09/29/2002
EDITORIAL NUMBER=0-10159

VIETNAM'S REPRESSION OF RELIGION

Francois Xavier Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan has died. He was seventy-four. Ordained a Roman Catholic priest in 1953, he was appointed deputy archbishop of Saigon [now Ho Chi Minh City] just days before the South Vietnamese capital fell to Communist forces in April 1975. Imprisoned by Communist authorities, Father Thuan spent thirteen years in a Vietnamese prison camp, nine of those years in solitary confinement. Forced to leave Vietnam in 1991, he was named a Cardinal by Pope John Paul the Second in February 2001.

Cardinal Thuan was an inspirational figure for many Vietnamese Catholics. In Vietnam, religious freedom is severely curtailed. Vietnamese authorities restrict religious worship to those religious organizations that register with the government. Government permission is required to train, ordain, transfer, or promote clergy. Government authorities decide whether religious groups can hold conventions, conduct celebrations, build or remodel places of worship, run charities, or operate schools.

The Vietnamese government exercises strict control over religious life. Charges such as "attempting to undermine national unity" or "abusing freedom of religion" are used to detain those active in religious groups the regime does not recognize. Hmong Protestants allege that they have been imprisoned just for practicing their faith.

The government requires all Buddhist monks to work under an umbrella organization controlled by the Communist Party. The Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam is outlawed. Its clergy are subjected to investigation and arrest. Its Supreme Patriarch, the Most Venerable Thich Huyen Quang [tick wen KWAHNG], has been confined to an isolated pagoda since 1982. More than eighty years old, he is reportedly in poor health. The Unified Buddhist Church's second ranking leader, the Venerable Thich Quang Do [tick kwahng DOE], was placed under house arrest after visiting the Supreme Patriarch in February 2001.

In October, 2001, a Roman Catholic priest, Father Nguyen Van Ly [nwen van lee], was sentenced to more than fifteen years in prison after he sent written testimony to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Father Ly had called attention to the Vietnamese regime's repression of religious faith.

"Everyone waits for freedom," Francois Xavier Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan once wrote from a prison cell. The people of Vietnam are still waiting.