The
Cardinal Kung Foundation
|
|
The Cardinal Kung Foundation |
|
ONLINE NEWSLETTER |
June, 2000
Dear Friends:
This edition of our Newsletter brings you a matter of great importance: an OPEN LETTER about the universal Church's policies and practices in relationship to both the underground Roman Catholic Church in China and the Chinese government-created and -sanctioned Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association (CPA).
A Matter of Justice in a Spirit of Charity
In recent weeks, you may have read in the religious press about this Open Letter, which was sent to Vatican officials on March 28. The approximately 10,000-word letter was addressed to five top officials of the Vatican. They are 1) Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Secretary of State, 2) Cardinal Jozef Tomko, Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, 3) Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 4) Archbishop Giovanni Battista Re, Department of State Undersecretary for Internal Affairs, and 5) Archbishop Stanislaw Dzwisz, Assistant Prefect of the Papal Household.
While we are familiar with the Chinese government's persecution of faithful Catholics in China, it is also important that, as members of the Church, we be faithful to the pursuit of fairness and clarity within the Church itself, specifically in terms of the ways in which the Universal Church appears to have treated the underground Roman Catholic Church in China. There are many questions, uncertainties, and confusions about these treatments. These questions, uncertainties, and confusions finally need to be answered and resolved. This is the importance of the OPEN LETTER . It is a matter of justice that clarification of these matters be achieved.
This Open Letter is written in a spirit of charity and out of concern for:
It is our hope that the Holy See will take advantage of this Open Letter to clarify the many issues that have haunted the underground Roman Catholic Church in China, and yet that have also been seemingly evaded by many within the universal Church. I urge you to read and even study this Open Letter.
Initial Reactions
1) Distort and Misrepresent: As of this date, the appropriate Congregations of the Holy See have not replied to my Open Letter . However, individual Vatican officials have separately given presumably unofficial remarks - both negative and critical - to the press, claiming, for example, that "there are unjust and inexact" statements in the Letter.
In the meantime, Coadjutor Bishop Joseph Zen Ze-Kiun of Hong Kong vaguely characterized my Open Letter as "helping the enemy to strike our brothers." But Bishop Zen failed to point out who the "enemy" is and who the "brothers" are. Clearly, the purpose of this Open Letter is to seek a clarification for the people of God to find the appropriate positions to help the underground Roman Catholic Church in China. It is therefore very confusing to me and most likely also to many other people to whom Bishop Zen could have been referring to by "enemies".
Unfortunately, these initial vague comments from individuals within and outside the Holy See both distort and misrepresent the Open Letter. When you read it, you will discover that the Letter does not criticize or fault the Holy See, but rather requests an unequivocal clarification of our understanding of the Vatican's policy on the Universal Church's relationship with and behavior toward the underground Roman Catholic Church in China. We aim at full adherence to the Church's Magisterium.
In my Open Letter, I state the facts as I know them, and I support these facts with words quoted from appropriate authorities. However, when one compares these facts with the official guidelines (Protocol 3314/88) issued by the Vatican in 1988, or with the words of past and current Popes or with basic Catholic doctrine, the situation becomes very confusing.
The Open Letter therefore presents a series of questions on the Vatican's official position relating to some specific ongoing events and how these events relate to the published Vatican guidelines and authoritative teachings of the Church. We respectfully request the Vatican's unequivocal clarification of these questions so that Catholic faithful can use the clarification to measure and plan their work, since the Vatican's previous official guidelines on the China Policy published in 1988 have, as I laboriously point out in the Open Letter, practically been ignored by the rank and file of the Church officials and have not been enforced.
Thus, a mere remark as reported by Catholic News Service (CNS) and the Union of Catholic Asian News (UCAN) for examples: one by an unnamed Vatican official that the letter is "unjust and inexact" in general, and another by the Coadjutor Bishop of Hong Kong that the letter is "helping the enemy to strike our brothers" without any clarification is not a sufficient and fair response. To these remarks, the author replies that "quod gratis asseritur quod gratis negatur", a familiar dictum of logic, which means that if one asserts something without any particulars to back it up, such assertions are freely denied. These very generalized remarks are not doing any justice to the underground Roman Catholic Church in China until and unless the Holy See points out the specific issue and paragraph in the Letter that needs to be corrected, if any, and how so, and unequivocally clarify and/or correct the situation if we correctly or incorrectly stated the case. If such a critic prefers only broad and unsubstantiated generalities, one can rightly assume either arrogance or failure to back up blanket criticisms with concrete facts and responses point by point to the issues raised in the Open Letter.
2) Encouraging Remarks: In spite of the above negative initial reactions to the Open Letter, we are very encouraged about its prospects. For example, according to UCAN, Bishop Andrew TSIEN Tchew-Choenn of Hualien, Taiwan agreed with our request for the Holy See to clarify its position regarding both the underground Roman Catholic and government-approved CPA Church in China.
Also, a priest from the underground Church in eastern China, as reported by UCAN, noted that the ambiguous attitude of the Church outside China toward the CPA has caused confusion among Catholics in the underground Church. Some government-approved Church clerics claim that they do not belong to the CPA in the hope of maintaining communion with the Universal Church. The fact that they are CPA members, however, means that they have agreed to abide by the government's policy in running the Church, he added. This underground priest was of the opinion that Vatican clarification of the issues raised in the Open Letter would give spiritual encouragement to the underground Church but would also cause the Chinese government to "pressure" it. However, as Bishop Andrew TSIEN of Taiwan put it, "Short term pain is better than long term sufferings."
Cardinal Tomko's Encouraging Homily
Finally, in a special way, our spirits were lifted by a homily delivered by Cardinal Jozef Tomko, Prefect of the Vatican Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, shortly after the Holy See's receipt of the Open Letter. This homily was delivered during the Mass at which he presided to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Chinese language broadcast on the Vatican Radio, This Mass was broadcasted directly to China. In his strongly worded homily, Cardinal Tomko openly embraces the underground Roman Catholic Church in China for its fidelity to the See of Peter: "we thank you for so many examples of fidelity to Christ, to this Church, to the Successor of Peter," and mentions that by its sacrifices, the underground Church has grown from 3 million to 12 million (we always talked about 8-10 million only!). Noting that "there have been attempts to break her off from her vital center, which guarantees her catholicity," the Cardinal clearly distinguishes between the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association and the Roman Catholic Church in China, thereby clarifying and negating the misconception that these are one and the same Church.
Cardinal Tomko also states that fidelity to the Successor of Peter is essential as "only the bishops in union with the successor to Peter are legitimate pastors of the Catholic Church. No authority, institution, or association can arrogate that function to itself." In these statements, Cardinal Tomko clearly points out the Patriotic Association's lack of authority to appoint bishops and clearly states that those bishops appointed by the government or by CPA are not legitimate pastors of the Roman Catholic Church. By these statements, the Cardinal is in fact repeating what the Holy Father had said in January 1995: "a Catholic who wishes to remain such and to be recognized as such cannot reject the principle of communion with the Successor of Peter;" and on December 3, 1996: "All Chinese Catholics are called to remain loyal to the faith received and passed on, and not to yield to models of a Church which do not correspond to the will of the Lord Jesus, to the Catholic faith, or the feelings and convictions of the great majority of Chinese Catholics." Pope John Paul II was clearly referring the "models" to the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association.
Cardinal Tomko says that he sends the greetings of the Pope, who "admires your fidelity, and urges you always to remain strong in faith." In the name of unity, some members of the universal Church have attributed responsibility for the division of Catholics in China to the underground Church and to its refusal to join the Patriotic Association Church. Currently in many parts of China, the government and the Patriotic Association Church have used great pressure on the underground priests and faithful to join the Patriotic Association Church or be subjected to continuous harassment, intensive surveillance, administrative detention or imprisonment. Even knowing "how many sacrifices, how many sufferings you have endured to remain in communion with the Pope," Cardinal Tomko exhorts the underground Church "to remain ever strong in the faith. With you we too firmly profess that the Catholic Church, even in China, is only one." He does not ask the underground Church to compromise its fidelity to the Pope in view of the current political situation in China and to join the Patriotic Association Church.
Recent Vatican Approval of Ordination of Patriotic Association Bishop?
Even Greater Urgency for Vatican Clarification
On May 10, 2000, it was reported by various media that a Chinese bishop was ordained for the Communist Chinese government state-controlled CPA on May 7 allegedly with the approval of Pope John Paul II. Bishop Zhao Fengchang, 66, was ordained bishop of Yanggu and apostolic administrator of Linqing (Shandong) by Patriotic Bishop Giuseppe Ma Xuesheng of Zhoucun, assisted by Patriotic Bishop Fang Xingyao of Linyi and Patriotic Bishop Wang Dianduo of Heze, in the presence of about 1,500 Catholics. Before the Ordination Mass began, the Holy See's approval is reported to have been publicly announced. This event as well as the speculations about it offered by news media in their reports only underlines and intensifies the need for the Vatican's clarification of its policy in relation to both the underground Roman Catholic Church and the CPA.
This ordination was reported as a "significant step forward in relations between the Vatican and China . . . (it) was not the first time the Vatican has given its stamp of approval for the ordination of an Association bishop. But it was the first time that the ordaining bishops were all in legitimate communion with the Holy See, at the Vatican's specific request . . . . the procedure adopted for the May 7 ordination was seen as a confirmation on the part of the Holy See and the Chinese Church of the need for explicit communion with Rome, to foster greater unity among all Chinese Catholics."
Going even further in its speculation, the media announced that "the new conditions for this ordination indicated a step away from the Patriotic Association (CPA) whose ideal is the control of the Church and its submission to the Communist Party."
In addition to the questions already raised in the Open Letter, we now have more questions as a result of this announcement and the media's speculations about it. These questions include the following:
We want to emphasize that these questions, like the ones raised in the Open Letter, are raised in a spirit of charity and respect, and have as their sole purpose the ultimate and true reconciliation of the Roman Catholic Church in China. At the same time, it is important to note that the answers to these questions will make all the difference in the world to those Catholics in China whose fidelity to the Successor of Peter, in accordance with Cardinal Tomko's exhortation " (the Pope) urges you always to remain strong in faith," knows no compromise but has caused them great suffering. Tragically, perhaps even this suffering does not seem very pressing to those to whom it is out of sight and mind.
Opening a New Chapter for the Roman Catholic Church in China
We hope that this Open Letter will encourage concerned Catholics and the Vatican to examine in depth together the issues we have raised so that these matters can finally be clarified. This would begin a new chapter for the reconciliation of the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association to the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church to which the underground Roman Catholic Church in China belongs. Because of its devotion to and insistence on being truthful, this Letter shall persist unto its fulfillment.
We join our minds and hearts to those of the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, and our beloved, the late Ignatius Cardinal Kung, who have unceasingly exhorted us to remain faithful to this goal, "in season and out of season" (2 Timothy 4:2).
Yours sincerely in Christ,
Joseph Kung
President
Please remember the Cardinal Kung Foundation Incorporated in your will.
Thank You.