A Chinese priest involved with the country’s underground Catholic Church has been missing ever since government officials took him just after Christmas for “re-educating”.
Fr Lu Danhua of Lishui Diocese of China’s eastern Zhejiang province was the only priest of the diocese, and took over from Kenneth Roderick Turner of Scarboro Foreign Mission Society from 1948 to 1983.
He was ordained to the country’s underground Church by Bishop Peter Shao Zhumin of Wenzhou on December 14 in 2016, and served Lishui Diocese until the incident.
Bishop Shao was released by authorities on January 3 after being detained since May 2017. A source who did not want to be named told ucanews.com that the reason for taking Fr Lu away was not related to Bishop Shao.
But he said authorities had stated that Fr Lu needed to go to Wenzhou for “re-educating” on new religious regulations coming into effect on February 1 and that he would return after obtaining a permit to be a priest.
At noon on December 29, officials of the State Administration for Religious Affairs (SARA) took Fr Lu away from a priests’ dormitory. A Catholic who witnessed the incident said the officials claimed Fr Lu was only going for a brief chat.