suffered terribly during the Cultural Revolution. Their family members killed, tortured, imprisoned in labor camps, and publicly humiliated under the threat of whimsical murder.
Some Chinese leaders were reportedly so afraid they curled up and sobbed.
So what does religion mean to them? Be it the Catholic Church, Protestant Evangelism, or even a cult like Falun Gong.
In their minds’ eye, all religion is the same thing. The offer to return to what may have been one of the bloodiest conflicts in human history: The Taiping Rebellion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_rebellion
And it all started when some Christian missionaries innocently gave a New Testament pamphlet to the wrong man. His name was Hong Xiuquan.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Xiuquan
Soon convinced that he was Jesus’ younger brother, and possessed of great charisma, he began a civil war in which some British historians have estimated that as many as 35 million Chinese were slaughtered.
That sort of thing leaves a lasting impression in a nation. Which is one very good reason the Chinese leadership will long mistrust and fear religion.
China's state-controlled Catholic church says it wants to quickly ordain at least 40 bishops, a move likely to further aggravate tensions with the Vatican.
Is there a Chinese Pope to sanctify these nominations?
Of course not.
That sounds like the sort of thing that would happen in the kingdom of Antichrist.
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