Bullying Swagger
It's well enough known how Beijing and Chinese authorities feel about human rights related to the freedom to worship the religions that are of importance to the populations controlled by China. There are the Uighurs and there are the Buddhists in Tibet. And there are Christians as well.
Those who define themselves as being oppressed and their religions not tolerated nor respected in China are considered by the government to be 'splittists', intent on sowing social discord within a country with the world's largest, possibly most unwieldy population.
Christians may practise their faith, but under the 'guidance' of Beijing, which approves and defines the government-sponsored-and-approved churches and clerics that may represent Chinese Christian Protestants and Catholics. But there is a vast network of underground churches covertly acting on their own, pursuing religious worship freely, unwilling to be controlled by Beijing.
And these churches are deemed by the government to be illegal, and Chinese authorities make every effort to reveal where they are, and to disband them.
So when a Chinese migrant who sought refugee status within Canada on the grounds that given those circumstances, he faced persecution within China for pursuing his religious beliefs, and who faced a series of what would be to him confusing queries it seems abundantly clear that the sympathies of the Immigration and Refugee Board adjudicator were not with him.
Nor does it seem that the adjudicator was well versed in the background circumstances of Christians in China.
Asking a Chinese refugee claimant who has had to practise his faith surreptitiously to avoid arrest and persecution questions whose purpose clearly is to reveal him as an impostor spoke more to the lack of understanding of the interrogator than that of the man being queried. For the Chinese Christian Jesus Christ represents a divine figure, not a mortal man.
How then could he respond to a question that urges he tell his interlocutor what "Jesus" was like "as a person"?
He was, to this man, the Son of God, not a person. To which statement the adjudicator insisted on repeating his question: "I am not asking who he was or what he did. I am asking what is he like as a person", insisted Daniel McSweeney of the Refugee Board. The applicant, Wu Xin Wang, had patiently explained that he was a member of one of China's many underground illegal Christian churches.
"Jesus was conceived through the Holy Ghost and was born in this world", Mr. Wang responded, clarifying in his way that Jesus was of divine provenance; he was not a "person". "In my heart he is my saviour", said Mr. Wang, obviously anxious to respond to the adjudicator in a manner that would satisfy his verbal prodding, for much depended upon it.
But Mr. McSweeney would have none of it, considering Mr. Wang to have memorized tenets of the creed, rather than telling him what he believed, what he practised, what he understood. As a result the Board saw fit to turn down his refugee claim on the basis that Mr. Wang's responses were incomplete and inconsistent.
Seems far more likely that human relations skills in determining who represents a genuine refugee and who does not are sorely lacking within the IRB.
Those who define themselves as being oppressed and their religions not tolerated nor respected in China are considered by the government to be 'splittists', intent on sowing social discord within a country with the world's largest, possibly most unwieldy population.
Christians may practise their faith, but under the 'guidance' of Beijing, which approves and defines the government-sponsored-and-approved churches and clerics that may represent Chinese Christian Protestants and Catholics. But there is a vast network of underground churches covertly acting on their own, pursuing religious worship freely, unwilling to be controlled by Beijing.
And these churches are deemed by the government to be illegal, and Chinese authorities make every effort to reveal where they are, and to disband them.
China is a country with a great diversity of religious beliefs. The main religions are Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism and Protestantism. Citizens of China may freely choose and express their religious beliefs, and make clear their religious affiliations. According to incomplete statistics, there are over 100 million followers of various religious faiths, more than 85,000 sites for religious activities, some 300,000 clergy and over 3,000 religious organizations throughout China. In addition, there are 74 religious schools and colleges run by religious organizations for training clerical personnel.The above is how China officially represents itself with respect to honouring the various parts of its population who worship their chosen religions. As long as the activities take place under Beijing-sanctioned rules and regulations they are permitted to exist. If they make an effort to become more authentic to the precepts of their religion they are deemed to be illegal and adverse to the well-being of the country, their practitioners labelled as enemies of the people.
So when a Chinese migrant who sought refugee status within Canada on the grounds that given those circumstances, he faced persecution within China for pursuing his religious beliefs, and who faced a series of what would be to him confusing queries it seems abundantly clear that the sympathies of the Immigration and Refugee Board adjudicator were not with him.
Nor does it seem that the adjudicator was well versed in the background circumstances of Christians in China.
Asking a Chinese refugee claimant who has had to practise his faith surreptitiously to avoid arrest and persecution questions whose purpose clearly is to reveal him as an impostor spoke more to the lack of understanding of the interrogator than that of the man being queried. For the Chinese Christian Jesus Christ represents a divine figure, not a mortal man.
How then could he respond to a question that urges he tell his interlocutor what "Jesus" was like "as a person"?
He was, to this man, the Son of God, not a person. To which statement the adjudicator insisted on repeating his question: "I am not asking who he was or what he did. I am asking what is he like as a person", insisted Daniel McSweeney of the Refugee Board. The applicant, Wu Xin Wang, had patiently explained that he was a member of one of China's many underground illegal Christian churches.
"Jesus was conceived through the Holy Ghost and was born in this world", Mr. Wang responded, clarifying in his way that Jesus was of divine provenance; he was not a "person". "In my heart he is my saviour", said Mr. Wang, obviously anxious to respond to the adjudicator in a manner that would satisfy his verbal prodding, for much depended upon it.
But Mr. McSweeney would have none of it, considering Mr. Wang to have memorized tenets of the creed, rather than telling him what he believed, what he practised, what he understood. As a result the Board saw fit to turn down his refugee claim on the basis that Mr. Wang's responses were incomplete and inconsistent.
Seems far more likely that human relations skills in determining who represents a genuine refugee and who does not are sorely lacking within the IRB.
Labels: Canada, China, Culture, Human Relations, Religion
posted by Pieface | 7:21 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home