Cardinal Zen says China and Vatican having `real talks'

Joseph Cardinal Zen Ze-kiun, S.D.B.

Function: Bishop of Hong Kong [Xianggang]

Title:

Birthdate: Jan 13, 1932	Country: Hong Kong

Elevated: Mar 24, 2006	More information: [link=http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/bishop/bzenz.html][www.catholic-hierarchy.org]

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Cardinal Zen says China and Vatican having `real talks'
Apr 27, 2006
Hong Kong's new cardinal said the Vatican and China are holding "real talks" about normalizing formal relations that were cut off more than five decades ago when the communists took power.

(AP, Apr 11, 2006) HONG KONG - Cardinal Joseph Zen's comments on the Sunday TV talkshow Newsline on Hong Kong's ATV World were among the most detailed he has made about the nature of the meetings between the Beijing and Catholic leaders in Rome.

The show's host, veteran journalist Frank Ching, noted that a senior Chinese religious official, Ye Xiaowen, recently said Beijing and the Vatican have only been in "contact" about the issue of forging new relations.

But the outspoken Zen insisted the meetings were much more substantial than mere contacts.

"My impression is that they've entered into real talks," Zen said, adding that negotiators were meeting in Rome.

Zen said one sticking point has been who would have the authority to appoint bishops. He said the Vatican would be willing to show China a list of candidates and allow Beijing to share its opinion, but that the Vatican should have the final say.

"The final word should not be exclusively on the side of an atheist government," said Zen, who was appointed cardinal last month.

Since China cut formal ties with the Vatican in 1951, Beijing has only allowed the faithful to worship in churches run by the state-sanctioned Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association.

Zen said one of the Vatican's conditions for re-establishing relations was that there must be religious freedom in China. But he said that the Vatican wasn't insisting on absolute religious freedom.

When asked whether the Vatican was satisfied with the level of religious freedom now, Zen did not directly answer the question.

"I think we can hope that the cage will become bigger and bigger, and we hope at the end they'll let the birds fly," the cardinal said.

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