Pope Leo vs China

From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey. It's Monday May twelve, twenty twenty five. Rome's conclave is done. Now it's Canberra's turn. This morning the National Party votes on its leadership, and on Tuesday the Liberals gather to choose between Susan Lee and a double act featuring Angus Taylor and Jaciner NumPy Price. Anthony Alberanezi will today reveal his reshaped cabinet in the wake of a tirade from

Pope Francis has died aged eighty eight.

And cardinals made their way to Rome to choose a new pope.

I no desire to create bitterness in this conclave, and I will be happy to stand down as deep.

The Chinese Communist Party was an opportunity. Without consulting the Vatican, China appointed two new bishops of the Catholic Church. It was a brazen power move.

It was really quite inappropriate, and the Vatican hadn't been told beforehand. Bishops can only ever be finally appointed in the Church if the reigning pope signs off on and these two were appointed after France has died.

Jess Livingston is a senior journalist with The Australian. She spent years reporting and writing about the Catholic Church, including two books about the late Cardinal George pell.

They want the Catholic Church in China for some reason, but they want it on their terms.

The new bishops weren't China's only move during the interregnum between two popes.

China has brought in a whole set of new rules from the first of May that unless the church workers and indeed church participants and worshipers toe the line on a whole lot of rules, they can be arrested and faced criminal charges, which is pretty off putting to the whole process. That's not just for Catholics over but other Protestant religions and Buddhists will suffer under that, as will

Since Chairman Maujidong took control in nineteen forty nine, China is officially a communist state, that means it's Apeist two. Religion is theoretically allowed, but only under the tight control of the Chinese Communist Party. In the late fifties, the Catholic Church was to be incorporated into official Communist Party

Christians have had a very rough deal from the Chinese Communist Party. Many, particularly adherents of the traditional Church, have been persecuted. There have been priests in jail there for decades, lay people tortured pretty brutally to Claire.

Adding to the tension, the Holy See doesn't recognize mainland China, instead enraging the Communists by recognizing Taiwan as the true China. And that's where Pope Francis comes in. When he became pope in twenty thirteen, Francis wanted to establish diplomatic relations with China, something previous Popes John Paul and Benedict had also hoped.

For the reason they never signed an agreement was when the negotiations got going, they saw straight away China was just going to impose too many limitations and restrictions on them.

Francis and his Vatican Secretary Estate, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, pushed ahead and in twenty eighteen signed an agreement with the government of Shijinping. But the agreement is secret. It's never been seen in public.

The agreement meant, I think that China would be able to ensure that the like minded bishops would be appointed bishops in sympathy with the Chinese Communist Party regime basically, and it caused a huge amount of anger there's an extraordinary character in Hong Kong. Cardinals Zenni's ninety three going on fifty, his bright and alert. He's very funny actually, but he said, look, this is a betrayal. You've thrown the faithful Catholics in China under the bus. He traveled

This all sounds very familiar to any student of Chinese history. In the fifties, China invaded Tibet, which the CCP considers Chinese territory, and began brutal repression of monks and clerics. Ancient monases were sacked, The young Dalai Lama was whisked out of the country and into India. He's never been back. In nineteen ninety five, the Chinese government kidnapped the second highest spiritual figure in Tibet, a six year old boy who had been proclaimed panchen Lama that is the reincarnation

It's become of greater concern over the years as China has become more aggressive, especially in our region. No one's forgotten that Cardinal Pailum came out and criticized Aucus when that agreement was finalized with Australia, the United States and Britain, and he said, oh, you know, it could lead to an arms race in the Pacific, it'll be bad for peace, etc.

Etc.

Now, it was a bit of a one sided statement and it rather echoed the Chinese view of aucurs at the time, So I don't think that did his cause a lot of good. With a large group of cardinals.

Robert Prevost came through the middle and was elected Pope Leo the fourteenth. On Saturday, he called a consistory to ask for cardinals collaboration.

He got all the cardinals together while they're still in Rome and had a meeting. That again was something Francis never liked to do, and Leo said at that meeting, you're my closest advisors. I want to hear from you. And everyone was delighted about that because it means he'll work with the College of Cardinals. Someone at that meeting, someone who's very experienced, who worked as a Vatican official for many years, he got up and said, look, something

There must be a bit of a dilemma for Leo now in regards to this Chinese deal, because presumably if he rips it up, the risk is that he exposes Chinese Catholics to retribution.

Oh, persecution, absolutely, Claire. Oh, look, I think people arguing it should be ripped up of being extremely naive. I think he will be as sensible, steady as she goes person. I don't think he will rip it up. It would be good, I think in the interests of transparency if it was made public and people actually knew the provisions of it, and then you know, we can see if China is held to account with its part of the bargain.

Tess Livingston is a senior US with The Australian and the author of several books. You can read her work and all our deep analysis and reporting on matters of