VATICAN (CNS): The Catholic Church in China registered 48,556 baptisms in 2017, according to a February 15 report by Fides, the news agency of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples.
 
The figures are likely incomplete, given the difficulty of procuring data from Catholic communities in the rural parts of China, report said.
 

by Michel Chambon
 
In the past few weeks, rumours have spread about a possible agreement between the Holy See and the People’s Republic of China. In an uncommon move, the Vatican has even asked two bishops from the unofficial Church to shift aside for two official bishops initially appointed by Beijing.
 

HONG KONG (SE): Joseph Cardinal Zen Ze-kiun, the former bishop of Hong Kong has not spared efforts and words to explain how Vatican officials do not understand the true nature of Chinese leaders and that their rush will harm the church in China. 
 
His recent meeting with the press at the Salesian Mission House, Shau Kei Wan, on February 9 highlighted that China does not respect religious freedom and worry that Pope Francis may involuntarily betray the underground side of the Catholic Church in China.
 

OTTAWA (SE): “We should be under no illusion that as China engages more and more with the political, economic and social frameworks of the world, that that is having any impact on their human rights record,” the former ambassador for religious freedom from Canada, Andrew Bennett, said in warning the Catholic Church that in its negotiations with China it should have no illusions in approaching Beijing.

ZHENGZHOU (SE): Kuan Yan, a Buddhist monk, set out from China on a pilgrimage to India with the intention of expressing his great personal devotion to Mother Teresa of Kolkata.

HONG KONG (UCAN): Bishop Casimir Wang Milu, from Tianshui in the northwest of China, suffered a stroke and later contracted pneumonia in hospital where he died on February 14 at the age of 74.

The bishop from the unofficial community of the Church was not recognised by the Chinese government. He had been hospitalised since early January, but his condition continued to deteriorate. His funeral took place on February 18.

SHANGHAI (UCAN): Bishop Thaddeus Ma Daqin, who has been under house arrest in Sheshen Seminary near Shanghai since he called the bluff of the government at his ordination in July 2012, has taken up two jobs in the same Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association that he quit.

Bishop Ma accepted the two positions as a member of the standing committee in the Patriotic Association of Shanghai at a joint meeting of the association and the Church Affairs Commission of Shanghai on January 20.