Vatican position on Chinese Appointments

[GreyPilgrim]

I've read this piece on the beeb a couple of times. Am I missing something?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4972004.stm

The Vatican has expressed "deep displeasure" over China's appointment of two Roman Catholic bishops.

The appointment of the bishops without the Vatican's approval represented a "grave violation of religious freedom", a statement said.

"The Holy Father learned the news with deep displeasure," said the statement.

"We are faced with a great violation of religious freedom."

...erm.. I know I'm slow. But, how does 'only being allowed to make appointments with the Popes express approval' equal 'religious freedom'

Can someone more clevererer than me please explain? AmyWilson? Can you field this one?

 

[This Guy]

Doubt I'm clevererer than you, but I think the issue is that perhaps the church (either in Rome, or China) really had no say in the matter. It was a Government appointment basically.

"The Vatican said it had received information that bishops had come under "strong pressure and threats" to take part in the ordinations."

That's just my take. Maybe I'm reading it wrong though.

/edit because " isn't the same as '

 

[brodski]

I've read this piece on the beeb a couple of times. Am I missing something?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4972004.stm

The Vatican has expressed "deep displeasure" over China's appointment of two Roman Catholic bishops.

The appointment of the bishops without the Vatican's approval represented a "grave violation of religious freedom", a statement said.

"The Holy Father learned the news with deep displeasure," said the statement.

"We are faced with a great violation of religious freedom."

...erm.. I know I'm slow. But, how does 'only being allowed to make appointments with the Popes express approval' equal 'religious freedom'

Can someone more clevererer than me please explain? AmyWilson? Can you field this one?

Because the RC church was not free to choose their own Bishops, in effect if the Bishops have not been approved by the Pope, then they are not Bishops at all, which means that China is in effect restricting the number of RC bishops, and preventing eth free exercise of that part of eth RC religion which requires bishops to be approved by the pope.Put it this way, if the US federal government decided that it could pick and choose the leaders of a religious group within the US, and started appointing (and blocking the appointments of) bishops, would that be a violation of religious freedom or not?

 

[Zep]

"Hello, commander? Yes, this is Bishop Ping here. I've just spotted some invading Italian men in red dresses and funny hats, and they look angry..."

 

[GreyPilgrim]

makes a bit more sense. Thank you. Although I initially thought

"The Vatican said it had received information that bishops had come under "strong pressure and threats" to take part in the ordinations."

was just the Pope throwing his toys out of the pram.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I seem to recall there being a little bit of fuss in Europe at one point over whether governments could appoint people into positions in the hierarchy of the Catholic Church. How did that work out?

Oh, yeah. Wars and Protestantism.

 

[ceo_esq]

I seem to recall there being a little bit of fuss in Europe at one point over whether governments could appoint people into positions in the hierarchy of the Catholic Church. How did that work out?

Oh, yeah. Wars and Protestantism.

There was a fuss at a number of points. In addition to the Henry VIII business, there was the Investiture Controversy of the eleventh and twelfth centuries.