Bishop John Fang Xingyao of Linyi, former president of the state-sanctioned Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, presides over the ordination ceremony of Father Anthony Sun Venjun, 53, as bishop of Weifang on Jan 29 (Photo: Bishops’ Conference of the Catholic Church in China)
By UCA News reporter
Jan 31 2024
CHINA – A new Catholic bishop was ordained for the recently established diocese of Weifang in central China, approved by both the Vatican and the communist government, four days after another bishop was ordained similarly.
Father Anthony Sun Venjun, 53, was ordained as bishop of Weifang in Shandong province on Jan 29, the Vatican press office said.
The news comes after the Vatican announced on Jan 25 the ordination of Father Thaddeus Wang Yuesheng the new bishop of Zhengzhou in the province of Henan.
Weifang was erected and its first bishop appointed in April 2023, but was announced only “on the day of the bishop’s consecration,” Vatican News said.
Bishop John Fang Xingyao of Linyi, former president of the state-sanctioned Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, presided over the ordination ceremony, the Vatican’s Fides news agency reported.
Four other bishops participated along with 44 priests and 330 women religious and laypeople, it added.
Catholics in Weifang are linked to the missionary work of French Franciscans, but they have been without a bishop since 2008.
Their new bishop has been working in the area since 2008. He was born in 1970 and completed his seminary studies at Sheshan Seminary in Shanghai from 1989 to 1994. He was ordained a priest in 1995 at Beijing Cathedral.
He took up pastoral work in Shandong in 2005 but in 2007 left for Ireland to continue his formation. In 2008, he returned to Weifang and continued his pastoral ministry there, Fides reported.
The new diocese’s territory has some 9 million people of which some 6,000 are Catholics, “served by ten priests and six religious sisters,” according to Fides.
The new appointment was made in the “context” of the Vatican-China provisional deal which reportedly allows both parties to collaborate on the selection of bishops in China.
Pope Francis erected Weifang on Apr 20, 2023, after he suppressed the Apostolic Prefecture of Yiduxian, Vatican media said.
These moves are made “with the desire to promote the pastoral care of the Lord’s flock , and to attend better to its spiritual welfare,” the Vatican said.
The apostolic prefecture of Yiduxian was erected in 1931 by Pope Pius XI, taking territory from the Apostolic Vicariate of Zhifu (present-day Yantai diocese), the official statement said.
It also spoke about redrawing the territories of nearby dioceses as it announced the territory of the new diocese, which is significant in the backdrop of the 2018 China-Vatican deal.
Vatican officials maintain the deal aims to regularize the structures and system of the Church for effective pastoral care in China.
Since 1951, the communist government in China has interfered with Church affairs, established dioceses, and appointed bishops independently of the Vatican. The deal wants to regularize diocesan territories and bishops to provide “better pastoral care” to the Church in China, Vatican officials say.
Since the agreement “there have been no more illegitimate episcopal ordinations, those celebrated without papal consent, which since the late 1950s had caused painful rifts among Chinese Catholics,” according to Fides.
Following the deal, until last month, there were six new episcopal ordinations approved by both parties. During the same period, six so-called ‘clandestine’ bishops appointed by the state have also been recognized by the Vatican, Fides said. – UCA News
