Catholic Church in China
In 1957, the communist government established the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association (CCPA) in Beijing,[2] which rejects the authority of the Holy See and appoints its own preferential bishops.
In September 2018, China and the Holy See reached a provisional agreement giving the Pope the power to veto any bishop which the Chinese government recommends.
Arriving in China during the Tang dynasty, the earliest Christian missionaries from the Church of the East referred to their religion as Jǐngjiào (景教, literally, "bright teaching").
Many Protestants use Shén (神), which generically means "god" or "spirit"[3]: 61 (although Catholic priests are called shénfù (神父, literally "spiritual father") or Yēhéhuá (耶和華, a transliteration of Jehovah).
Missionary priests of the Latin Catholic Church in Europe are recorded to have entered China in the late 13th century, with the earliest being Franciscans.
They had mixed success at first, but eventually came to have a strong impact, particularly in inter-cultural scientific and artistic exchanges among the upper classes of China and the imperial court.
His whole approach was quite subtle, interesting the Wanli Emperor and the Ming Chinese authorities in aspects of western technology and learning as a point of opening.
Likewise, the development of Catholic Christianity in China originated an interesting process of cultural and artistic hybridization during early globalization and up to the present.
[13] In the Qing dynasty, the Jesuits' pragmatic accommodation with Confucianism was later to lead to conflict with the Dominican friars, who came to Beijing from the Philippines in the middle of the century.
It sentenced Europeans to death for spreading Catholic Christianity among Han Chinese and Manchus (Manchurian people, originally from North China).
[18][19][20] The clause stated: "People of the Western Ocean, (Europeans or Portuguese,) should they propagate in the country the religion of heaven's Lord, (in Chinese: 天主教， the Chinese name of the Catholic Church) or clandestinely print books, or collect congregations to be preached to, and thereby deceive many people, or should any Tartars or Chinese, in their turn, propagate the doctrines and clandestinely give names, (as in baptism,) inflaming and misleading many, if proved by authentic testimony, the head or leader shall be sentenced to immediate death by strangulations: he who propagates the religion, inflaming and deceiving the people, if the number be not large, and no names be given, shall be sentenced to strangulation after a period of imprisonment.
(...) All civil and military officers who may fail to detect Europeans clandestinely residing in the country within their jurisdiction, and propagating their religion, thereby deceiving the multitude, shall be delivered over to the Supreme Board and be subjected to a court of inquiry.
The Chinese Amban Feng and Commandant in Chief Li Chia-jui managed to escape by scattering rupees behind them, which the Tibetans proceeded to pick up.
[22]: 182 France, which had framed itself as the protector of Catholics in China since the unequal treaties and had a long-standing dispute with the Holy See as a result, blocked these diplomatic efforts.
[22]: 182 The Kuomintang's 1926 National Congress in Canton endorsed the growing anti-Christian movement in China, labelling missionaries as "tongues and claws of imperialism."
On 8 December 1939, the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith issued—at the request of Pope Pius—a new instruction, by which Chinese customs were no longer considered superstitious, but instead an honourable way of esteeming one's relatives and therefore permitted by the Catholic Church.
As the Church began to flourish,[28] Pope Pius established a local ecclesiastical hierarchy and elevated the Archbishop of Peking, Thomas Tien Ken-sin, SVD, to the Sacred College of Cardinals.
Li Weiguang and a group of 783 priests, nuns, and lay Catholics signed a declaration opposing what they viewed as Vatican interference and Western imperialism.
[31]: 33 Chinese authorities arrested Riberi on allegations of colluding with American intelligence and false accusations of participating in a plot to kill Mao Zedong.
[33] All legal worship was to be conducted through state-approved churches belonging to the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association (CCPA), which did not accept the primacy of the Roman Pontiff.
[34] Chinese authorities also had reportedly pressured Catholics to break communion with the Vatican by requiring them to renounce an essential belief in Catholicism, the primacy of the Roman Pontiff.
[22]: 180 By the terms of the canon law of the Catholic Church, the Chinese bishops and people who actively participate in their ordination would be automatically excommunicated, a result called latae sententiae.
[citation needed] Some, including Hong Kong Cardinal Joseph Zen, saw the progress between Vietnam and Vatican officials towards re-establishing full diplomacy as a model for Sino-Vatican normalization of relations.
[39] By late 2004, prior to the death of Pope John Paul II, Vatican and Chinese government representatives were in contact with the apparent goal of moving closer to the normalization of relations.
In a public address on 13 December 2001, CCP general secretary Jiang Zemin stressed the importance of regulating religion because of the influence it has on the political and social landscapes of a society.
[44][45] According to the communiqué released by the Holy See Press Office, the Provisional Agreement aimed to create "conditions for great collaboration at the bilateral level.
Cardinal Joseph Zen, former archbishop of Hong Kong, strongly opposed the deal, stating that the agreement is an incredible betrayal of the Catholics in China.
[50] As a response to the criticism, Pope Francis wrote a message to the Catholics of China and to the Universal Church on 26 September 2018 to provide context on how to view the Provisional Agreement.
Just a month before the release of the new rules, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian had stated that China is willing to work together with the Vatican "to maintain close communication and consultation and advance the improvement of bilateral ties"[56] through the Provisional Agreement.
However, Pope John Paul II was denied a visit (which was deemed "inappropriate") to Hong Kong in 1999, by then Chief Executive, Tung Chee Hwa, who was in office from 1997 to 2005, a decision many believe was made under pressure from the central PRC government.
