so what? should they be gotten rid of, or should they change their title, or are their followers worshipping the wrong god written up in doctered text? No, perhaps, no and no are the reasonable anwsers?
"So what?" is that Roman Catholics look to the Pope in Rome as their spiritual leader, and the PRC finds this too threatening to tolerate, so they've created an ersatz church which pretends to be Catholic but ignores the Pope.
Seems to me that this is similar to exiling the Dalai Lama from Tibet, and outlawing Falun Gong, period.
In the beginning of Communism, religion was outlawed because Communism was officially atheist.
Now, it's just outlawed due to fear of "deviant" thought, which is to say, individualism.
Any religion which has a central tenet of "just is," fatalism, accepting one's fate, bowing to authority, that's ok.
China simply does not believe in free minds, free thought, or free exchange of ideas.
Too bad there isn't a license plate that says, "Free China," I'd get one of those. |
