The normalization of ties between the Holy See, head of the largest unified religion of the world, and China, the most populous country on Earth, registered progresses in recent years and months. However, the distance between the parties remains significant. The Holy See is extremely concerned about the situation and the division of the Catholic Church in China vis a vis the government. Meanwhile, Beijing is still very cautious about how it should handle the strange phenomenon of a universal religion with an independent “political statehood”. Trust, mutual fear is an issue, cultural perceptions is another. Still Beijing is clear that mormalization of ties with the Vatican could improve immensely its perception in the world.
Rome’s tortured state of mind
In Rome, many people are very worried and concerned about the underground Church. They think these people can be both fickle and difficult. They are fickle because, with the years in isolation, they lost touch with the proper Catholic education, and they missed the long process of Vatican Council II, which started in the 1960s. Conversely, some underground Chinese Catholics started following a mishmash of strange religious creeds. Furthermore, Beijing tried to avoid dealing with them, fearing accusations of suppression of religion; Rome could not reach out to them because they claimed to be under Communist suppression; and therefore, some of them would not listen to Rome or Beijing. Some of them de facto made up a group of their own, bringing embarrassment to Rome. They claim to be Catholics but are not totally in line with Rome’s tenets, and they are hindering the Holy See's normalization of ties with Beijing, which is a primary objective for the Pope.
However, Rome has resisted calls to drop them, ignore them, and start afresh, even though China is a huge “market” of souls: Many Chinese are looking for a religious belief. If the Vatican dropped those troublesome underground Catholics and stopped defending them, the Chinese government might be grateful and therefore more relaxed in checking on the church's missionary work. In no time, the Church of Rome would become much, much larger and would be able to grow in influence.
Although the idea circulated, it gained little consensus because, “we cannot let them go; we cannot abandon them; it is inconceivable that mother church abandons its children.”
The objection to this was: “It is not you who abandoned them; it is they who abandoned you.”
The reply is: “They went astray, but it was not their fault. We were forced to abandon them. Now that we can help, we must help them.” The help is reuniting them within the family of the Church, a very strange concept for normal Chinese or nonbelievers.
A recent book, Mao’s China Puts the Church on Trial, casts light on this idea[1]. The book is written by Angelo Lazzarotto, born in 1925, former dean of the missionary university in Milan, and a supporter of Cardinal Joseph Zen. The preface is by Claudio Maria Celli, who for many years was responsible for the China desk.
Lazzarotto tells the story of the sufferance of the priests and Catholics in the early 1940s. They were arrested, tortured, and forced to hard labor. Yet the book reports at length that the greatest suffering of the time was not the torture, but the feeling that the Chinese Church was being separated from Rome, that bishops were not approved or chosen by the Pope, and that preaching slowly went astray and did not follow Rome’s creed. The main wrong of the Patriotic Association was to drive those Catholics away from the Pope and away from the universal unity of the Church.
It was as if a son or a daughter is forced with violence and deceit to abandon the rest of the family: The abandonment would be a major suffering for the family and for the child who feels a huge shock. The family is Rome’s Church, and the children are the Chinese Catholics gone underground or even those who have become part of the Patriotic Association. Even the people in the Patriotic Association were torn away from Rome and felt guilt and remorse for their actions.
For Rome, the real purpose of reestablishing relations is to reconcile the religious faith of the Chinese Catholics and heal the scars that burden both the underground and the official Church.
“This task will not be easy, and it will take many years,” said someone in Rome. “This is all we will have to do for many future years, to heal the past sufferings concretely, community by community. We have to do it in the spirit of the Pope’s letter: Make people understand that they have to be and can be good Catholics and good Chinese. There must not be contradictions between the two.”
How Rome wants to achieve this goal
For the Vatican, the main purpose of the reestablishment of the diplomatic relations is to set foot in China and slowly work out all the different local issues of the Church in China. The work will be very complicated because, with the Vatican Council in the 1960s, the Catholic Church underwent a deep revolution that changed many Church rules. Therefore, the Vatican will need to supervise the education of the new priests and bishops, and it will have to make sure the old priests and bishops fall in line and understand the new theological rules. This new education will then have to be passed on to the common believers. In this spirit, it will have to reunify the Church.
This, then, is a double challenge for Rome: 1) to unify Catholics who have been split for decades, and 2) make sure that all of them understand and follow the new rules, which can have significant differences from the old ones.
From Rome’s point of view, this task is very complicated also because of communication difficulties that are mainly cultural (because Chinese culture is different from the Western one dominant in the Vatican) and political (because communications with Chinese authorities are not as smooth as with authorities of other countries).
On these two points, the dominant thinking in the Vatican seems to be that Rome must understand these cultural and political differences and adapt to them. The Vatican should not try to convert the Chinese culturally or politically. This is a self-defeating strategy, Rome thinks. Culturally, China is too complex and too ancient a civilization to be changed into the Western mindset. Politically, because the Vatican is not a democracy and looks with concern at the American ideological drive to “democratize” the world, it thinks that destabilization of China would cause major turmoil in world. Furthermore, the Catholics in China have always refrained from bringing their protests to a broad national level. During June 4th, they stayed put, never organizing large protests as, for instance, the Falun Gong did.
However, cultural and political differences are objective hurdles to the theological unification and will have to be addressed with Rome’s adaptation to and understanding of the local reality. This will take a lot of time.
There is also a broad belief that if a Nuncio comes to China, things could be easier. The Nuncio would be able to establish more contacts and a better feel for the Chinese political system. Therefore, the Vatican would better understand the Chinese political sensitivities that are largely obscure to Rome.
So far, Rome is flooded with information from the local Church, both underground and official. Bishops, priests, and laymen write to the Vatican letters and long reports about the local and general situation. In fact, the information is overwhelming and strongly one-sided against the government, as the people complain to the Vatican and seek direction.
The Vatican handles this information with great care, unable to come to a clear judgment about many local situations. This flow of information is virtually unstoppable because it comes through e-mail, phone calls, and mail sent directly or through various addresses and friends. The mass of information, its accuracy, and the enthusiasm and loyalty it betrays, however, make impossible for the Vatican to ignore. So far, the Vatican has been withstanding this pressure, trusting that the talks are making progresses. The belief is that once the Nuncio is in Beijing, he will be able to talk directly to the authorities, understand the situation better, and thus also better rein in the local discontent. Yet, if things fail to improve over a period of time and ties are not established, the Vatican might feel obliged to trust its own sources—the local Catholics in China.
This would mean trying to unify the Catholic faith in China by depending largely on information fed by local Catholics—often with their own anti-government agenda. The militancy of some of the local Catholics worries Rome, which believes Catholics should be more prudent, and so far Rome treats with caution the information coming from that channel. This enthusiasm adds urgency to Rome. The local Catholics argue that Rome should not wait forever, and that in many cases, it should decide how to act in a local situation while disregarding Beijing. These voices are hard to ignore. With some 13 million faithful, China has more Catholics that ultra-Catholic Ireland. The Chinese local Catholic Church is becoming a large constituency in Rome, and with many nuns and priests flowing in for training, it is growing in strength.
Still, the Pope wants to achieve unification by talking to the authorities. The Pope fears that siding with the local Catholics will renew the old rift between Chinese Catholics loyal to Rome and those loyal to Beijing. Working with Beijing would also fix a reality in which some bishops play a double game, pledging total allegiance both to Rome and to Beijing while defying instructions from both and gaining great independence. The Pope appears to work for a “unified” Chinese Catholic Church. But if the Chinese government does not help, the Pope will have to move on it alone. Responding to this local pressure, he issued the letter to China two years ago. If ties had been normalized by then, the Pope might have not written the letter, or the letter would have been written with greater consultation from Beijing authorities.
If ties are not normalized soon enough, Rome might feel growing pressure to again address its faithful in China. This could be especially the case if the Patriotic Association proceeds to appoint bishops without Rome’s approval. Rome will feel forced to take a stand on the appointed bishop and on the bishops who took part in the appointment. Are they legitimate? Illegitimate? Excommunicated?
The Vatican perception of China
So far, Rome has been waiting largely because it does not have a clear idea of what is going on in China. Rather than making a mistake, it prefers to wait and see.
The main idea in Rome so far is that there are many forces working in China and many different interests that are hard to reconcile. Their feeling is that there are three main centers of power in China that are interested in Catholics: 1) the central government, 2) the local governments, and 3) the Patriotic Association.
The perception is: 1) The central government is growing tolerant and understanding towards religion freedom. 2) For the local governments, the religious issue is mainly one of public order, and thus it depends on the local people and local situation. 3) The Patriotic Association is afraid to give up the power and privileges accrued in the decades when it was outside of Rome's control and had only relatively loose control from Beijing.
The central government is no longer the old dictatorship that was able to simply force agreements down the throats of the Patriotic Association and local governments. Rome understands Beijing will need to build a consensus, and for this, it must be willing to wait and be patient.
The bigger idea Rome has about Beijing regards an ideological change in viewing religion. According to Rome, Beijing now believes that religion is useful for social peace. They came to this conclusion on the basis of the 2001 article by Pan Yue on religion, the 17th Party Congress Report’s section on religion, the conferences on Buddhism, the growing tolerance of religions, the freer activities of Catholics, and the change of attitude in dialogue with the Vatican. Furthermore, Rome thinks there are different views in China about ways to handle religion. Moreover, there is great work within the central government regarding ways to cope with ties with the Holy See, and the overall direction is one of more tolerance and understanding for religions.
However, in Rome, there are also forces arguing otherwise.
The most extreme strongly support the militants in the underground Church who say that this is all a trick, like the Communists pulled in the 1950s, for a crackdown on and control of religion. Ultimately, the Communist Party wants total control over religion, and there is no sense in talking to it. This is a small minority, but one with a strong voice. It is made up of people who have been loyal to Rome despite many years of persecution, and their testimony can’t be easily forfeited.
This voice lends more credibility to a more moderate voice that argues for a yet stronger stand with Beijing. They say, yes, we must talk to Beijing because there are many voices in China, things are complicated, and there is a will from the central government to push the Catholic agenda ahead.
However, there must be a clear indication from the central government of the direction to take, and the central government will have to commit to the general trend to follow in the future. Without this commitment, the moderates think, the Catholics will become hostage to internal party politics, and their agenda could be pushed off forever.
Of course, in this position, there might be another interest as well: The Catholics could just talk to the central government and then pit the central government against the local governments or authorities based on their agreement. In this way, the Catholics would be united, with the support of the central government, against the local governments. The “moderates” are afraid that without a clear, immediate bargain on the bishops, for instance, the Catholics will split into many parties trying to negotiate different deals with different entities. In a way, through the “centralized bargain,” the Catholics will be more united. The drawbacks of this approach are that it will take a long time to make progress in China and part of the Catholic interests (naming some bishops or the organization of the Conference of Bishops) will be sacrificed. But this approach is more prudent, loses less in the beginning, and keeps the radicals on board.
So far, the Vatican has taken another faction's approach. Let’s call them, the “talkers.” Their idea is to get to a very minimal agreement that is sufficient to justify moving in. After that, they will discuss the remaining agenda, the many bishops to be appointed, the Conference of Bishops, and so on. They think that there must be a process of gaining mutual trust first, and then the parties can deal with the many issues on the table. They also believe that there is a line of thinking in Beijing that religion is good and positive for the social harmony, as preached by President Hu Jintao. Rome thinks that China realizes Catholics are not rebellious but are a force of stability. They think they proved it many times—in the many years when they avoided confrontations and endured the crackdown on them. During Tiananmen in 1989, Zen forbid Catholic students from joining the protests, and in 2008, when large Madonna processions were cut down, they didn’t make a fuss about it.
The prize for this process is to more rapidly gain a foothold in China and eventually find a win-win solution for the singular appointments of bishops or the Conference of Bishops —a solution that would not sacrifice Vatican or Chinese interests. The drawback is that the Vatican may be completely fooled in the process and will have lost years in talking to the government without achieving anything. This would allow many local situations to fester and build anger against Vatican senior officials who supported this line.
It is therefore a risky line: Either it brings results, or it might be completely reversed when other forces build enough pressure to do without the present officials holding this line. If this line is reversed, the “moderates,” partly or totally, might become more inclined to think that the radicals, opposed to any dialogue, are right—and that it makes no sense to talk to China.
In a way, facts will soon decide which “theory” is right. Results must come for the “talkers” otherwise domestic pressure on the Vatican could become hard to withstand.
Two episodes were particularly important in the past months: the agreement to send the Chinese bishops to Rome and the celebration of the 50th , on December 19th 2008, anniversary of Patriotic Association. Both episodes greatly weakened the position of the “talkers.”
In the first, the Vatican thought it had reached an agreement to receive some Chinese bishops, but Beijing backtracked on the agreement. It was a blow for those in Rome who had endorsed the policy of dialogue with Beijing and compromise on the bishops. The second, the grand official celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Patriotic Association also put the “talkers” on the spot.
One crucial is issue is that Catholics are not a priority for Beijing, and because of this, many times things get out of control on this issue. Catholics are just one percent of the Chinese population, and they are overall not as troublesome as other religions. Beijing, then, is not overly concerned about them. Beijing has always other priorities such as the economy, unemployment, ties with Taiwan, and relations with the U.S.—all good reasons to put the Catholic issue on the back burner.
However, they could become a major issue if radicals get the upper hand and if the Pope loses control of talks. In fact, the Catholics within and outside of China could become the greatest trouble for Beijing, far larger than Falun Gong or the Dalai Lama. Unlike these two groups, the Catholic Church is the largest single religious organization of the world, and it commands huge prestige among both believers or nonbelievers. The funeral of the late Pope John Paul II in April 2005 proved the point: Everybody that counted was there, except the Chinese. The Holy See, in other words, could be in a position to scuttle the Chinese effort to join the international community as a responsible stakeholder and major player. The Pope, despite conflicts in the 1980s and despite the recent tensions, has always refrained from open clashes and has been growing conciliatory. But it is not impossible to think that things could proceed otherwise.
On the other hand, this immense power, hard to define and restrict in traditional political terms, puts off the Chinese leadership: How to cope with it? How to establish effective mechanisms for mutual restrictions? The traditional political levers do not apply. The Holy See could at any time blackmail Beijing with an ideological holy war to reach its goals. The power is there, Beijing thinks, and it is not relevant that Rome might not be willing to use it. Rome has this power, has used it in the past, and that is sufficient. In these conditions, paradoxically, Beijing could be better off without diplomatic ties than with them. With diplomatic ties, the Holy See is in China, it has a stronger grip and leverage, and thus its potential damage could be larger. Kept out of China and without diplomatic ties, Rome’s grip and threat would be weaker.
Paradoxically, in sum, from Beijing’s view, Rome’s power is also a hindrance to the normalization of ties.
However, Beijing thinks of the Vatican in purely political terms, which do not fully cover the Vatican. The contours of the Vatican are without precedent in the political history of China and are something that Beijing is not culturally prepared to cope with. Beijing’s idea would be to start on a trial basis, inviting Rome come over and work things out with minimal promises. Rome is reluctant because many there feel Rome will be duped and taken for a ride by the Communist Party. And the Catholics being what they are, a meek flock, not a restive minority, will just take it.
In this, the crucial element is a deep lack of trust between the two sides. In these cases, the Church, “professionally” dealing with faith, should take the leap. However, this papacy believes strongly in the quasi-continuity between faith and reason. Therefore, the two sides have to work hard to breach the remaining gaps, or they will see the cloth, painfully woven over the years, torn apart.
© Francesco Sisci & La Stampa, 2009
[1] Angelo Lazzarotto, “La Cina di Mao processa la Chiesa,” Emi 2008
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