The battle for the next Pope may be shaping up to be a contest between a Filipino and a Hungarian, but Vatican Secretary of State, Pietro Parolin, is said to be a big favourite of Pope Francis when it comes to succession. Yet is the Italian Cardinal undermining his chances of succeeding the Pope? Cardinal Parolin is seen as aligned with the Pope, although he has expressed more conservative opinions upon occasion. In 2015, he called the referendum endorsing same-sex marriage in Ireland a “defeat for humanity”.
Yet, it is on China where the Cardinal may have really undermined his chances, as tensions heat up between China and Taiwan. A 2018 agreement between the Vatican and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was renewed once in 2020 and is set to be renewed again in 2022. As the Vatican’s top diplomat, Cardinal Parolin has been instrumental in the deal.
The Vatican and the CCP have now agreed to cooperate in the selection of bishops of a united Catholic Church in China. The objective is to merge the Underground Catholic Church with the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association (CPCA). In spite of this, one report by the US Congressional-Executive Commission on China found that Chinese Catholics suffered “increasing persecution” after the deal was actually signed.
This is unprecedented. The Vatican never accommodated a regime like the CCP before since communist regimes in Europe never tried to select bishops. Meanwhile, the position taken by St. Pope John Paul II – instrumental in the collapse of communism in his native Poland and neighbouring countries – has given way to a new Ostpolitik. Cardinal Parolin – having brokered a power-sharing deal with Vietnam in 1996 – has since led efforts with China, and was previously responsible for establishing contact as Undersecretary of State.
In an interview with Italy’s La Stampa in 2018, Cardinal Parolin said: “We trust that the Chinese faithful, thanks to their spirit of faith, will know how to recognise that our action is animated by trust in the Lord and does not answer to worldly logic”. He added: “I am also convinced that part of the suffering experienced by the Church in China is not so much due to the will of individuals as to the objective complexity of the situation.”
Cardinal Joseph Zen – since arrested by Hong Kong authorities – has been especially critical of Cardinal Parolin’s role. Prior to his resignation, Pope Benedict XVI terminated negotiations with China, likely due to poor conditions on offer. According to Cardinal Zen, “Pope Francis does not know the real Communist Party in China, but Parolin should know.” Cardinal Zen has told Pope Francis: “that he [Parolin] has a poisoned mind. He is very sweet, but I have no trust in this person. He believes in diplomacy, not in our faith.”
Cardinal Zen has since said he thinks Cardinal Parolin is “manipulating” the Pope and may be acting out of “vainglory”, according to an interview with New Bloom Magazine. For Cardinal Parolin, however, speaking in 2020: “With China, our current interest is to normalise the life of the Church as much as possible, to ensure that the Church can live a normal life, which for the Catholic Church is also to have relations with the Holy See and with the Pope”, as reported by AgenSIR. But, as the Catholic Herald reported in 2020, Cardinal Zen continued to criticise Cardinal Parolin’s claims about China, accusing Cardinal Parolin of “telling a series of lies”.
In particular, Cardinal Zen criticised a speech in which Cardinal Parolin said Benedict XVI had given his approval to a draft of the 2018 deal, calling it “sickening”. Cardinal Parolin had cited Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, claiming he said that “Pope Benedict XVI [approved] the draft agreement on the appointment of bishops in China, which it was only possible to sign in 2018.” Cardinal Zen said it was “very ridiculous and humiliating” for Re “to be ‘used’ once again to support the falsehoods of the Most Eminent Secretary.”
“Parolin knows he is lying, he knows that I know he is a liar, he knows that I will tell everyone that he is a liar, so in addition to being cheeky, he is also bold,” Cardinal Zen said.
For Cardinal Parolin, however, there are signs the deal was helped unify the underground Church and the state-backed CPCA, and while there have been “misunderstandings” over the deal and “many other problems”, they cannot all be addressed at once. “We know that the road to full normalisation will still be a long one, as Benedict XVI predicted in 2007,” Cardinal Parolin said, adding the deal concerns only the appointment of bishops and that no illicit appointments had occurred.
Cardinal Zen retorted: “All legitimate bishops, but in a Church that is objectively schismatic, is that good?” Cardinal Parolin later said he was “very saddened” by Cardinal Zen’s arrest, but that it should not be read as “a disavowal” of the deal, stating: “The most concrete hope is that initiatives such as this one will not complicate the already complex and not simple path of dialogue.” Criticism of Cardinal Parolin extends beyond China, however.
The Italian cleric has also been criticised for his stance on the Order of Malta, after he announced that a commission to investigate the dismissal of the Order’s Grand Chancellor was to proceed. Cardinal Parolin – according to Ed Condon, writing for the Catholic Herald in 2017: “is alleged to have reasoned, the Holy See has the authority to intervene in the Order’s internal governance. It is hard to believe that so seasoned a Vatican diplomat as Cardinal Parolin would make such a basically flawed legal argument.”
According to Condon, while the Order is a lay Catholic order, its constitution separates it from oversight of any Vatican department, and to compromise the Order’s sovereignty, the Pope would have to abrogate the Order’s rights and laws, which he had not done. But it remains China which raises the greatest controversy. Yet, as the deal with the CCP is set for renewal, Cardinal Parolin has the chance to take a stand by persuading the Pope to cancel the deal or attach conditions, such as the release of incarcerated clerics. Time however is running out, with renewal expected in Autumn. As tensions in the Taiwan Strait increase, the deal is surely ripe to be re-examined. If it isn’t, Cardinal Parolin’s possible succession to Pope Francis might be re-examined instead.
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