George Weigel on the China deal and the Synod:
“A great deal was made of the fact that two bishops from the People’s Republic of China, Guo Jincai and Yang Xiaoting, would be attending a Synod of Bishops for the first łtime. Both bishops had once been excommunicate (one as recently as mid-September), because they had been illicitly ordained. They were warmly welcomed by Pope Francis in his homily at the Synod’s opening Mass, and proponents of the Vatican’s recent deal with the Chinese government on the appointment of bishops lauded the two Chinese bishops’ presence as a first fruit of that arrangement and a step toward the deeper unity of the Church.
“Then, after ten days or so, the Chinese bishops left, pleading previous engagements at home. One could only wonder what those engagements might be.
“It then turned out that the two bishops had been proposed by the Chinese communist party (which now has supervisory responsibility for religious bodies in China) and then accepted by the Vatican. That sequence, plus their premature departure, seemed to signal that the “first fruit” of the new Vatican/China deal might be a bit rotten, as many had feared. One also wonders what impression all this made on young adults in China who are pondering the Catholic Church and its message. If the message conveyed by this subplot is that the Church is another puppet of the Chinese communist party and the Chinese government, it is difficult to see how evangelization in China will be advanced among the young people who were supposed to be the Synod’s primary concern.
“Meanwhile, within ten days of the bishops’ return to China, the Chinese authorities destroyed the Marian Shrine of Our Lady of Sorrows in Dongergou (Shanxi province) and Our Lady of Bliss, also called Our Lady of the Mountain, in Anlong (Guizhou province). No word has yet been received from Bishop Marcello Sanchez Sorondo, Chancellor of the Pontifical Academies, on whether these demolitions have caused him to reconsider his description of China as a country that brilliantly embodies Catholic social doctrine.”
