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Continued Suppression of Underground Catholic Church 01/26/2019 Gu Qi Despite an agreement between the Vatican and Beijing, Chinese authorities continue to squelch churches. The crisis facing the Underground Catholic Church in mainland China is getting worse by the day, as authorities, despite the Vatican-China deal of 2018, are raiding and shutting down underground church meeting venues one after another.Making it extra precarious are the new requirements set into place by the new Regulations on Religious Affairs, which mandate that every meeting venue that doesn’t join the official Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (CPCA) is regarded as illegal and will be a...

Chinese priests abandon the ministry out of opposition to the Patriotic Association According to Fr Peter, a priest who belongs to the official community, many fellow clergymen feel "betrayed" by the Vatican, especially after the interim agreement between Beijing and the Holy See on the appointment of bishops. The Patriotic Association (CPCA) is still working to set up a Church that is "independent" (from the Holy See). Its role should be addressed in future talks between Vatican and Chinese delegations. Beijing (AsiaNews) – Several priests in the underground community are giving up on their mission because they are in conflict...

And Persecution of Underground Catholics Continues Never mind a nearly four-month-old provisional agreement with the Vatican – one that was supposed to ease decades-long tensions regarding the appointing of bishops – the Chinese Communist Party, or CCP, is upping its suppression and persecution of underground Catholic churches and believers.Under the Vatican-China deal of 2018, Pope Francis recognized the legitimacy of seven Chinese-government-appointed bishops, who, not having been selected by the Vatican, had been excommunicated. In turn, Beijing finally, and formally, recognized the pope’s authority.“China and the Vatican will continue to maintain communications and push forward the process of improving relations...

Open letter: Rethinking the future of the Catholic Church in Hong Kong A group of Catholics, mostly young people, have addressed a letter to the diocesan Curia. Whilst appreciating the educational and charitable work the Church has offered so far, the petitioners demand the diocese not be China’s "vassal" and end the "colonial" phase of its work as a substitute services provider. It also notes the commitment of Christian in politics, defending the right of the faithful to religious freedom in China as well as Hong Kong’s freedom. Hong Kong (AsiaNews) – A group of Hong Kong Catholics, most of...

Regulations to “protect” minors from religion reach a new level of absurdity, as churches near schools are forced to close, asked to share lists of youth members.The Chinese government has declared schools to be church-free zones and is taking steps to enforce its will. Bitter Winter obtained a copy of a document entitled Implementation Plan on the Special Governance of Private Christian Gathering Sites, which was issued by the Bureau of Ethnic and Religious Affairs of a city in the northern Shanxi Province. The document calls for the “centralized remediation” of religious meeting venues near colleges and universities (remediation being...

Francis Claims That There is Full Communion With “All” Chinese Regime-Bishops During his annual address to the Diplomatic Corps accredited to the Holy See (January 7), Pope Francis hailed his secret agreement with the Chinese regime as one of his major initiatives in 2018. Expressing his satisfaction he claimed that for the first time after so many years, all bishops in China were in full communion with the Pope. However, according to the Vatican agreement only seven regime-bishops were accepted of which two are known to be married with children. There are about 65 Chinese regime-bishops. #newsXxdtbhmajv

Christmas Behind Bars In China, For the Martyrs of the Free Press “Looking To China” was the five-column headline that “L’Osservatore Romano” - no longer directed by Giovanni Maria Vian, but by Andrea Monda - ran in presenting the news that “two Chinese children, ages six and seven, brought flowers before the statue of the Child Jesus together with Pope Francis,” on Christmas Eve in Saint Peter’s Basilica.Meanwhile, however, things are happening in China that the official Vatican media will never be able to report, gagged as they are by the accord signed on September 22 between the Vatican and...

Underground Catholics in Jiangxi May Lose Their Churches Authorities are harassing underground Catholic churches in the Diocese of Yujiang, intimidating believers into joining the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association. Bitter Winter has recently reported that underground Catholic meeting venues in the Archdiocese of Fuzhou, in the southeastern coastal province of Fujian, have been suppressed by the authorities and even shut down. Members of the Underground Catholic Church in the central province of Jiangxi face the same predicament, suffering frequent coercion and harassment at the hands of authorities. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) interprets the Vatican-China deal of 2018 to the effect...

Dear Vatican, what should we do about the Patriotic Association? Savio, a priest of the underground Church, writes of his difficulties of conscience in accepting bishops who are involved with the Patriotic Association, because they support an "independent Church", incompatible with Catholic doctrine. For the priest there is an unresolved ambiguity in the Vatican's behavior. And he asks for help and for coherence. Rome (AsiaNews) - We received and decided to publish this "open letter" from a priest of the underground Church in China, whom we will refer to under the pseudonym of Savio. It is an example of the difficulties and...

Duty change in Mindong diocese should be read with goodwill: bishop A Vatican delegation has been in China this week for talks about the implementation of a bishop-appointment agreement signed between the two sides, said a Holy See spokesperson. The delegation is in China for talks with "both government and church officials" to work on "practical steps" to implement the recent provisional agreement, Greg Burke, director of the Holy See press office, told the Global Times in an emailed statement on Friday local time. The content of the provisional agreement on the appointment of bishop has not been made public...

The China-Vatican Accord Is Secret Only in its Actual Words. Here’s How It Works About the accord signed on September 22 between the Vatican and China, it has been said only that it concerns the appointment of bishops. Its contents have been kept secret. But from then until now so many things have happened that it has become all too clear how it works.Cardinal Zen Ze-kiun (in the photo), 88, made a special trip from Hong Kong to Rome to personally deliver to Pope Francis an impassioned seven-page letter of appeal on the dramatic situation into which the “underground,” or...

Underground Bishops Expected to Subject Themselves to Communist Ones Favored by Pope as Sign of Obedience “Gesture of obedience": Archbishop Celli with legitimate bishops of China, who have to resign in favor of bishops who belong to the state. (Beijing) Two legitimate bishops were called to resign yesterday on behalf of Pope Francis. They have to give way to Patriotic bishops loyal to China’s Communist regime. Underground Bishop Vincent Guo Xijin was the Bishop of Mindong, officially recognized by Rome. He was rejected by the Communist government in Beijing. At the insistence of Rome, he will now resign to...

Underground and Patriotic Catholic Church: Merged in Two Dioceses? AsiaNews reported on December 13 that Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli went to Beijing as special envoy of Pope Francis to “accept” the resignations of the bishops of the Underground Catholic Church for the dioceses of Mindong, Mgr. Vincent Guo Xijin, and Shantou, Mgr. Peter Zhuang Jianjian. The Vatican will now recognize Mgr. Vincent Zhan Silu as bishop of Mindong and Mgr. Joseph Huang Bingzhang as bishop of Shantou. These are bishops of the Patriotic Catholic Church, whom the Vatican has previously excommunicated, but later pardoned as part of the Vatican-China Deal...

November 27, 2018, (LifeSiteNews) – In a recently published rebuke to the Vatican for its recent agreement with China’s Communist Party, heroic world-famous blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng explained why the Holy See should not cede the selection of bishops in China to the Communist Party (CCP). Chen, in his article titled “A Pact with a Thief, a Deal with the Devil: The Vatican’s Pending Agreement with China,” said he was shocked and dismayed in seeing the Vatican/China agreement take shape.  “I have known and worked with countless individuals in China who have been persecuted for their beliefs,” wrote Chen...

Vatican “Diplomacy” in China: The Judas Model In the aftermath of the Vatican’s disgraceful secret agreement with the Communist dictatorship in Beijing, it becomes clearer by the day that the Body of Christ in China has been handed over to its executioners by the Judases of Vatican “diplomacy.”An article at LifeSiteNews this week reports on an interview of Cardinal Joseph Zen published by the French website La Croix International, wherein Cardinal Zen “renewed his resistance against the 22 September 2018 ‘provisional’ agreement between the Vatican and Communist China on the appointment of bishops, whose full content, however, is still largely unknown.”  The Cardinal protests...

Cdl. Zen: Vatican is helping China’s Communist govt. ‘annihilate’ underground Church November 27, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – In a recent interview with the French website La Croix International, Cardinal Joseph Zen has renewed his resistance against the 22 September 2018 “provisional” agreement between the Vatican and Communist China on the appointment of bishops, whose full content, however, is still largely unknown. But it will readmit “to full ecclesial communion the remaining ‘official’ Bishops, ordained without Pontifical Mandate.” The agreement is now being used to coerce the Underground Catholics to join the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association under Communist rule, as the...

How Deeper Underground Can Underground Catholics Go?   Refusing to join the government-controlled Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, some priests in Hebei have been forced to leave their churches and now organize secret “guerrilla-like” congregation gatherings. Despite the September 22 provisional agreement between the Vatican and China, the latter has not ceased its harassment of underground Catholic Church. Holding on to their beliefs, some underground clergy in the northern province of Hebei, China’s Catholic heartland, refuse to follow the Party line and pay the price of going even deeper underground. Bitter Winter talked to some of such priests.It was in 2011...

The scandal of China’s political bishop Cardinal Joseph Zen, emeritus of Hong Kong, was in Rome earlier this month to hand-deliver a letter to Pope Francis about the escalating persecution of the Catholic Church in China.This is becoming something of a pattern in Rome, where bishops urgently arrive to ask for a correction in the Holy See’s foreign policy. The leadership of the Venezuelan bishops made such a visit in June 2017, and this past June it was the turn of Sviatoslav Shevchuk, Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. And this was not Cardinal Zen’s first such...

Two months out, the China-Holy See provisional agreement on episcopal appointments is proving to be yet another tool for Beijing to suppress the Chinese faithful. And its damage goes even deeper than the Chinese government’s selection of Catholic bishops, as critical as that is for the hierarchically structured Roman Catholic Church. In asserting state control over religion, Chinese President Xi Jinping continues the harshest crackdown since the Cultural Revolution against all religions, the Catholic Church included, as documented by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China. Meanwhile, the agreement gives the Chinese regime moral cover and provides it with new opportunities for...

Anything but a synodal Church. After extolling “synodality” as the preeminent fruit of last October’s synod of bishops, and after promising since 2013 more autonomy and powers for the episcopal conferences, including some “authentic doctrinal authority,” Pope Francis has dismembered the agenda of the plenary assembly of one of the biggest episcopates in the world, that of the United States, which has been meeting in Baltimore since Monday, November 12. And at the same time he has abandoned to themselves, in China, those bishops who are not part of the secret accord signed at the end of September between the...