Christianity in Vietnam - Roman Catholics

Roman Catholics

Roman Catholicism first entered Vietnam through Catholic missionaries in 16th century and strengthened its influence when Vietnam was a French colony. France encouraged Catholicism.

The most active introducers of Western enlightenment were the Jesuits, who were, at that time, in the prime of their exploratory efforts. The Franciscans, Dominicans, and others, although prominent, never reached the influence of the Jesuits who were determined to plant the spiritual and cultural power of Roman Catholic Church in Southeast Asia. Having arrived there about 1627, they developed their activities in many fields. Their activities were helped by the printing of the first Bible in 1651, and the growing influence of several individuals, who were welcomed in certain powerful circles. Jesuit missionary Alexandre de Rhodes created an alphabet for the Vietnamese language in 17th century from the Latin script. Today it is the official writing system as is called Quốc Ngữ (national language).

Catholicism came to widespread prominence when the French missionary priest and Bishop of Adran Pigneau de Behaine played a key role towards the end of the 18th century. He had come to southern Vietnam to proselytise. Pigneau then became the confidant of Nguyễn Ánh the last of the Nguyễn Lords, then engaged in civil war. Pigneau hoped that by helping in a Nguyễn Ánh victory, he would gain concessions for the Catholic Church in Vietnam.

Pigneau and other missionaries bought military supplies and enlisted European soldiers for Nguyễn Ánh and they took part in military operations.

Nguyen conquered Vietnam and became Emperor Gia Long. He tolerated the Catholic faith and permitted unimpeded missionary activities out of respect to his benefactors. The missionary activity was dominated by the Spanish in Tonkin and French in the central and southern regions. At the time of his death, there were six European bishops in Vietnam. The population of Christians was estimated at 300,000 in Tonkin and 60,000 in Cochinchina.

The peaceful coexistence of Catholicism alongside the classical Confucian system of Vietnam was not to last. Gia Long appointed Minh Mạng his successor for his deeply conservative Confucianism; his first son's lineage had converted to Catholicism and abandoned their Confucian heritage.

A power struggle then developed between Minh Mạng and pro-Catholic, pro-Western officials who wanted to maintain the power they had been given by Gia Long. Eventually, 2,000 Vietnamese Catholic troops fought under the command of Father Nguyễn Văn Tâm in an attempt to depose Minh Mạng and install a Catholic emperor.

The revolt was put down, and restrictions were placed on Catholicism. Persistent rebellions occurred throughout the Nguyễn Dynasty, many led by Catholic priests intent on installing a Christian monarch. During the French colonial campaign against Vietnam from 1858 to 1883, many Catholics joined with the French in helping to establish colonialism by fighting against the Vietnamese government. Once colonial rule was established the Catholics were rewarded with preferential treatment in government posts, education, and the church was given vast tracts of royal land that had been seized.

After the end of the French rule and Vietnam division in mid-1950s, Catholicism declined in the North, where the communists regarded it as a reactionary force opposed to national liberation and social progress. In the South, by contrast, Catholicism was expanded under the presidency of Ngo Dinh Diem, who promoted it as an important bulwark against North Vietnam. Diem, whose brother was Archbishop Ngo Dinh Thuc gave extra rights to the Catholic Church, dedicated the nation to the Virgin Mary and preferentially promoted Catholic military officers and public servants while restricting Buddhism and allowing Catholic paramilitaries to demolish temples and pagodas. In 1955 approximately 600,000 Catholics remained in the North after an estimated 650,000 had fled to the South in Operation Passage to Freedom.

In 1975 the Communist authorities, which united the country by military force and after the US troops withdrawal, claimed that the religious activities of Roman Catholics were stabilized and that there was no religious persecution. Meanwhile, the Government acted to isolate and to neutralize hard-core opposition within local Catholics to party policy and to persuade less strongly opposed factions to join a party-controlled "renovation and reconciliation" movement. A significant number of Vietnamese Roman Catholics, however, remained opposed to communist authority.

In 1988 all Vietnamese Catholics, who died for their faith from 1533 to present time, were canonized by Pope John Paul II as Vietnamese Martyrs.

Read more about this topic:  Christianity In Vietnam

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