Posted on 04/08/2012 7:53:47 AM PDT by markomalley
Beijing (AsiaNews) - The Easter holiday will be "very discreetly" celebrated this year in unofficial (underground) communities in China. Many community leaders, bishops and priests, were in fact called in by the police for a "conversation" and even underwent weeks of indoctrination on the government's religious policy. Several Church observers clearly see a campaign underway to "convert" the underground Church and absorb it into the official church.
"This year - an underground priest told AsiaNews - we will celebrate Easter in silence and discretion, without any solemnity. In other years, we had to find locations big enough so we could celebrate together. This year, we will celebrate Easter in small groups. Like every year there will also be the baptisms of adults and children. In my parish there are 10. There are less than usual this year because we wanted to raise the level of formation, and follow the rules of the Church, to give at least a year of catechism. "
According to the priest, the discretion and silence of this year is due to the fact that the police are rather restless: in October there will be a leadership change, with a new president and a new prime minister who will replace Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao.
The priest said that he and other colleagues have received an invitation from the police to call in for a "conversation" in which they promised to "be calm".
"In other parts of China - said the priest - is a bit 'more dramatic, like in Wenzhou and Tianshui".
In Wenzhou (Zhejiang), the coadjutor bishop, Mgr. Peter Shao Zhumin, and the chancellor, Fr. Paul Jiang Sunian were called by police on March 19, "invited" to a "study session" for at least a week. Bishop Shao, 49, directs the "underground" community of Wenzhou. Appointed by the Holy See and consecrated bishop in 2007, to promote integration between official and unofficial, the Holy See decided that Mgr. Shao would be the coadjutor bishop, while the ordinary is Msgr. Vincent Zhu Weifang. The two communities are still struggling to integrate. But the police are trying to "facilitate" this by pushing the underground community to become part of the official Church, by signing the accession to the Patriotic Association and the idea of a Church independent of the pope.
According to sources cited by Eglises d'Asie, the dialogue between the police, Msgr. Shao and priests have also focused on the situation of Tianshui (Gansu), where for several months, there is a new underground bishop in the person of Mgr. John Wang Ruohan, former administrator of the diocese. Since January, Msgr. Wang and some of her priests are being subjected to "study sessions" on the government's religious policy.
Similar events occurred in Hebei and Inner Mongolia. According to observers, there seems to be in a clear policy to wipeout the underground community.
On 2 March, in front of representatives of the council of Chinese bishops (official) and the Patriotic Association, a senior official from the United Front - which also controls religious affairs - claimed that the two organizations should strive to achieve good results for "the conversion of the underground community." Of course the term "conversion" means the total submission of the community to Chinese government policy directives.
Week long “study sessions”! And this is the government that Obama wishes we had so he could rule more efficiently.
Don’t think for a moment that this couldn’t happen here.
As the years pass, I am becoming more and more worried and quietly resigned that the worst is yet to come, and that we will have to sacrifice an enormous amount to preserve freedom for all.
The supreme good is like water,
which nourishes all things without trying to.
It is content with the low places that people disdain.
Thus it is like the Tao.
In dwelling, live close to the ground.
In thinking, keep to the simple.
In conflict, be fair and generous.
In governing, don't try to control.
In work, do what you enjoy.
In family life, be completely present.
When you are content to be simply yourself
and don't compare or compete, everybody will respect you.
>>Don’t think for a moment that this couldn’t happen here.
I didn’t say that it couldn’t happen here. In fact, it will happen here. We live in a nation of immoral people who want everything handed to them and think that credit is like money in the bank. Why should our representative democracy be anything but a cross-section of those same people? Our nation is like the men of Sodom who came out to rape the angels in Lot’s house. They are people of darkness who hate those who have any light and just want us to shut up and join the crowd.
Happy Easter everyone!
Pray for the Church in China.
That's what Cesar always wants, to subject all right to organize anything, especially to organize a Christian church, to the State.
The Romans didn't didn't raise a generation of lion cubs on the flesh of slaughtered Christians because they were worshiping Christ, they slaughtered those Christians to refuse to accept Cesar as the foremost authority in all things and the King of Kings. One of the first things that shocked me when reading what all Luther wrote was that he was so strongly convinced that the State should be the chief authority over the Lutheran Church with each other country doing likewise. Were are the heads of people who can think that the State will be benign toward Christ over any protracted length of time? Where has a country been benign towards Christ for multiple generations and not periodically persecuted one or another group of Christians the State didn't agree with or care for? The US can't make that claim given the anti-Catholic laws they've passed in many states and the way the Federal government treated the Amish during WWI when they refused to serve due to their religious beliefs.
Anyone reading this post has by definition someone who has lived through the most pro-Christian period in the history of this country and yet the majority of them think the world is coming to an end when things are really just settling back to the mean. Christ said we are to spread His Kingdom so by definition, Christians are either Christians in name only or they're a threat to State power.
Those who believe that giving up and going into hiding is what Christ had in mind those who follow Him have to ignore or dismiss great deal of both the Old and New Testaments in order to rationalize their opinion. We're supposed to rock the boat, make the State more like His Kingdom, and in general be a thorn in the side of all those who believe that the State or anything other than Christ should rule.
JMHO
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