Decree of Propaganda Fide on Questions from the China Mission (1645)
Seventeen questions put to Rome by missionaries in China, with the answers approved by Propaganda Fide and Pope Innocent X. Questions 8 and 9 describe the honours paid to Confucius and to ancestors as sacrifices and are answered that Christians may not take part.
Each question describes a Chinese practice as its proposers understood it and asks whether converts may share in it. The eighth says that governors offer a solemn sacrifice in the temple of Confucius twice a year, with a pig, a goat, candles, wine, flowers and incense, and that the intention of the rite is to give thanks for his teaching and to obtain from him talent, wisdom and understanding. The answer is that it is not lawful. The pope ordered all missionaries in China, of whatever order, including the Society of Jesus, to observe the answers until the Holy See should decide otherwise.
The decree does not name those who put the questions. See the Chinese Rites Controversy.
Cited in
- 1704 to 1742, firm date