ROME – Chinese authorities arrested the coadjutor bishop of Wenzhou, China, and local faithful said it was to prevent him from taking possession of the diocese after the death of Bishop Vincent Zhu Weifang.

VATICAN CITY – Prayer and "healthy realism" are needed to ensure progress in Vatican-Chinese relations and, particularly, in promoting a situation in which all Chinese Catholics can feel both fully Catholic and fully Chinese, said Cardinal Pietro Parolin.

BEIJING – China has lodged a diplomatic protest with the United States after a U.S. government commission said Chinese violations of religious freedom last year remained “severe,” the Foreign Ministry said.

BEIJING - On a hazy Sunday morning, the fourth floor of a dingy gray office building in a far-flung region of this city is bursting with prayer.

In the Chinese capital, it’s not uncommon for church services to be held in Soviet-era office buildings. But the poorly lit, cracked-concrete dankness of this particular location cannot dampen the enthusiasm of this evangelical congregation.

BEIJING - A top Politburo official told faith leaders that religious groups must promote Chinese culture and become more compatible with socialism.

TORONTO - Archbishop Savio Hon Tai-Fai, the Vatican’s Secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, will be the keynote speaker at a Jubilee Year of Mercy conference in Toronto on New Year’s weekend.

HONG KONG - The morning after the industrial blast in Tianjin, China, the Tianjin Diocesan Social Service Center helped line up 60 volunteers to assist the government's rescue and relief work. The volunteers donated drinking water, clothes and other supplies to hospitals and temporary settlements for evacuees, reported ucanews.com.

HONG KONG - Cardinal John Tong Hon of Hong Kong has issued an "urgent appeal" to Communist Party chiefs in Beijing, calling on them to order a halt to an ongoing cross-removal campaign from Christian churches in Zhejiang province.

HONG KONG - When Fr. Joseph Zhang Yinlin was ordained coadjutor bishop of Anyang Diocese, he became the first publicly ordained Chinese bishop in three years and the first since the Vatican and China restarted its dialogue in June 2014.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis asked Catholics worldwide to show solidarity through their prayers for Catholics in China and for persecuted Christians over the Pentecost weekend.

The World Day of Prayer for the Church in China is observed each year on the feast of Our Lady Help of Christians, May 24, which this year falls on Pentecost.

TORONTO - The diplomat’s take on what it means to be educated includes getting out of your country and out of your comfort zone. For incoming University of St. Michael’s College president David Mulroney, his diplomat’s understanding of education also happens to be Catholic.

If you ever visit Tiananmen Square in Beijing on a Sunday and decide you would like to attend Mass at Our Lady of China, you will have to catch Line Two from the Qianmen subway station just south of the square and travel six stations to Dongzhimen. Walk about five minutes west from Dongzhimen and you will find yourself at the front gate of the Canadian Embassy. Inside the embassy on Sundays expatriates from Africa, Europe, Canada and elsewhere gather to form their own parish.

HONG KONG - Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-kiun, retired bishop of Hong Kong, protested at the Chinese Liaison Office in the city and asked the whereabouts of Bishop Cosmas Shi Enxiang of Yixian, who was said to have died in detention.

MANILA, Philippines - The recent announcement of this year's working plans of the Chinese State Administration for Religious Affairs has driven a young priest from northern China to call church leaders to work for dialogue and reconciliation among Catholics in his country.

ROME - The Dalai Lama said he would not meet Pope Francis while in Rome for a summit of Nobel Peace Prize winners.