by Judi McLeod, Canadafreepress.com
Saturday, February 12, 2005
It was a lonely funeral in a faraway land. Just one day after his death, the ashes of Mgr. John Gao Kexian, unofficial Catholic Bishop of Yanti, China were buried. There were no mourners, no tears, and no last rites.
Posting a link from asia News, the website SpiritDaily was one of the few western news outlets to mark the bishop's passing.
Denied religious comforts, the affection of his blood relatives or visitors from the outside free world, Bishop Gao languished, largely forgotten in prison for five years. In the news blackout that sealed off all information about him in the last years of his life, no one can really say what else he may have been denied in the way of human comforts, what foods he was given, what medication, if any his jailers may have patently ignored.
It was while he was out making a routine visit to parish families that the police arrested Bishop Gao. He was never to be heard from nor seen since the day of his arrest.
In a country with a checkered human rights record, and in an era where Christians are under attack, who would speak out against the imprisonment of an aging Catholic bishop?
Just recently, there was a state crackdown in China on the death of a former Communist leader who sympathized with the Tiananmen Square protests.
While Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin raised the case of two Chinese-Canadian journalists who had their visitor's Visas revoked 48 hours before they were to join Martin's nine-day tour of South asia, he remained mum on the issue of Zhao Ziyang, whose death was suppressed by the Chinese media.
For anyone who cares about the fate of Bishop Gao, it must be bitter medicine to know that Martin credits China with having made "considerable progress" in improving its human rights records. Martin is an avowed devout Roman Catholic.
Bishop Gao was 81-year's-old. Fearing his fragility during five years of incarceration, rumours of the bishop's illness led to rumours of his death months before the actual event. a nun was said to have informed the Vatican, which announced the bishop's official death date as September 11, 2004.
Rumour became reality when the bishop's death was confirmed by several sources in China's Shandong province. Relatives who wanted to visit the ailing bishop in a Binzhou hospital found that he was already dead. Police who rushed his interment the following day without an autopsy, pre-empted any Christian burial.
With his passing little noticed by the outside world, the Bishop's remains now lie in a cemetery on the outskirts of Gaomiaoli Village, not far from Binzhou.
Bishop Gao was ordained in July 1983 and became bishop in October 1992.
Perhaps the many years he spent in a forced labour camp at Longzhen in Heilongijang Province as a seminary student prepared him for the long lonely years he spent in prison at the end of his life. a thought to cling to as the only solace for grieving relatives not permitted to see him before he died.
Communist China has a record of cruelty in its treatment of Catholic bishops.
Msgr. Joseph Fan Xueyan, who died in 1992, spent some 26 years in and out of prisons. at the beginning of 1990, he was picked up by police. On the night of Holy Thursday, april 13, 1992, his body was dumped by police at the door of his family home. Closed in a plastic bag, his corpse showed clear signs of torture.
Meanwhile, it is more than curious interest keeping asiaNews pondering whether Bishop Gao died of torture, prison hardship or old age.
"The issue is important because Chinese authorities still detain incommunicado two other bishops: James Su Zhimin, Ordinary Bishop of Baoding (Hebei province) and Mgr. Francis an Shuxin, his auxiliary. They, too, were abducted by the police in 1997 and 1996 respectively."
Canada Free Press founding editor Most recent by Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. Her work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck. Judi can be reached at: judi@canadafreepress.com
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