Pope ‘loves China’, Vatican official says on trip to Beijing
Pontiff keen to heal decades-old rift between Vatican and China, visiting monsignor says
Pope Francis “loves China” and the Vatican hopes the country has a great future, a Chinese state-run newspaper on Friday cited a visiting Vatican official as saying, in an expression of goodwill despite strained relations between the two.
Pope Francis would like to heal a decades-old rift with China, where Catholics are divided between those loyal to him and those who belong to a government-controlled official church.
In June, China said it opposed outside interference in its internal affairs after the Vatican expressed concern about a Chinese bishop it said had been “removed”.
Speaking in Beijing where he was attending an organ transplant conference, the head of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences, Monsignor Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, expressed the Pope’s goodwill, Global Times reported.
“Pope Francis loves China and loves the people of China, its history and population. We hope China can have a great future,” he was quoted as saying.