The Vatican Capitulates... clock ticking on relations with the Holy See?

The old railroad bridge in Shigang, now a bicycle trail.

The news wires were burning up this week with the announcement that the Vatican and the CCP had come to an agreement. WSJ reported...

Pope Francis has decided to accept the legitimacy of seven Catholic bishops appointed by the Chinese government, a concession that the Holy See hopes will lead Beijing to recognize his authority as head of the Catholic Church in China, according to a person familiar with the plan.

The pope capitulated, as WSJ observed in a few places in the article, and received no guarantees. The camel's nose is now inside the Big Tent, in classic Beijing fashion. Beijing will simply slice and slice away in tiny chunks until the Pope's authority is emptied and the Catholic Church in China is completely under CCP control. That is Beijing's short-term plan. In the long term, one can foresee that Beijing dreams of the first Chinese pope... of course, a staunch member of the CCP.

The Vatican itself described the negotiations:

Interview with the Secretary of State who responds to the accusations made against the Holy See regarding the ongoing contacts, “We trust that the Chinese faithful, thanks to their spirit of faith, will know how to recognize that our action is animated by trust in the Lord and does not answer to worldly logic”

Well, when the Church itself says it is irrational....

As many noted in discussions of the agreement this week, this rapprochement between the two Leninist organizations fighting for control of China's Catholics means that at some point Beijing will ask the Vatican to switch recognition to the PRC, and the Vatican, eyeing competition from Protestant Churches in China, as well as the flow of donations from China's increasingly affluent population, will concede. Indeed, all last year rumors went caroming around the intertubes to that effect.

The Vatican is the last European government to recognize the ROC as China. Tick, tick, tick.....
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