The pope just renewed the Vatican’s deal with the Communist Chinese to govern the appointment of bishops in China. In what I interpret as a show of utter contempt for the Church, the government has now forced nuns to leave a convent. From the Catholic News Agency story:
Due to pressure from the Chinese government, eight Catholic nuns have reportedly been forced to leave their convent in the northern province of Shanxi. Their current whereabouts have not been reported.
“Officials declared us ‘dangerous persons’ and repeatedly harassed us,” said one of the nuns, according to Bitter Winter, an Italian magazine that focuses on human rights and religious liberties in China.
“They asked us to write down what we had done since kindergartens and demanded to disclose everything we did over the past few months. They even wanted us to remember the license plates of the vehicles we used during our trips.”
The nuns have been under constant surveillance by the Chinese Communist Party because they used to live abroad and have refused to join the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, the communist-run state church, according to Bitter Winter.
Yes. For an authoritarian regime, faithful nuns are indeed “dangerous persons,” because they illustrate that there are values more important than obeisance to the state.
But what kind of government goes after nuns? Oh. Right.