VATICAN CITY (Reuters) -China’s government has recognized the authority of the Catholic bishop of Tianjin, Melchior Shi Hongzhen, the Vatican said on Tuesday, who had previously been placed under house arrest for refusing to join China’s state-backed church structure.
“This development is a positive fruit of the dialogue established in recent years between the Holy See and the Chinese Government,” the Vatican said in a statement.
The Vatican struck a landmark deal with the Beijing government in 2018, which was renewed in 2022, over the appointment of Catholic bishops in the country.
The agreement gives Chinese officials some input into who Pope Francis appoints as bishops in the country, and seeks to ease tensions in China between an underground Catholic flock loyal to the pope and the state-backed church.
Aged 94, Shi was ordained as a Catholic bishop in 1982 and had refused to join the state church. He became the bishop of Tianjin in northern China in 2019.
(Reporting by Joshua McElwee, editing by Giulia Segreti and Bernadette Baum)
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