Catholics in a coastal town near Ho Chi Minh City recently baptized 130 new converts. Tribal Christians are pressured to recant. Authorities tore down three churches last year and ordered the Christians to return to their former religions or lose their possessions, news reports said. Those who agreed were forced to take part in traditional religious practices such as drinking the blood of sacrificed animals, Rhodes said. Leaders who refuse to recant are jailed.
Catholics also suffer.
Vietnam has Asia's second largest Catholic population with seven to eight million adherents, Rhodes said, but government restrictions have created a shortage of priests. There are only six seminaries and the government approves applicants as well as graduates before they can be ordained, he said. Authorities also approve a priest's parish assignment. A diocese near Hanoi has one priest for 24 congregations and 16,000 parishioners, Rhodes said, and a single priest in another diocese serves 47 congregations, including seven cathedral-sized churches. Bishops are ordaining priests without the government's approval, he said.