Cardinal Zen Trial: The Chinese Communist Party’s Vision for a Compliant Christianity

Cardinal Joseph Zen, along with five co-defendants, was convicted on November 25 by a Hong Kong magistrate’s court of a regulatory breach for failing to properly register a humanitarian-aid fund of which he was a trustee. The fine of about $512 that he has incurred is relatively small, but there’s more to this case than meets the eye.

When asked about Zen’s trial last September, Pope Francis responded, “He says what he feels, and you can see that there are limitations there.” Every observer understands that the cardinal’s real offense was dissenting from Chinese Communist Party repression. His real sentence, therefore, includes self-censorship and self-restraint from anything that might be construed as countering party ideology. It is a taste of much worse legal trouble ahead for the Church. Moreover, the draconian National Security Law, under which Zen is separately being investigated, contains a vague prohibition on “foreign collusion” that hangs like the sword of Damocles over him and the rest of the Catholic Church in Hong Kong.

About the Author

Nina Shea

Nina Shea is director of Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom and author of the new report “Ten Persecuted Catholic Bishops in China”

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Cardinal Joseph Zen, along with five co-defendants, was convicted on November 25 by a Hong Kong magistrate’s court of a regulatory breach for failing to properly register a humanitarian-aid fund of which he was a trustee. The fine of about $512 that he has incurred is relatively small, but there’s more to this case than meets the eye.

When asked about Zen’s trial last September, Pope Francis responded, “He says what he feels, and you can see that there are limitations there.” Every observer understands that the cardinal’s real offense was dissenting from Chinese Communist Party repression. His real sentence, therefore, includes self-censorship and self-restraint from anything that might be construed as countering party ideology. It is a taste of much worse legal trouble ahead for the Church. Moreover, the draconian National Security Law, under which Zen is separately being investigated, contains a vague prohibition on “foreign collusion” that hangs like the sword of Damocles over him and the rest of the Catholic Church in Hong Kong.