In 2018, the Vatican and China signed a controversial and secretive deal on the appointment of bishops that is up for renewal in the coming weeks. One of the major critics of the deal, Cardinal Joseph Zen, a human rights activist and former bishop of Hong Kong, was arrested by Chinese authorities and put on criminal trial on Monday.
“Here at the Vatican, there is a dialogue commission that is doing well,” Francis said during the in-flight news conference, but he added he doesn’t “feel like qualifying China as antidemocratic because it’s a such a complex country.”
Francis has remained quiet on the persecution of Uyghur Muslims and the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong in order to support the Sino-Vatican deal, which promises to breach the historical rift between the state-recognized Catholic Church in China and the “underground church” approved by the Holy See.
William McGurn, former speechwriter to U.S. President George W. Bush, wrote an opinion article in The Wall Street Journal on Monday declaring “The Pope Abandons Cardinal Zen.” Cardinal Gerhard Müller, formerly at the head of the Vatican’s doctrinal department, criticized Rome’s silence on Zen’s arrest during a summit of cardinals at the Vatican in late August.
“Nobody has raised the grave question of our brother Zen,” Müller told fellow cardinals and the pope. “I hope he won’t be abandoned.”
According to Gaetan, critics of the pope’s diplomacy are part of “a campaign against Pope Francis’ diplomatic approach with relations with Russia and China.”
Gaetan pointed to the fact that a long-standing group studying Holy See-Chinese relations might soon move from Hong Kong to Beijing and that the Sino-Vatican agreement will likely be renewed in October.
“The pope and his diplomats will not change because of this criticism,” Gaetan said. “Their mission is clear and has been practiced for centuries,” he added, pointing to the fact that even the fiery St. John Paul II did not interrupt dialogue with Beijing after the events at Tiananmen Square.
Aguilar believes it’s a mistake to expect a public pronouncement by Pope Francis on international diplomacy. “It will be the very ancient, slow cup of tea of Monsignor Paul Gallagher that will solve everything without a press conference,” he said, referring to the Vatican’s head of relations with states.
Instead of “a soft diplomacy,” Aguilar added, the Vatican operates a “very hard diplomacy” by leveraging its numerous faithful in the world through its nuncios and the Vatican’s foreign office.
In Catholic-majority Nicaragua, Pope Francis has not publicly denounced the oppressive government of President Daniel Ortega, which has been openly hostile toward the Catholic Church by arresting clergy members and banning feasts and processions.
