Underground Chinese bishop, aged 93 missing, presumed dead

Mar 05, 2015

SHIZHUANG: The oldest bishop of China’s underground Catholic Church, Shi Enxiang — who spent more than half a century in detention for refusing to renounce the authority of the Pope — had died, aged 93 almost a month ago. Since then, nothing: no official confirmation, no corpse, no ashes.

“All we want is to be able to bury him. They should give us the body out of human dignity,” said Shi Wanke, 66, the bishop’s nephew. Around him, his children nodded in agreement.

The family were first told at the end of January that Shi Enxiang — whom they have not heard from since he disappeared during a trip to Beijing in 2001 — had died.

The village chief “asked if we had received the body of my uncle”, said Shi Wanke. “We asked if he was alive. He said: ‘No, he’s dead. Apparently he’s dead.’ After that, he came back twice to see if the body had arrived.”

The former bishop of Yixian in the northern province of Hebei, Shi Enxiang was ordained in 1947, two years before the Communists came to power. He spent 54 years in labour camps for refusing to disavow the Pope and cooperate with China’s state-sponsored Church, the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (CPCA).

Instead, he ministered in one of the hundreds of underground churches that have sprung up across China.

“He is a martyr and I hope that, one day, the life of our bishop will be recognized by the Pope,” said his 33-year-old great-nephew Shi Daxing.

“We want to organize a big public ceremony for his funeral. Even if we are under pressure, we want to honour him, as a member of our family (and) as a prominent member of the Church.”

The fates of Bishop Shi Enxiang and Bishop Su Zhimin, who was detained in 1997, have been a key sticking point in relations between the Vatican and Beijing. --AFP