Chinese bishop focused on adapting faith to Communist Party ideals, Shanghai Catholics say

CNA Staff, Nov 22, 2024 / 06:00 am

A Chinese bishop with a history of support for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) emphasized in a recent diocesan seminar the socialist state’s influence over the Church more than the Vatican’s, according to Catholics who attended the bishop’s talks. 

Bishop Joseph Shen Bin of Shanghai, who was illicitly installed as bishop by Chinese authorities in 2023 and brought into communion with the Church by Pope Francis a year later under the Vatican-China deal, was featured as a speaker at a Vatican conference in May, where he promoted a “Chinese-style modernization” of the Church in line with socialist ideals. 

Shen recently gave a diocesan seminar Nov. 4–6 about “Sinicization of Religion in Shanghai.” According to a report from Bitter Winter, Shanghai Catholics who attended the bishop’s seminar said he “did not discuss at all the Vatican Synod [on Synodality] nor Pope Francis and his recent documents.”

Instead, several sources said, Shen “focused on ‘sinicization,’ which as it is now clear does not mean adapting religion to Chinese customs but to the CCP’s [Chinese Communist Party] ideology.”

“An optimist could object that Bishop Shen Bin did not explicitly tell Shanghai Catholics ‘not’ to listen to the pope’s teachings, which oppose the CCP’s ideas on key matters such as abortion and the role of religion in society. But for a bishop ignoring the pope and his documents in such solemn events is tantamount to rejecting them,” reported Bitter Winter, a publication that focuses on Christian persecution in China.

Since coming to power in 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping has mandated the “sinicization” of all religions in China — a move the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has called “a far-reaching strategy to control, govern, and manipulate all aspects of faith into a socialist mold infused with ‘Chinese characteristics.’”

Shen in his November seminar reportedly also emphasized the need for stricter cooperation with the United Front Work Department, which is in charge of controlling and supervising “official” religion in China.

A recent analysis published by USCIRF asserts that the CCP’s “sinicization of religion” policy consistently violates the internationally protected right to freedom of religion. The term sinicization means to conform to Chinese culture, but the policy essentially subordinates faiths to “the CCP’s political agenda and Marxist vision for religion,” according to the report.

Chinese officials have ordered the removal of crosses from churches and have replaced images of Christ and the Virgin Mary with images of Xi, according to the report. They have also censored religious texts, forced members of the clergy to preach CCP ideology, and mandated the display of CCP slogans within churches.

Shen has gone on the record numerous times in support of Xi’s program of sinicization of religion, saying in 2023 that sinicization is “a signpost and a direction to adapt to the socialist society as well as an inherent rule and a fundamental requirement for the survival and development of the Catholic Church in China itself.”

He went on to emphasize that Catholic teaching should “align” with the party’s ideology.

“The policy of religious freedom implemented by the Chinese government has no interest in changing the Catholic faith but only hopes that the Catholic clergy and faithful will defend the interests of the Chinese people and free themselves from the control of foreign powers,” Shen said in his May speech at the Vatican, where he appeared alongside Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin.

In China, Catholic priests are reportedly only allowed to minister in recognized places of worship in which minors under the age of 18 are not allowed to enter. Religious groups in China have been barred from conducting any religious activities online without first applying and receiving approval from the provincial Department of Religious Affairs.

The CCP’s efforts to control religion are not limited to Catholics but also extend to Protestants, Muslims, Taoists, Buddhists, and adherents of Chinese folk religions. Chinese officials also suppress the Falun Gong religious movement.