Catholic politician slams Vatican-China agreement: ‘Deal with the devil’
‘Fear of upsetting the Chinese Communist Party has led the Vatican to remain silent about gross violations of religious freedom,’ the UK’s Lord David Alton said.
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Tue Aug 18, 2026 - 4:19 pm EDT
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(LifeSiteNews) — Lord David Alton of Liverpool, a Catholic member of the U.K.’s House of Lords, in an interview published on Tuesday, slammed the Vatican’s secret agreement with the communist Chinese government as a “deal with the devil” and criticized Rome’s silence as the faithful are persecuted.
During his interview with Crux, published August 18, Lord Alton, while discussing an ongoing petition launched by Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) calling on countries to fulfill the obligations of Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), namely, defending religious freedom, discussed China’s egregious violations against Christians, Muslims, and others.
He notably referred to the Sino-Vatican deal and called it a “deal with the devil,” lamenting the fact that the Vatican is silent, apparently out of fear of upsetting the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as it continues to violate the Catholic faithful’s religious freedom.
“In the case of the Chinese Communist regime, (the Vatican) is making a deal with the devil – a regime which has committed genocide against Uyghur Muslims and persecutes Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong practitioners and Chinese Christians,” Lord Alton told Crux.
“Fear of upsetting the Chinese Communist Party has led the Vatican to remain silent about gross violations of religious freedom,” he added. “(T)he Vatican has betrayed the loyal, persecuted, underground Catholic Church and embraced an ‘official’ church which is merely an extension of the Communist State, replacing faith with Communist ideology.”
The officially secret Sino-Vatican deal signed in 2018 is believed to recognize the state-approved “church” in China and to allow the CCP to appoint bishops. The pope apparently retains veto power, though in practice the CCP has control. It also allegedly allows the removal of legitimate bishops and their replacement with CCP-approved bishops.
READ: China-Vatican deal on bishops is ‘escalating repression’ of Catholics: Human Rights Watch
Thus, the deal makes it much easier for the CCP to force Chinese Catholics to conform to its ideology. This deal was most recently renewed in 2024 for a four-year term.
Since the secret deal was signed, several prominent Catholic prelates, including Cardinal Joseph Zen of Hong Kong, have sharply criticized the agreement. The 94-year-old cardinal once described the agreement as an “incredible betrayal” of China’s Catholics and even accused the Vatican of “selling out” the Chinese faithful.
“They’re giving the flock into the mouths of the wolves. It’s an incredible betrayal,” Zen told Reuters back in 2018. “The consequences will be tragic and long lasting, not only for the church in China, but for the whole church because it damages the credibility.”
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Since the signing of the secret agreement, the CCP has apparently gained influence in purportedly Catholic institutions.
In July, Peter Tan, the chair of the U.S.-China Catholic Association (USCCA) Board of Directors, which is notoriously pro-sinicization, was allegedly given orders by two Chinese officials to cancel a keynote address scheduled to be delivered by Professor Fenggang Yang, who has been critical of both CCP’s persecution of Christians and the Vatican-China deal, during its biennial conference at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas.
EXCLUSIVE: Professor says Chinese communist officials ordered his removal from Catholic conference
“China’s transnational repression has become quite well known by now. Still, the willing cooperation of the USCCA with China’s transnational repression is disappointing and troubling,” Yang previously told LifeSiteNews. “It is a shame that a U.S.-based Catholic organization has become part of China’s long-arm repression in the United States.”
The USCCA board under Tan also allegedly removed its only member who opposed sinicization and was sympathetic to Cardinal Zen, persecuted Chinese Catholic businessman Jimmy Lai, and the entire underground Church.
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- Lord David Alton
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- Vatican-china Deal
