VATICAN CITYÂÂ10/3/2004Â15:49
HOLY SEE âWORRIED AND SADDENEDâ BY CHINESE BISHOPâS ARREST
The Vatican is âworried and saddenedâ by yesterdayâs news of the arrest in China of a Catholic bishop in the region of Helongjiang on 5 March, the director of the Vatican press office Joaquin Navarro-Valls has said in a statement. âWhatever the accusations are against the bishop, they should be made public, as happens in any lawful state,â he added. âThe Holy See, for its part, has no reason to doubt the innocence of the bishop.â Yesterday, the US-based association Cardinal Kung Foundation announced the arrest of a bishop of the so-called âundergroundâ Catholic Church (which recognises the authority of the Pope but is not sanctioned by Beijing), Monsignor Wei Jingyi, in Qiqihar, in northeast China. The prelate was taken into police custody at a motorway toll booth on March 5 as he was returning from the provincial capital Harbin, where he had met âforeign friendsâ. The local authorities have denied all knowledge of the incident. Ordained bishop of Qiqihar in 1995, 46-year-old monsignor Wei served two periods of detention in work camps, from 1987 to 1989 and from 1990 to 1992, before being arrested again in September 2002. The authorities of the Peopleâs Republic of China formally recognise freedom of worship, but they allow citizens to profess their faith only within state-sanctioned organisations. Followers of the underground Church, who are thought to number eight million, are often persecuted by the authorities. It is estimated that there are over ten million Catholics in China.[LC]
"The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth becomes the greatest enemy of the state."
- Dr. Joseph M. Goebbels - Hitler's propaganda minister
