Hundreds gather at the site after evening Mass

Praying at the site after Mass

Hanoi, Apr. 10, 2008 (CWNews.com) - While a standoff between Vietnamese police and Catholic demonstrators at a Hanoi Redemptorist monastery continues, state-run media have begun urging "extreme actions" to terminate daily protests which continued for more than three months.

Since April 7, Hanoi television has aired a series of reports charging that Catholic protestors are trespassing on state-owned land (although the Catholic activists argue that the land still belongs legally to the Redemptorist order). The New Hanoi newspaper went further, charging that the protestors are using claims of religious freedom to stir up protests against the government. The media campaign has led to fears that a police crackdown is imminent.

In the latest indication of possible government action, local officials have ordered Father Vu Khoi Phung, the superior of Redemptorist religious order in Hanoi, to present himself before the People’s Committee of Dong Da District. Currently, hundreds of protestors are camping at the disputed site, where land owned by the Redemptorists was seized by the Communist government. After each Mass in the morning and evening, Redemptorist priests and their associates, carrying a large cross, lead a procession to the site. There they pray, chant, and sing for hours in front of hundreds of crosses and icons of Our Mother of Perpetual Help which have been placed on the fences. Some Westerners also come to the site to show their solidarity with protestors.