The Holy See issued a statement following a two-day review of its China policy last month. It was an olive branch from the Vatican to Beijing after months of conflict over the appointment of bishops. All that the Catholic Church state wants is to have dialogue with the Chinese to "overcome the misunderstandings of the past" so that they might normalize relations.
Ever since the apostolic nuncio was ousted from China in 1950, the Holy See has never ceased to try to get another one back to Beijing as soon as it possibly could. The purpose is for the Church to take care of more than 20 million Catholic faithful in China. The effort has been thwarted by China, however.
As a matter of fact, many a round of negotiations was all but to be crowned with success when China would do something to spoil everything. When Pope John Paul II was ready to cut off diplomatic relations with Taipei and accept the Polish formula for the ordination of bishops in 2000, Beijing demanded that he withdraw the beatification of more than 100 Catholic martyrs in China during the Boxer Rebellion of 1900. Of course, the Chinese knew the Pope is infallible and can't cancel the beatification. They made the demand to spoil normalization of relations between the Vatican and Beijing.
Since his election in April 2005, Pope Benedict has made normalization of relations with China one of the political and pastoral priorities of his papacy. Negotiations continued smoothly until last summer, when China began appointing bishops against the objection of the Holy See. It is the power of the Pope alone to ordain bishops, but the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, which does not recognize the authority of the Holy See, went right ahead with a series of bishopric appointments, to the chagrin of the Vatican. A two-day review meeting was held to come up with a suggestion that might solve the current stalemate.
It is now totally up to China to accept the new offer, which has not been made public. At any rate, the Holy See has to have a symbolic modicum of papal authority over bishopric ordination in yielding to China's communist leadership. If Beijing thinks it is urgently necessary to make the Holy See walk out on Taipei, that offer would be taken. But the chances are that President Hu Jintao, who is waxing confident of his newly successful anti-Taipei campaign, does not want to do so.
That is the reason why China has not given an encouraging response to the new Vatican offer. Beijing has just reiterated that the Holy See has to sever diplomatic relations with Taiwan first and pledge not to "interfere" in China's "internal affairs." That means China would continue to ordain Catholic bishops as it pleases.
（本文刊載於96.02.06 China Post第4版，本文代表作者個人意見）
