Chinese authorities, seen as repressive toward Roman Catholics, are giving increasingly encouraging signals to the country's small Russian Orthodox community.
Orthodox followers in China hope they will soon be able to practice their faith normally after being forced into hibernation for many years, partly because of a lack of active priests.
The situation was due to be raised during Russian President Vladimir Putin's official visit to China last week, according to religious sources in Moscow, although this was not confirmed.
There are an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 Russian Orthodox Christians in China, either descendants of Russian immigrants or converted Chinese.
Most of them are in Inner Mongolia and around Urumqi, the capital of northwestern Xinjiang Province, although there are also a few hundred in Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin and Harbin.
The Chinese Orthodox church reached its peak in the mid-1950s when it became autonomous and had two bishops who oversaw an estimated 20,000 faithful. However, the church was to suffer much at the hands of the Red Guard, which drove it underground in 1966.
The two bishops died in the 1960s and have never had any successors.
China's Orthodox community has since diminished, with many expecting it to disappear altogether after the death of the last active priest in December.
But, benefiting from the current healthy political climate between Moscow and Beijing, the Russian patriarchate has taken steps to revive the faith in the country.
The most important of these was the decision by Beijing to allow 18 Chinese students to undertake studies in seminaries of Moscow and Saint Petersburg.
"If they are allowed to fulfil their priesthoods in China by the Administration for Religious Affairs, one day they will become bishops and be able to ordain priests. Orthodoxy will thus return in China," said Russian businessman Dmitry Napara, who is delighted with the move.
Last June, China permitted an Orthodox monk from Alapayevsk, in Russia's Ural Mountains, to celebrate mass in northeastern Harbin, which is probably China's most Russian-influenced city.
The church has remained open in Harbin, where the faithful have had to make do with services held by laymen since the death of their priest more than four years ago.
In another gesture from Beijing, two Orthodox churches in Shanghai, one of which had been converted into a nightclub, will be returned to "more serious" use, according to Napara.
It was likely that one of them would be developed into an arts centre devoted to the history of the Russian presence in China, he says.
Napara also said the pragmatic Chinese may see the activities of the church in Harbin as an opportunity to attract tourists.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of