PopeWatch: Moral Compass

If we wish to assess the moral compass of the gang currently at the Vatican we only have to look at their China policy:

Human-rights activists worry that religious freedom may be the next to be suppressed in Hong Kong. In May last year, two Chinese religious sisters at the Vatican’s study mission in Hong Kong, a kind of unofficial nunciature in the absence of formal diplomatic ties between the Holy See and the People’s Republic of China, were arrested by Beijing authorities on a visit home to mainland China.

After being held for three weeks, the sisters were then put under house arrest and prohibited from leaving the  mainland. Reuters reported that Beijing had ramped up its surveillance of the mission at the beginning of last year, signifying the country’s increasing grip on Hong Kong and a possible wish to close down the mission. 

Cardinal Zen said he had “much compassion” for the two sisters and advised that he had warned the Vatican not to employ young religious with families in mainland China, as it puts them in an “impossible situation” and makes the mission vulnerable to Chinese government surveillance. 

But despite these developments in Hong Kong, Pope Francis and the Vatican are remaining silent — a controversial approach but in accord with the Vatican’s general position on China, which officials believe better serves the long-term prospects for the Catholic Church in China. 

Rogers, however, views the Vatican’s silence as “dramatically undermining” the Church’s “moral authority” and as the “greatest ethical folly in recent times.” 

Added to reports in mainland China of a genocide against Muslim Uyghurs and other atrocities and the persecution of Christians, members of the Falun Gong and other religious minorities, Rogers said that “to be silent in the face of such horrors, at a time when other faith leaders are speaking out, brings shame on the Church.” 

Cardinal Zen noted that the Vatican’s silence is a long-running approach, part of recent decisions, which, he firmly believes, “have sold out and betrayed our Church in China.” These include the renewal last year of the 2018 Provisional Agreement on the appointment of bishops that remains secret and what he views as a more serious and “terrible thing”: the signing of pastoral guidelines concerning civil registration of clergy in China signed in 2019 that, he argues, encourages people to join the state-run church, the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Organization. 

Although the Shanghai-born Cardinal Zen primarily criticizes the Vatican secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, for the Vatican’s decisions regarding China, he also urges Pope Francis to listen to his and others’ concerns. 

“He talks very much about the periphery. We are the periphery, but it seems we have no say at all. Anything to do with our Church is carried out without consulting us,” he said. 

Go here to read the rest.  They have sold out the faithful Chinese Catholics.  They would sell out the rest of us in a heartbeat to meet their goals, which have bupkis to do with Catholicism.