VATICAN, Aug. 25 (FIDES/CWNews.com)

    Although the Beijing government did not allow Catholic youngsters to travel to Rome for World Youth Day, several dozen Chinese pilgrims did participate in the events, according to the Fides news service.

    Fides reported that the young Chinese pilgrims circumvented the government ban on travel to Rome, obtaining visas for the purposes of tourism or study and then quietly continuing their travels to include the Vatican.

    Early in August the head of the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, Liu Bainian, announced that no young people from the mainland would be authorized to participate in World Youth Day. But loyal Catholics, tired of the government's manipulation of the "Patriotic Church," used their own ingenuity to find ways to Rome.

    Fides saw the presence of young mainland Chinese at the Rome events as a demonstration of the loyalty of Chinese Catholics, and their great affection for Pope John Paul II. Those ties to the Holy See have endured despite the years of effort by the Communist government to set up an independent "Patriotic Church" that would be subservient to the Communist Party and alienated from Rome.

    Fides notes that, despite consistent government efforts at repression, the Catholic Church has grown in China since the advent of the Communist regime. In Beijing, in Nantang cathedral, there are 300 new baptisms every year; in Guangzhou more than 400; hundreds more are celebrated in Shanghai, Tianjin, Xiamen, and Urumqi. Since 1949, when the Communist regime came into power, the number of Catholics has grown from 3 million to the 12 million.

    One of the unauthorized Chinese pilgrims who participated in World Youth Day-- identified only as "Wang"-- told Fides that he was saddened when the Pope listed all of the countries represented for the event, and did not include the People's Republic of China. Wang observed, "I am lucky to be here, but many, many more would have given anything to come."

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