Priests
and nuns in the Shanghai diocese have been forced to attend compulsory
“study classes”, which observers believe were imposed by Chinese
authorities in response to the new Shanghai auxiliary’s renunciation of
the Catholic Patriotic Association.
In September, approximately 80
diocesan priests and 80 nuns of the Our Lady of Presentation
Congregation were divided into three groups to take three days of
classes at the Shanghai Institute of Socialism, reported the Asian
church news agency UCA News. Classes lasted 12 hours each day and
included university professors lecturing about strengthening the sense
of duty toward China, the law, and the independent Church principle, UCA
News reported.
The main subjects included state-religion
relations, the Communist Party’s religious concepts, policies and
regulations, the socialist core value system and economic development in
China, it said.
A priest who asked that his name not be used told
UCA News that all priests and nuns obeyed directives given by the
diocese, so the classes ran smoothly. Religious officials at the city
and district levels sat in throughout the classes, he said.
Auxiliary Bishop Thaddeus Ma Daqin, 45, quit the government-approved Catholic Patriotic Association
at his ordination in July. Since then, he has been in “retreat” at the
Sheshan seminary with a “certain degree of freedom”, sources told UCA
News.
The priest told UCA News that he thought government
officials would criticise Bishop Ma’s episcopal ordination during the
classes, but they did not.
“Anyhow, it is understood that the so-called study classes were to counter the ordination,” the priest said.
“The
classes were very strict. No one was allowed to miss them. We had to
take an exam on religious regulations and policies and write an account
on what we learned at the end,” he said.
Other Church sources told
UCA News they believed that the Shanghai government organised the study
classes for a variety of reasons: brainwashing priests and nuns,
venting officials’ anger, and doing something to appease Chinese
officials at the national level.
In late August, the diocese suspended the autumn term at its major and minor seminaries.
Bishop
Ma is the first government-approved bishop in recent years to announce
publicly that he would give up his duties with the Catholic Patriotic
Association, UCA News reported.
Pope Benedict XVI’s 2007 letter to Catholics in China
stated that the aim of the patriotic association in upholding the
independence of the Church in China was incompatible with Catholic
doctrine. However, in his letter, the Pope also recognised the difficult
situation of bishops and priests under pressure from the government and
said the Holy See “leaves the decision to the individual bishop”,
having consulted his priests, “to weigh … and to evaluate the possible
consequences” of dealing with government pressures in each given
situation.
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