Christians make up just 4% of the People’s Republic of China’s population of 1.3 billion. However, China is among the countries showing the highest increase in the number of Catholics in recent years, with the number rising from around 8 million in the 1980s to today’s nearly 12 million, though still scarcely 1% of the population of China. Blanco said, “Many people are still converting to Catholicism, even within the Communist Party itself, which imposes heavy penalties because it sees Catholicism as a threat to Marxist ideology”. According to Blanco, “The Chinese government is afraid that alleged ‘religious activism’ will turn into ‘political activism’, and so they try to control it”.
The Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) foundation has been assisting the clandestine Catholic Church in China for over fifty years. In the course of her speech, the ACN delegate explained the situation of Catholics in China and the Chinese government’s creation in 1957 of what it called the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association (CPA). The aim of the CPA was to exercise governmental control and avoid “foreign influences” that sought to destroy China, a clear reference to the loyalty of the Catholic Church to the Pope. “This is how the current Chinese government claims to respect religious freedom”, observed Blanco. In theory, five religions are tolerated, among them Catholicism. Curiously, according to Blanco, “the Communist Party acknowledges that religion is beneficial to society and that Catholics make good citizens".
However, Blanco warned, “China is a complex country and judgements should not be made lightly”. The reality is also very different to what some might perceive. “Some people thought that the Olympic Games would calm down the issue, but in fact there have never been so many arrests for religious reasons as there have been in the last year. They don’t say they are being arrested for being Catholic, but for seeking to disturb the social order."
The Chinese seminary student then gave his own personal account. He explained that he had come to Spain to receive the Catholic education he was unable to obtain in China. He said, “My bishop has been under house arrest for 15 years. they have incarcerated him several times for no reason. When I go back, he will ordain me, but I still don't know for sure whether it will take place or how."
This seminary student was educated in the Catholic faith and is the fourth of five siblings, the eldest of whom is now a priest. He narrated the experiences of his life and said, “It is very hard not being able to see your parents for four or five years, because of the total ban on having more than one child”. He continued, “We Catholics used to pray together. My parish priest served 60 villages and every Sunday we had to travel kilometres on foot or by bicycle (a car was a real luxury) to be able to hear Mass in one of those villages”. In spite of the sometimes considerable difficulties, he added, “I have never once voluntarily missed a Sunday Mass”. Spain makes it very easy: “Where I live, 70 Masses are said every Sunday!” he joked, “But not in China”.
During the round of questions, Blanco expanded on the forms of assistance the ACN gives to Chinese Catholics. She said, “Bishops will ask us for help to get seminary students out of the country. If we manage to do it, we never tell their families where they are, so as not to endanger anybody if relatives are arrested and tortured for information”. For his part, the Chinese seminary student was optimistic about the future: “Yes, I am sure that things will improve one day, but I don’t know when. It’s like the Second Coming”. What seems clear is Blanco’s assertion: “In China there is a great hunger for God”.
The event was chaired by Dr. Belén Zárate, the Vice Rector of the UIC University Community, who in closing reviewed the activities promoted by the University in the course of the Year of Faith and urged the audience to “discover accounts of anonymous heroes, nonconformists who have rebelled against the inconsistencies of their world”.
