The news was leaked on April 28, when in Rome there was no more Pope Francis and as yet no Pope Leo. And it ran that in Shanghai an assembly of priests, nuns, and lay people under government obedience had been convened to ratify the selection of a new auxiliary bishop in the person of Ignatius Wu Jianlin, former vicar general of the diocese and a member of the arch-official Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.
It is true that according to the agreement between the Holy See and Beijing signed in 2018 the Chinese authorities have the first choice of each new bishop, which the pope can approve or not but in fact has so far always endorsed.
But that this designation was an umpteenth affront to the Church of Rome was more than evident. Not only because it was carried out in the interregnum between one pope and the other, as if both counted for nothing, but even more so because in Shanghai – where the head of the diocese, Bishop Joseph Shen Bin, who is also president of the Chinese pseudo episcopal conference never recognized by Rome, was installed in 2023 by a unilateral decision of the regime only afterward communicated to Pope Francis – there are already two auxiliary bishops, but both restricted : Joseph Xing Wenzi, 62, ordained in 2005 but then fallen from grace and forced to retire to private life in 2011, and above all Thaddeus Ma Daqin, 57, who on July 7, 2012, during his episcopal ordination, revoked his membership in the governmental Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, with the immediate effect of being held since then under continuous arrest in the seminary of Sheshan.
Well then, almost six months after his “election,” on October 15 Wu Jianlin was ordained bishop, in the wake of a campaign to promote his appointment conducted by none other than titular diocesan bishop Shen Bin, with the argument among others that Wu “had to be ordained anyway, having been left as the only non-bishop among the Catholics belonging to the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.”
All this with the passive submission of Rome, which limited itself to a laconic confirmation of Wu’s ordination, declaring it “approved” by the pope on August 11.
At the same time a parallel statement from the official news agency of the Chinese Catholic Church also reported Wu’s ordination, but with the quite different specification that “he was elected bishop on April 28, 2025, by the Catholic diocese of Shanghai,” without the slightest mention of the pope’s approval.
Presiding over the ordination ceremony (in the photo) was, of course, the bishop of Shanghai, Shen Bin. Who, however, when it came time for him to be installed in the diocese on April 4, 2023, by unilateral decision of the Chinese regime, had provoked a knee-jerk reaction from Rome, with Pope Francis indeed approving the appointment on July 15 but accompanying it with a statement from cardinal secretary of state Pietro Parolin that denounced the violation of the agreements, expressed the hope that there would be no more violations in the future, and urged “a just and wise solution” to the cases of the two auxiliary bishops already present in the diocese but still restricted.
Protests and requests that all fell on deaf ears, or rather have been toppled by what has just happened, despite the vague announcement by Leo– who since being elected pope has already appointed three other bishops in China – that he might act differently in the future, after listening to those “Chinese Catholics who for many years have experienced a sort of oppression or difficulty in living their faith freely and without taking sides.”
It now remains to be seen what will happen with the other Chinese bishop who was declared “elected” on April 28 : Li Jianlin, candidate for the diocese of Xinxiang, about whose approval or lack thereof on the part of the pope nothing is yet known.
But perhaps the closest testing ground on which Pope Leo is awaited is now that of Hong Kong, one of two dioceses in China, along with Macau, that are not subject to the 2018 agreement on the appointment of bishops.
In Hong Kong, in fact, there is quite a stir over the appointment of a second auxiliary bishop, requested by the current titular of the diocese, the cardinal and Jesuit Stephen Chow Sauyan.
Chow’s candidate is Peter Choi Waiman, currently one of the three vicars general of the diocese and for at least six years in the running for the post of auxiliary bishop. Where since 2014 this role has been held by the Franciscan Joseph Ha Chishing.
But while Ha has always been close to the protests of the Hong Kong democracy movement and to Cardinal Joseph Zen Zekiun, 93, former bishop of the city from 2002 to 2009, a harsh critic of the communist regime and of the understanding between Beijing and the Holy See, Choi has long been the man that Beijing would like to have at the head of the diocese of Hong Kong, at least as auxiliary.
Support for Choi’s appointment is thought to come not only from the current bishop of Hong Kong but also from his predecessor, Cardinal John Tong Hon, to the point that for both, Tong and Choi, news circulated at the end of September that an audience was scheduled in Rome with Pope Leo, on October 4.
Then, however, on October 2, came a denial that the two would go to Rome. A sign that the question is still open.
But in the meantime the greater concern is that the future for the Catholic Church and other religious denominations in China is becoming ever bleaker, above all by the determination of the authorities in Beijing.
Over the evangelical communities a persecution is gathering that according to some observers is “the most widespread in the last forty years.” In particular, the Zion Church was struck a crippling blow in recent days with the arrest of dozens of its faithful and of its leader Jin Mingri, in his youth among the protagonists of Tiananmen Square.
Moreover, the Department of Religious Affairs has promulgated a new, prohibitively restrictive “Code of Conduct for Religious Clergy on the Internet,” which prohibits any transmission of faith and religious formation via the web, with very severe penalties for violators.
There was the most complete silence even at twenty-fifth anniversary of the canonization of 120 Chinese martyrs from between 1648 and 1930, celebrated by John Paul II on October 1 of the holy year of 2000 : a canonization that indeed provoked a furious reaction from the Chinese government, which branded these martyrs of the faith as imperialists and colonialists, although their stories say the exact opposite. John Paul II then wrote a letter to the Chinese president at the time, Jiang Zemin, asking for “forgiveness and understanding,” without getting a reply.
But even more indicative of a further narrowing of the room for religious freedom in China is the speech that current president Xi Jinping gave on September 29 at a special study session of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party, which he convened precisely on the theme of religious policy.
In his speech Xi insisted once again on the necessary “sinicization” of the religions, that is, the adaptation “to Chinese characteristics” of “doctrines, rules, management systems, rituals, customs, and norms of behavior.” This because “for the socialist state led by the Chinese Communist Party it is an unavoidable requirement to actively guide religion to adapt to socialist society.”
Evidently for the Chinese authorities the appointment of Catholic bishops is also part of this policy of “sinicization,” with an ever more crushing domination of Beijing over Rome.
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On October 16 a Catholic of the diocese of Shanghai published on “AsiaNews” a heartfelt reflection on the modalities of the appointment of the new auxiliary bishop, which reads in part :
“If the truth of the facts is ignored, if no action is taken regarding the imprisonment of a bishop already legitimately consecrated, if the ordination of previously unrecognised bishops is retroactively approved, if we recognise bishops who merely obey the government without proclaiming the Gospel… then doubts are inevitable. If the head of the family, the Holy See, does not teach its children what is right and what is wrong, if it does not defend the truth to pursue instead harmony without principles, and if it does not promote an authentic and healthy faith… is this truly the communion that Christ intended?”
(Translated by Matthew Sherry : traduttore@hotmail.com)
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Sandro Magister is past “vaticanista” of the Italian weekly L’Espresso.
The latest articles in English of his blog Settimo Cielo are on this page.
But the full archive of Settimo Cielo in English, from 2017 to today, is accessible.
As is the complete index of the blog www.chiesa, which preceded it.