Pope Leo faces challenge with Chinese Communist Party

The 2018 contract between the Vatican and the Communist Party of China (CCP) provided by Cardinal Pietro Parolin is again under surveillance because the questions remained about how newly appointed they were Pope Leo XIV CCP will take on.

The contract that broke out to the conditional was and remains a controversial agreement between the leader of the Catholic Church and CCPwho has long -descended Catholics throughout China.

While the agreement was late advocated Pope Francis And his Secretary of State, Parolin – a top diplomat of the Vatican – as a step towards “normalizing” Catholicism in the communist nation, experts claim that this has brought dangerous consequences for believers.

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“Erodates the Pope’s authority to appoint the bishop, the leadership of the Catholic Church In China, “Nina Shea, Senior Associate and Director of the Center for religious freedom at the Hudson Institute, she told Fox News Digital.

“The main responsibility of the bishop is the training and ordination of the priest,” she explained. “Therefore, the CCP received control in determining the chain of government in the hierarchical church.”

According to this agreement, all the Catholic clergy must be registered in the Patriotic Association of CCP – which was created in 1957 and the Catholic Church has long rejected as illegitimate because it required all the clergy to reject foreign influence, including the Pope.

Parolin in 2019 he said The goal of this agreement was “to improve religious freedom in terms of finding normalization for the Catholic community.”

The details of the agreement remain unclear because it is kept secret, Shea explained.

Although the agreement reportedly ended the multiple negative connections between the Vatican and the CCP, allowing China to have a greater impact on Episcopal appointments, experts claimed for years that it was too authorized to give a oppressive government.

But there is an even bigger problem when it comes to the Vatican that seems to be capitulated on the CCP.

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Following agreementThe Vatican has further agreed that it will give up supporting the underground Catholic network, which has existed in China for decades and supported millions of Catholics in the country.

According to Shea, the CCP basically “cheated” Vatican Because at the same time, in what he believes he was unknown to Parolin, he forbade children to allow them in the Catholic Church – this ban included important sacraments of the Church such as baptism, holy communion and certificate.

The ban effectively blocks the continuation of the Catholic Church in China.

“The underworld, even during the most fundamental period under the Mao, conducted this education and evangelism,” shea said. “Without being perpetuated, the Catholic Church in China could extinct in several generations.”

“It’s a campaign create an atheist society“She added.

The Vatican did not immediately answer Fox News Digital questions about whether Pope Leo would comply with an agreement with a CCP or watch to create a new one.

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But in his first homily on Friday since he became the leader of the Catholic Church, Pope Leo emphasized the fight against the growing atheism.

“There are many settings in which Jesus, although appreciated as a man, is reduced to a kind of charismatic leader or Superman. This is true not only among unbelievers, but also among many Christians baptized, who have eventually lived in this level in a state of practical atheism,” he said. “These are contexts in which it is not easy to preach the gospel and testify to his truth, where believers mock, opposes, contempt, or at best tolerate and pity.”

The Pope said, for that reason, “the missionary reach is desperately needed.”

Pope Leo warned that “the lack of faith” led not only “loss of meaning in life” for many, but also “neglect of mercy, terrible violations of human dignity, the crisis of families and so many other wounds that hit our society.”

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While congratulations They were released equally by the leaders of Catholic and non -Catholic countries, China did not issue a similar message after the Pope appointed Thursday.

At a press conference on Friday, when asked about the new leader of the Church, the spokesman of the Chinese Foreign Ministry Lin Jian said: “We hope that, under the guidance of the new Pope, the Vatican will continue to have a dialogue with China in a constructive spirit, depth communication on international issues of common interest, joint constant improvement and proportion of stability in the stability in the stability in the stability in stability in stability.