Bishop ordination to be speeded up

The Chinese Catholic society is speeding up the process of selection and ordination of young bishops to better serve millions of followers in the country, a top Catholic leader has said.

Liu Bainian, vice-president of the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, said posts need to be filled to serve dioceses without bishops for a long time or replace older bishops in some dioceses.

There are 97 dioceses on the Chinese mainland, of which 40 do not have bishops.