Phan Van Loi

The situation of  Religious Freedom in Vietnam in 2008

I- APPRAISAL

To really understand the Religious situation in Vietnam, first, one must affirm and grasp the principle of rule of the Vietnamese Communists (VC), that is a totalitarian dictatorship. It means that the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) wants to manage all individuals, collectives, organizations and institutions in Vietnam, and to render them into instruments of the regime, of the party, or at least to paralyze all individuals and collectives, organizations and institutions who dare to challenge the power of the party.

Religious issue in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam must always conform to that principle of totalitarian dictatorship. All religions currently are affected by special policies of the Vietnamese Communists, typically the "Ordinance on Religion and Belief" No 21/2004/QH11, issued by the National Assembly Standing Committee of VC on Jun 18, 2004, and the "Decree guiding the Implementation of some articles of the Ordinance on Religion and Belief" No 22/2005/CP issued by the government on Mar 1, 2005.

These Ordinance and Decree want to control and dominate all religions and churches at 5 points, according to the 5 factors of religious activities: statute, personnel, operations, assets and international relations.

1 - On statute:

To operate, currently all religions in Vietnam must "register" (= to sign up, enter one's name, which is in fact to seek permission) with the VC government and must be officially recognized by it (i.e. allowed) according to Article 16 of the Ordinance. But nowadays, some denominations of Protestantism, Caodaism and Hoa Hao Buddhism are still not officially recognized even though they had registered, for example the Evangelical Church of Viet Nam in Thai Binh (refer to RFA interview on Sept 3, 2008) ...

The Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam has still been considered outlawed and is suppressed heavily because it did not "register" (ask for acknowledgment) with the VC government, citing the reason that it has existed for nearly two thousand years in Vietnam (Press Release from International Buddhist Information Bureau on Dec. 16, 2008:  Excerpt from Venerable Thich Thien Hanh responding to the U.S. Vice-Ambassador).  Even if being registered, this church would not be surely acknowledged, and if registered but not acknowledged, all religious activities of this Church will explicitly become illegal.

The VC government uses this measure "registration to operate - recognition of statute" to hinder any religious organization from operating independently, out of control of the Communist government.

2 - On Personnel:

In all religions, those who want to become monk or clergy must first "register" with the local authorities (People's Committee at the district level, Ordinance a. 21. 2). All religious dignitaries, starting from initiation, training, ordination, to appointment and transfer, shall be subjected to the intervention of the government.

In the Catholic seminaries, the Board of Directors must report the academic curriculum to the government. The government appoints instructors to the seminaries to teach Marxist doctrine, Communist Party history and socialist legislation: "The subject of Vietnamese history and law is the curricular subject in the training program at religious schools for those specializing in religious activities." (Ordinance a. 24.2).

In addition to indoctrinating seminarians, the government-appointed instructor is responsible for monitoring thoughts, tendencies (political, social) of the priesthood candidates, so the government can pay special attention and take active countermeasures against individuals with thoughts unfavorable to the government, when such individuals are ordained and appointed.

Priesthood candidates must be scrutinized by local authorities (provinces), and in fact many of them have been ruled out or stalled in the process for many years. There are those who, in order to be ordained, have promised to work secretly (as informants) for the police. The appointment of the priests to the parishes also must have approval of local provincial and district authorities (in the parish where he is assigned).

The government pays special attention to the important religious points (such as cathedral parish, pilgrimage center, holy shrine...) and important functions in the diocese (such as vicar general, seminary's rector, director of the pastoral center...). Assignment to such a place requires that the dignitaries have not an "anti-communist antecedent". The priests who have signed the 8406 Declaration now face much hardship, particularly regarding overseas travel.

Episcopacy candidates must have approval of the central government (Prime Minister). Usually the Catholic Bishops' Conference presents to Vatican a list of several candidates, then Vatican also presents to the VC government a list of several candidates. To our knowledge, some chosen candidates are obliged to make certain commitments to the government.

The very government's interference with bishop appointments causes the quality of the Vietnamese bishops to not fully meet the expectations of the Holy See and of the Christian believers. There is evidence that many young bishops soon resigned (such as Bishop Nguyen Van Yen in Phat Diem; Bishop Nguyen Tich Duc in Ban Me Thuot...) and most bishops want a peaceful life. They dare not confront the authoritarian, oppressive and corrupt government.

In general, religious dignitaries who dedicatedly serve the regime, obedient and silent before the errors and crimes of the government, have more convenient opportunities to go overseas, organize and build... Those who dare to declare the truth or claim the justice are oppressed (harassment, house arrest, imprisonment, for example Most Venerable Thich Quang Do, Rev. Nguyen Van Ly...)

3 - On Activities:

Worship activities of the religions may still only be executed in government-approved locations (churches, temples, pagodas...). In many cases, priests who celebrate the mass in private house (in areas where there is no church or no permission for building one), or pastors who conduct prayer services in such house were prohibited (see report of Pastor Nguyen Van Dien, Vietnamese Protestant Church, Tra Vinh branch, on Mar 7, 2008 from RFA).

Rev. Hoang Can, Hue diocese, was once forbidden to celebrate Christmas mass at the religious point Nam Dong and was refused a request for overseas travel, because he had signed the Bloc 8406 Declaration. In An Bang parish, Rev. Nguyen Huu Giai was prohibited from celebrating mass at the monument of the cross in An Bac within the parish during Christmas 2008.

Pastoral activities of the religions such as mission, education, social services are still limited. Religions do not have private publishers, independent newspapers, or their own radio and television broadcasts. They don't even have airtime on state-owned media stations (existed on public tax money). The web site of the Vietnamese Redemptorists was hacked after releasing information about the conversion of Thai Ha parish land into a park (Sept 2008) and had to be rebuilt recently under a different name.

Religions only have the right to open kindergarten, but they cannot establish private primary schools, secondary schools nor universities (as existed before 1975 in the south). Thousands of religious establishments continue to be confiscated or not returned. Even some major seminaries, as in Xuan Loc, were allowed to open only after many years of waiting (in September 2008). The religions cannot build hospitals, they may only open infirmaries for the poor.

As for the extensive relief for victims of natural disasters, it is still banned by the “Decree on the mobilization, reception, distribution and utilization of resources contributed voluntarily to support people to overcome difficulties due to natural disasters, fire, grave events, and serious diseases" No. 64/2008/ND-CP issued by the government on May 14, 2008. According to this Decree, Article 5: " Except for the organizations and units of the Fatherland Front of Vietnam, the central and local offices of Red Cross Association, no organization, unit or individual has the right to organise the reception of the donations of aid money and goods ."

The government does not allow the religions to participate extensively in education, not because they don't trust in religions or because the religions don't have abilities. Rather, the government wants exclusive rights to shape the citizens, especially the young generations, into servants submitting to the Communist Party and blindly accepting the totalitarian regime.  

4 - On assets

Assets of the religions consist of land, worship place, educational, charitable and missionary establishments. All are protected by the state (places of worship), or completely confiscated (educational, charitable, and missionary establishments), or deprived of ownership and given only the right of use (land). A number of churches (where there are few or no parishioners) were occupied, and much cultivated land (source of livelihood) was completely confiscated. In recent years, through the policy of land-register to approve the rights of land use, the government requested the dioceses, parishes or the religious order (Catholicism) only to report the current amount of land used and not the total land owned before 1975.

The VC government enforces the above, basing on the principle of "state land management" and "exclusive education" as well as basing on the 1992 Constitution (Articles 17-18), the 2003 Land Law (Article 5), the Resolution No. 23 of the National Assembly (Nov. 26, 2003) and most recently the 1940 Directive on religious land (Dec. 31, 2008). According to this Directive, land confiscated or borrowed from the religions will never be returned. This is one use of law or legislative power to rob people's land.

The reason for this newest Directive is that in recent years, the religions stood up to demand back their land and facilities unfairly confiscated and used for the wrong purpose by the state (they are rendered into business areas or privately divided among party members and cadres). Most notable are the cases of the Apostolic Delegate Residence of Hanoi diocese, the Holy Land of Mary of Thai Ha parish, the convent of St. Paul in Vinh Long...

This struggle of the religions hit an basic principle of the Communist regime and a survival means of the Party, which is the public ownership (more exactly, party ownership) of the land, but ought normally the private ownership. Therefore this is not a land dispute between two groups (state and church) with civil or criminal characteristics, but rather the political dispute between an authoritarian power (seeking to seize all land and resources of the country into their hands), and a force protecting justice, human rights and democracy.

5 - On international relations:

 The Ordinance on Religion and Belief, Article 35 states: “When implementing the following international relations, there must be the consent of the Central Management Organ for Religious Affairs: 1- Inviting foreign organizations and persons into Vietnam, or developing the policy of religious organizations outside Vietnam; 2- Participating in religious activities, sending participants to religious training in a foreign country."

In fact the VC government applied this article to prevent the entry of many overseas religious dignitaries who have criticized the regime (in some cases, they are expelled at the airport such as Rev. Tran Cong Nghi from U.S. in 2006, or allowed entry and later detained or disposed of secretly, such as Msr. Dao Duc Diem from England in Jan. 2003), or to prevent the foreign travel of domestic religious dignitaries who have independent attitudes or dare to confront the government (e.g. the Venerable Thich Quang Do has been prevented from going to Norway to receive the Rafto prize for human rights in 2006; many Catholic priests in Hue have been banned from foreign travel due to having signed the Declaration of Bloc 8406).

One important event showing the VC government's interference in international relations of the religions, is that they managed and controlled the United Nations Day of Vesak Celebrations 2008 (May 13-17, 2008) in Hanoi. In this ceremony, the government used the Buddhist Church of Vietnam as its own apparatus and excluded the orthodox Unified Buddhist Church, with a clearly political purpose: extolling the regime and propagandizing an artificial religious freedom before international public.

II- PROPOSALS FOR E.U./E.C. POLICY ON RELIGION

The situation of religion is causing many problems in Vietnam (The government continuously issues documents on religions and beliefs in the purpose of controlling, dominating, transforming churches into instruments, then paralyzing them and altering their nature; continues to propagandize before the international community that Vietnam has religious freedom. The religions always find ways to remove the iron chain with 5 collars, ie the Ordinance on Religion and Belief). The very cause of these problems is that the current totalitarian regime is established by an materialist, atheist, dictatorial and authoritarian party which govern timeless and is ready to crush all human rights. If the E.U./E.C. wishes to help Vietnam have religious freedom, they must help the Vietnamese people have true democracy and human rights.

Some specific suggestions:

1- List Vietnam among countries of particular concern, because the Vietnamese government has never made clear and true improvement in respecting religious freedom. The progress visible to many E.U politicians regarding religious activities are the external and secondary (such as the construction of worship places, the organization of religious festivals, and the overseas travel of religious dignitaries).

2- Apply sanctions - especially economic sanctions - because the VC government only fears the impact on the flow of international revenue and aid.

3- Press the VC government to immediately and unconditionally free the religious followers and dignitaries who are being detained, under house arrest or harassed. Remember that they are not criminal offenders, state law violators, but only fighters for religious freedom, democracy and human rights.

4 - Intervene so that the churches have the right to provide education (the right to open private schools at all levels), the right to disseminate information (right to own newspapers, media stations, publishing houses) and further to abolish the Ordinance on Religion and Belief because it is only a legal instrument to suppress the religions in Vietnam.

Rev. Peter Phan Van Loi, Hue, Vietnam
Feb 01, 2009