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Vatican – China relations are likely to sour further after excommunicated bishop Paul Lei Shiyin joined the Vatican – China approved ordination ceremony of Father Peter Luo Xuegang.
Earlier this week China indicated it is keen to improve its relations with the Vatican.
Xuegang’s ordination was seen as an encouraging sign by the Vatican and Chinese catholics.
However Shiyin’s participation at the ordination defied a Vatican warning that no non-Vatican approved bishop should participate in the ceremony.
“The ceremony must respect the laws of the Catholic Church; that is, that the faithful are informed of the Holy See’s approval of the candidate, and that no illegitimate bishop will participate at the ceremony,” Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi said.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei did not comment directly on the ordination of Father Peter in Yibin. “We have always been sincere about improving relations with the Vatican,” he told a daily news briefing on Tuesday.
Lombardi said Wednesday evening that Lei’s participation “causes disapproval and consternation,” especially since “it appears he participated as a consecrating bishop and co-celebrated the Eucharist.”
“Instead, the participation of the illegitimate bishop – who, as is known, is in the canonical condition of being an excommunicated person – doesn’t go in the same direction and causes disapproval and consternation among the faithful,” Lombardi said in a statement.
Lombardi noted that in “ordinary situations,” there would be church consequences for the other bishops who participated in the ceremony despite Lei’s presence. “In the present circumstances, it is probable that these (bishops) weren’t able to impede him without grave repercussions” on themselves, he said.
The ordination of bishops is a key test in dealings between China and the Vatican, because it sets the Communist Party’s role in policing religious life against the Catholic Church’s traditional hostility to interference from secular authorities.
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