Another Chinese bishop has been arrested by the Communist authorities. Bishop Martin Wu Qinjing of Zhouzhi in the Shaanxi province was taken into custody. He was ordained a bishop last year, but not approved by the Communist government, which forbade him from exercising his ministry. Obviously, he ignored them.
Bishop Wu was warned that he should not “behave as a bishop,” but he ignored that order, wearing his episcopal ring as he celebrated Mass in the city’s cathedral.
The bishop was arrested on September 11, with about 30 policeman conducting a raid in which they broke into a parish house and roughed up religious and seminarians who tried to stop them.
The Communist Chinese government requires Christians to worship only in state-controlled associations, including the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, which eschews any connections to the Vatican or the Pope. Many Catholics worship in illegal, underground churches, following only bishops appointed by the Pope, although the divisions are not hard and fast. Many priests and laypeople, and even bishops, are members of the patriotic association in public, and of the underground Church, in secret.
Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for him.
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