Joseph Fan Zhongliang

Joseph Fan Zhongliang S.J. (born 18 December 1918 in China) is a Catholic bishop in the bishopric of Shanghai in the People's Republic of China.

He became bishop for the Catholic underground church, and was a helper bishop for the underground Catholics in Shanghai.

Life

Fan was baptised aged 14. He joined the Jesuits in 1938 and became a priest in 1951. He was arrested together with bishop Ignatius Kung Pin-Mei of Shanghai and other priests in 1955. He was convicted of counter-revolutionary activities and sentenced to 20 years in jail in 1958 and sent to a work camp in Qinghai province, northwest China.

After his release in 1978, he taught at a high school in Qinghai. The bishop of Qinghai ordained him to co-adjutor bishop of Shanghai on 27 February 1985, while the bishop was in jail.

Security police arrested him again on numerous occasions, and ransacked his flat. In 1992, the accounts of the entire Shanghai underground church were closed down, along with many of the bishops' personal accounts, including the bishopric.

Formally, Cardinal Ignatius Kung Pin-Mei was the leader of the church in Shanghai. After a long prison sentence in China, he moved to the USA, and died there in 2000. At that point, Fan Zhongliang took over as underground bishop of Shanghai.

Later, another former Jesuit, Aloysius Jin Luxian, was named actual bishop of Shanghai, causing a rift in the church. Both bishops were in their later years, and due to a change in the political climate in the People's Republic, decided to work together. They, with the support of the Vatican and the church in the regiun, chose a candidate to succeed them. This was Joseph Xing Wenzhi, who was named by the bishopric as helper bishop on 28 June 2005.

As of 2010, both bishop Fan – who is very elderly – and (co-adjutor) bishop Jin, live in the large bishop's house in Shanghai. Bishop Jin exercises the spiritual power of the de facto head of Shanghai's head bishop.