Thaddeus Ma Daqin
|
The Most Reverend Thaddeus Ma Daqin |
|
|---|---|
| Bishop of Shanghai | |
| Church | Roman Catholic |
| Diocese | Diocese of Shanghai |
| See | St. Ignatius Cathedral, Shanghai |
| Installed | 16 March 2014 |
| Predecessor | Joseph Fan Zhongliang |
| Orders | |
| Ordination | 1994 |
| Consecration | 7 July 2012 by Joseph Fan Zhongliang |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1968 Shanghai, China |
| Motto | Ut Sint Unum Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam |
| Coat of arms |  |
Thaddeus Ma Daqin (Chinese: 马达钦) (born 1968, Shanghai, China) is the Roman Catholic bishop of Shanghai. He was appointed as auxiliary bishop with the approval of the Holy See and Chinese Government in July 2012. He announced his resignation from the Chinese government mandated Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association at his episcopal ordination Mass, and was taken into custody as a result. The Chinese Government has detained him under house arrest ever since (largely confined to Sheshan Seminary) and has prevented him from carrying out his episcopal duties.
Ma was born in Shanghai and was ordained as a priest in 1994, after graduating from the Sheshan Seminary. He is a former editor of the Shanghai Diocese's Guangqi Press, one of the two main Catholic publishers in the People's Republic of China. He served as head of Shanghai Pudong Deanery and, in December 2011, was appointed as Vicar General by Bishop Aloysius Jin Luxian.
In 1951, the Chinese government severed formal ties with the Vatican, and by Chinese law Catholic worship is only permitted in government-controlled churches. Many of China's estimated 10 million Catholics are believed to have remained loyal to the Pope, gathering in underground churches. The Chinese government claims the authority to approve and appoint bishops.
In 2012, Ma received the approval of both Beijing and the Holy See for appointment as an Auxiliary Bishop of Shanghai. On 7 July 2012 was consecrated a bishop. In Shanghai's St. Ignatius Cathedral, in front of a congregation which included Communist Party officials, Ma used his ordination speech to announce his resignation from the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association.
Catholic priests and nuns had gathered outside the Cathedral in protest at the participation of Vincent Zhan Silu in the ceremony. Zhan had been appointed "bishop" without the approval of the Vatican, and was loyal to the Patriotic Association. Bishop Jin and two other Vatican affirmed bishops performed the "laying on of hands" ritual to invoke the Holy Spirit during the ceremony. Zhan and two other bishops were also supposed to perform the ritual, but, according to Reuters, Ma "prevented them from putting their hands on his head by rising from his knees and hugging the three bishops instead."
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