VATICAN CITY – Christian monastic XVI insisted Sat on his exclusive right to invest bishops as he consecrated a Asiatic prelate in an implicit challenge to attempts by China's authorised faith to invest bishops without his approval.
Monsignor Savio Hon Tai-Fai, a 60-year-old Salesian prelate from Hong Kong recently titled to the No. 2 spot in the Vatican's religionist office, was digit of five bishops ordained by monastic in St. Peter's Basilica.
His elevation comes amid a newborn baritone saucer in relations between the Holy See and Peiping over the Asiatic state-backed church's designation of bishops without papal consent.
Benedict didn't refer specifically to China in his discourse but insisted in general on the obligation and requirement for the pope to study bishops to secure disciple succession. He said digit of the key jobs of a bishop is to secure that there is an "uninterrupted concern of communion" with the apostles.
"You, my love brothers, have the assignment to confiture this Christian communion," monastic said. "You know that the Lord entrusted St. saint and his successors to be the edifice of this communion, the guarantors of existence in the totality of the disciple communion and the faith."
China unnatural its romish Catholics to cut ties with the residence in 1951 shortly after the communist seizure of power. Although exclusive state-backed Christian churches are recognized, jillions of another Asiatic belong to summary congregations loyal to Rome.
Dialogue has been used to assist tensions, but a important sticking saucer has been the Asiatic church's insistence that it — not the pope — has the right to constitute bishops. It maintains that Rome's position amounts to interference in its internal affairs.
The sides had come to a breakable improvement in past eld whereby leaders tacitly authorised the bishops appointed by Beijing. But that appeared to fortuity downbound New terminal assemblage when the Asiatic faith ordained a bishop who did not have the pope's approval, a move it said it was unnatural to verify because of a demand of response from the Vatican.
The frictions worsened after a gathering in Dec of most 300 bishops, priests and laymen in Beijing, at which Bishop Ma Yinglin — who is not constituted by the Holy See — was chosen as nous of the Bishops' Conference of the Christian Church of China.
The residence at the instance condemned the gathering as a ravishment of religious freedom and manlike rights; there were reports that whatever prelates loyal to leaders had been unnatural to attend.
Hon was recently titled No. 2 in the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples. He has said he hopes to be a bridge between leaders and Bejing and that his high-profile designation was a sign of the pope's love for China.
On Saturday, Liu Bainian, spokesman for the Asiatic Patriotic Christian Association, congratulated Hon and said there was no requirement for him to be a bridge since the residence and China already had a dialogue.
But in an interview with The Associated Press in Beijing, he said the faith could meliorate relations between the digit by respecting what he said were digit conditions put forward by the Asiatic government: "First, to cut the so-called smooth ties with Taiwan and discern the People's Republic of China as the mend lawful government. Second, do not interfere in China's internal affairs, including in the denotive of bishops," he said.
The residence has said it is primed "at any time" to switch its smooth relations from Taiwan to China, which claims Taiwan as its territory.
Liu said Hon could help meliorate Sino-Vatican ties. "Bishop Hon is a Asiatic citizen and has the responsibility to build the socialist country with Asiatic characteristics unitedly with the Asiatic people and attain contributions to the rejuvenation of the Asiatic nation," he said.
During the solemn Mass, which began with a biblical reading in Chinese, the five newborn bishops prostrated themselves before the altar. The men then kneeled as mountain of bishops laid their safekeeping on their heads in prayer. The five then conventional their spinous headgear from the pope.
In addition to Hon, the another bishops ordained Sat were: Monsignors Marcello Bartolucci, the No. 2 in the Vatican's saint-making office; Celso Morga Iruzubieta, the No. 2 in the Vatican's Congregation for Clergy; and Antonio Guido Filipazzi and Edgar Pena Parra, both of whom are residence diplomats.
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Associated Press illustrator Henry Hou in Peiping contributed to this report.
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