A few years after Mao won the civil in China, Nikita Khrushchev became the leader in the Soviet Union. Before this, Joseph Stalin was the leader in the Soviet Union, Mao liked Stalin and respected the way he led, and China and the Soviet Union became allies with each other. Khrushchev thought Stalin was a criminal dictator, and led the country very differently. Mao and Khrushchev did not like each other, so the Soviet Union was no longer allies with China. China now had only a few allies like Albania, North Korea, Democratic Kampuchea, and Pakistan. This change of friends was called the Sino-Soviet split. "Sino" is another way to say "Chinese".
During the 1970s, Mao became more friendly with the United States. In 1972, American president Richard Nixon visited the People's Republic of China and met Mao. Mao died in September 1976, and the Cultural Revolution also ended that year. Mao's supporters were imprisoned, and Deng Xiaoping, who followed Mao, revised Mao's policies so that Chinese people could have private ownership.
Mao Zedong was afraid that Liu Shaoqi would overthrow him, and take over the CCP. As in the result, Mao blamed Liu Shaoqi for being a capitalist, and placed him in jail. Liu Shaoqi died in prison from brutal treatment, hunger, and terrible conditions.
After Liu had been removed from leadership, the defence minister Lin Biao was ranked second in the party and hoped to succeed Mao.
In 1971, Lin Biao and his wife died in a plane crash after trying to assassinate Mao and seize power for himself.
Mao had been in poor health for several years and had declined visibly for at least six months prior to his death. There are unconfirmed reports that he possibly had ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease. Mao's last public appearance was on 27 May 1976, where he met the visiting Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto during the latter's one-day visit to Beijing.
At around 5:00 pm on 2 September 1976, Mao suffered a heart attack, far more severe than his previous two and affecting a much larger area of his heart. Three days later, on 5 September, Mao's condition was still critical. On the afternoon of 7 September, Mao's condition completely deteriorated. Mao's organs failed quickly and he fell into a coma shortly before noon where he was put on life support machines. He was taken off life support over 12 hours later, quarter to midnight and was pronounced dead at 12:08 am on 9 September 1976.
His body lay in state at the Great Hall of the People. There was a three-minute silence observed during this service. His body was later placed into the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong, despite his wishes to be cremated and he had been one of the first high-ranking officials to sign the "Proposal that all Central Leaders be Cremated after Death" in November 1956.
Many Chinese mainlanders still believe Mao Zedong was a great leader, but they also knew that he did unwise and bad things. According to Deng Xiaoping, Mao was "seven parts right and three parts wrong" and his "contributions are primary and his mistakes secondary." Supporters praise him for having unified China and for ending the previous decades of civil war. He is also praised for having improved the status of women in China and for improving literacy and education. Some people think Mao Zedong made China lose its most important ally, or friend, the Soviet Union, in the Sino-Soviet Split. The Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution were two of the things that Mao did that many people disliked. Some historians think that tens of millions of people died because of Mao's bad ideas and neglect. Some people disliked Mao because he did not express support family planning, and this caused too many births, making too rapid population growth in too small places. Leaders of China after Mao had to pass a new law called the one child policy.
Mao Zedong also made several changes to the Chinese language, such as switching from the Wade Giles system of Romanization to Pinyin. For this reason, Nanking is now called Nanjing on modern maps. Taiwan still uses Wade Giles, so its capital is called Taipei instead of the pinyin Taibei. He also simplified the Chinese characters, in theory it would make them easier to read and write so that more people would be literate.
Opus Dei
Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei (more commonly known as Opus Dei) is an organization of the Roman Catholic Church. ("Opus Dei" means "Work of God" in Latin.) Opus Dei says that the Catholic Church gave them a special job: to tell everyone that God wants them to be close to him. This means that everyone is called by God to become a saint.
Opus Dei was started by St. , a Roman Catholic priest, in 1928. It was approved by Pope Pius XII in 1950. Now, Opus Dei has around 85,000 members in 80 different countries.
In 1982, Pope John Paul II decided to make Opus Dei into a personal prelature. Usually, in the Catholic Church, there are separate dioceses in different areas. Each area has its own bishop who is in charge of just that diocese. But because Opus Dei is a personal prelature, its bishopm called the Prelate, is not limited to any specific area. He is in charge of members of Opus Dei wherever they are, around the world. The prelate of Opus Dei is Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz Braña.
Opus Dei was started by a Roman Catholic priest, Josemaria Escrivá, on 2 October 1928 in Madrid, Spain. He said that God showed him what to do. On that day he "saw Opus Dei."
Escrivá said that the goals of Opus Dei are:
Opus Dei gives classes, talks, and other help so that people can practice these teachings.
Pope John Paul II has said that Escrivá was led by God when he started Opus Dei.
In 2002, Pope Benedict XVI said that Opus Dei is God's work, not Escrivá's. He said that God just used Escriva as a tool to start his own work.
Escrivá and Opus Dei teach that a person can get close to God by doing these things:
Escrivá said that the basis of a Christian life is being a child of God. If people are aware of this, then they will always be very happy. He wrote that joy comes from knowing we are children of God.
According to the Catholic Church, people can find God in their daily work and activities. There they can be very close to him. They do not have to become priests or monks to become a saint. God wants them to become a saint by doing their ordinary duties and activities well. The Catholic Church gave Opus Dei the job of spreading this knowledge, and teaching people that they can be real saints just by doing ordinary things and offering them to God.
Pope John Paul II praised Opus Dei and said that its aim of bringing God into the place of work is something great. Cardinal Albino Luciani, who later became Pope John Paul I, said that Escriva brought about a big change in how people deal with God. Before, people saw prayers as the only way to be close to God. Luciani said that Escriva also gave importance to work. The work one does can become prayer.
But when Escriva started teaching this, some Jesuits in the 1940s did not understand him. They said his beliefs were against the Catholic faith, because at that time Catholics thought that only priests and nuns could become holy. Some Jesuit leaders started saying that Opus Dei had secrets which it did not want the world to know, and that Opus Dei was dangerous. In fact, they said, Opus Dei just wanted to become very powerful and to control the world.
All these accusations were cleared up by the Popes and Catholic officials. These officials say that Opus Dei is doing something good for the world, by teaching people how to practice good habits, like telling the truth, working hard, keeping promises, loving people, and being concerned with those who are in need.