Thursday, June 07, 2012

Candidate elected to be coadjutor bishop of Shanghai

Fr. Thaddeus Ma Daquin (Photo UCAN)Father Thaddeus Ma Daquin has been elected as the candidate to be the coadjutor bishop of Shanghai, one of the largest and most important dioceses in mainland China.

The election took place in Shanghai, May 30, and followed the usual democratic election process established by the Chinese authorities, whereby priests, nuns and lay Catholics vote for the candidate to be bishop in a given diocese. 

The 96-year old Jesuit Bishop, Aloysius Jin Luxian, who enjoys the approval of both Beijing and Rome and heads the state-sanctioned ‘open’ Church community in this megalopolis of 23 million people, presided over the election and also cast his vote.

Father Ma, a native of Shanghai, was the only name on the ballot sheet at the election, in which 190 persons voted. He received 160 votes in his favor, 2 against, and there were 28 abstentions, according to UCA News which broke the news. The news agency also reported that he had received approval from the Holy See recently.

The forty-year old Father Ma was vicar-general of the Shanghai diocese’s open Church community at the time of his election. A bright student, he studied for the priesthood at the Sheshan seminary and was ordained priest in 1994. He has spent most of his time as a pastor in the diocese, but has also served as editor of the diocese’s Guangqi Press, one of the two main Catholic publishing houses in the People’s Republic of China.

The result of his election as candidate to be coadjutor bishop in Shanghai will now be transmitted to the state-established Bishops Conference of the Catholic Church in China (BCCCC) in Beijing for its approval. The body is not recognized by the Holy See.

Once the BCCCC gives its approval, the road will then be open for his ordination as coadjutor bishop of the diocese. Bishop Jin Luxian is expected to be the main-consecrator at the ordination ceremony which could take place at the end of June.

Shanghai diocese has about 150,000 Catholics, and in due course Father Ma is expected to succeed Bishop Jin.

There is also an “underground” community in Shanghai, not recognized by the Government, led by 94-year old Bishop Joseph Fan Zhongliang S.J.  who is ill and has lived under surveillance for many years.