China's lesson on freedom of religion
Some Americans see ‘separation of church and state’ as a manufactured way to keep God out of public view. But Beijing’s repressive government illustrates that without that separation, the church — not the state — is ultimately in the greatest jeopardy.
By Richard W. Garnett

Although its government likes to claim otherwise, and apparently hopes people won't notice, meaningful religious freedom does not exist in China. Quite the contrary: As the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom stated in its report last year, "The Chinese government continues to engage in systematic and egregious violations of freedom of religion or

And so, it was probably more disappointing than surprising when the government-controlled puppet church, the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, late last year purported to ordain a new bishop for Roman Catholics in the Xuzhou Diocese, about 400 miles south of Beijing, over the objections of the Holy See.

Why should we care? True, we might sympathize with the millions of Chinese believers whose freedom of conscience is systematically violated, and we might harbor a general unease about China's increasing power, ambition and influence. But putting that aside, is there any reason, really, why Americans should worry much about which of these two bureaucratic adversaries — the Holy See or the People's Republic — picks Chinese bishops? the rest