Melchior Shi Hongzhen is a Chinese Roman Catholic prelate currently serving as a bishop of the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Tianjin The Roman Catholic Diocese of Tianjin/Tíentsín (Latin: la, Tienzinen(sis), ) is a suffragan diocese in the Ecclesiastical province of the Metropolitan Archbishop of Beijing in PR China. Its cathedral episcopal see is Cathedral of St. Joseph (La ...

. He has been under house arrest since he refused to join

Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association The Catholic Patriotic Association (), abbreviated CPA, is a state-sanctioned organization of Catholicism in the People's Republic of China. It was established in 1957 after a group of Chinese Catholics met in Beijing with officials from the Chi ...

(CPCA).

Biography

Hongzhen was born in

Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popul ...

, China on 7 January 1929. He was ordained a priest on 4 July 1954. He was ordained a bishop on 15 June 1982 by Bishop Paul Liu Shuhe and appointed Coadjutor Bishop of the

. After the death of Bishop Paul Liu Shuhe, on 8 June 2019, he Succeeded as bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tianjin but he was never recognised by the Chinese authorities because he refused to join

(CPCA) and since then he has been under house arrest by the Chinese government.

References

{{reflist 1929 births Chinese bishops Living people Roman Catholic bishops in Asia Roman Catholic bishops