Chinese bishops side with communist regime to restrict worship, ban ‘unregistered clergy’

(LifeSiteNews) — The government-approved Chinese Catholic bishops have backed the Communist Party’s limitation on public worship.

EWTN reports that the Bishops’ Conference of the Catholic Church in China (BCCC), sanctioned by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), supported the government’s ban on “unregistered clergy” engaging in religious pastoral work or doing so in “unapproved sites for worship.”

In a February 4 statement, the BCCC stated that “religious groups must comply with relevant laws and regulations when conducting religious activities.”

Compliance with these rules is a matter of “national and public interest,” according to the bishops.

The CCP introduced legislation limiting religious activities to “registered” religious venues by “certified and registered religious personnel.”

Nina Shea, who directs the Center for Religious Freedom, called on Pope Leo XIV to summon the bishops from the BCCC to the Vatican for their support of the “suppression of Chinese Catholicism.”

“That the heads of these entities are the bishops of Beijing and Shanghai, China’s most important dioceses, is shameful,” she said. “Pope Leo should immediately summon them to Rome to review their episcopal authority.”

“Supporting the CCP ban on unregistered clergy and churches directly conflicts with Vatican policy,” Shea stressed.

She said Leo “should disclose the content of the Holy See’s provisional agreement with China and review whether this new Chinese policy constitutes a breach of the agreement’s terms or even of its spirit.”

The officially secret Vatican-China deal, signed in 2018 under Pope Francis, is believed to recognize the state-approved church in China and allows the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to appoint bishops. The Pope apparently maintains veto power, although in practice it is the CCP that has control. It also allegedly allows for the removal of legitimate bishops to be replaced by CCP-approved bishops.

The deal was renewed most recently in 2024 for a four-year period.

READ: China consecrates bishop approved by Pope Leo XIV under Vatican-China deal

Shea referenced a 2007 letter from Pope Benedict XVI to the Catholic Church in China in which he said that the attempt by the CCP to impose its own structure on the Chinese Church was “incompatible with Catholic doctrine.”

She also cited the Vatican’s 2019 pastoral guidelines to members of the Chinese Catholic Church that affirmed that priests and bishops had the right to “individually follow one’s conscience on whether to refuse to take the pledge renouncing foreign influence, such as papal influence – a pledge required to register with the state’s Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association and its bishops’ conference.”

“This new position in support of banning and criminalizing those clergy who refuse to take the pledge renouncing papal authority lays bare these entities as mere party tools for communist control and suppression of Chinese Catholicism,” Shea warned.