Later this year, a deal inked in 2018 between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Vatican will expire. The initial two-year agreement – whose terms remain secret – was already renewed once in 2020. Now after two years of COVID-19, revelations about genocide of the Muslim Uyghurs in western China, the collapse of Hong Kong’s liberties, and mounting concerns over China’s designs on democratic Taiwan, will October be the time to scrap the deal altogether?
Although the text is officially secret, we know the CCP and the Vatican have agreed to cooperate in the selection of bishops (formally appointed by the Pope) of a united Catholic Church in China. As Wang Linbin pointed out in The Diplomat, Beijing now elects and appoints bishops through the Bishops Conference of Catholic Church in China (BCCCC). The objective is a gradual merger of the Underground Catholic Church into the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (CPCA).
