Bishop John Fang Xingyao, the bishop of the Diocese of Lanyi (a city near the east coast in Shangdong province), was speaking at the Political Consultative Conference on Religions - a Communist Party sponsored meeting last week discussing religion in China.
Bishop Fang is also the president of a state-sponsored Catholic group, the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association. The group was on one side of a disagreement between China and the Vatican about the presence of the Roman Catholic Church in China.
In 2018, the Vatican-China agreement was made which, apart from being mostly secret, aimed to bring together the state-sponsored group and the underground Catholic Church.
It allowed the Pope to veto bishops approved by the Communist Party of China.
Bishop Fang was first appointed a bishop by the Chinese government in 1994.
However, those who do not attend state-sponsored Catholic (and Protestant) churches are frequently reported to face more persecution.
This week, a Protestant pastor in China was sentenced to four years in prison, charged with "illegal business operations."
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