Chapter 91 Cardinal

Anrigan Church is located in the center of the British Concession, between Midostra and Horse Track Road. During its construction, it was stopped for a period of time due to the Boxer Rebellion. After its completion, it has always been a gathering place for Western churches in the British, French and other concessions. The church building is a traditional Western Goethe-style building with brick and wood structures, pointed doors and windows, and a towering bell tower. It has no excessive decoration on the surface and looks simple and solemn. Like most public facilities in the concession, although there is no explicit regulation here, it is also subtly not allowed to enter. All Chinese and Western churches in the concession will listen to preaching and mass in another church.

It was obvious that Xu Changqing's arrival surprised or shocked all foreigners. It was hard for them to imagine that someone would dare to openly break the rules they set in this way. Since it was in the British Concession, Xu Changqing did not wear the fake braid and was dressed casually. He casually wore a vest on his shirt, and the cuffs of the shirt looked like a newspaper's small opening, which was particularly eye-catching among a group of people who were dressed up.

"Stop!" Xu Changqing was about to enter the church when he was stopped by a foreigner wearing a tweed coat and a proud look. Xu Changqing was tall among the Chinese, and even compared to most foreigners, he was obviously shorter in front of this foreigner. The strong body of this foreigner stretched his clothes to a full extent. He blocked half of the entire church gate. The gold watch on his body, the ring full of fingers, and this valuable suit all showed how noble his identity was here. The foreigner looked at Xu Changqing contemptuously and said coldly: "You have just come to the concession. Don't you understand the rules in the concession? Can you come to this place?"

Xu Changqing was not even interested in looking at him at such a foreigner, and even more uninterested in paying attention to his questions, and turned around and walked over to him.

"Damn the yellow pig, don't you understand English?" The foreigner obviously did not expect anyone to despise his authority like this. When he was angry, he would reach out and grab Xu Changqing's shoulder.

However, before he could catch Xu Changqing, his body suddenly became uncontrollable. He grabbed Xu Changqing's hand, turned around and slapped himself hard. The power of this slap made everyone in the church hear it. When everyone looked over, they saw the foreigner's hair slightly messy, the eyes on the bridge of his nose fell to the ground, half of his face swollen, and a wisp of blood flowed out of his ears. Just as everyone was guessing what was going on, the foreigner slapped the other side of his face with his other hand. The force was even greater than the slap just now, and everyone was stunned for a moment.

When the foreigner shook himself in a daze, his legs became extremely heavy as if they were filled with lead. His body sank little by little, causing his knees to kneel on the ground involuntarily. Then no matter how hard he tried, he could not move his knees away from the ground. At this moment, he became panicked and did not have time to pay attention to Xu Changqing. He quickly asked his companions with him to help him. But what was strange was that seven or eight people worked hard together, but they could not lift the foreigner from the ground, and even their knees could not move, which seemed very strange.

Although he is both a foreigner, it is obvious that this gentleman is not welcomed by his compatriots. Many people gloatly watched him make a fool of themselves and were unwilling to come forward to help. Some even said that this was God's retribution for him, which made him sincerely repent. It is obvious that this foreigner was embarrassed, which is more interesting than Xu Changqing entering the church. Not many people have focused on Xu Changqing. When everyone's eyes were all focused on the foreigner, Xu Changqing silently walked to a relatively remote corner of the church and sat down, quietly waiting for the appearance of the mysterious invitation.

Although Xu Changqing deliberately hid herself, someone still focused on him. After he found a seat and sat down, he immediately left his seat and became by his side. Xu Changqing looked at the woman sitting next to him indifferently. She was the woman named Jennifer who intended to harass Xu Changqing in the salon last night.

"Hello, Mr. Xu!" Jennifer, who was dressed relatively dignifiedly, ignored Xu Changqing's indifferent expression, and introduced himself in Chinese: "We met him yesterday, but it seems that he did not leave any good impression on you. Now I will introduce myself again. My name is Jennifer, and I am the director of Lehua Foreign Company and the executive manager of Tianjin Office."

Xu Changqing frowned, looked at Jennifer, took out the invitation from his vest pocket, and said, "Is this invitation yours?"

"Invitation? What invitation?" Jennifer was stunned. He obviously didn't understand Xu Changqing's words, nor did he know about the invitation.

"It's good." Xu Changqing's expression eased a little. He didn't want to come over with interest and see the mysterious man who sent the invitation, but in the end he only saw a Western slut.

"Our Lihua Foreign Company has a lot of business dealings with the Chen family, so we also know something about Mr. Hu. Yesterday I was too casual. I hope Mr. Xu won't blame him!" As he said that, Jennifer used Chinese etiquette to hold his fists to Xu Changqing for his guilt.

Looking at the inappropriate apology method in his eyes, Xu Changqing smiled and said, "Miss Jennifer, there is no need to be like this! Although Xu Changqing is not a generous person, he is not a petty person. I know very well that what happened yesterday was a completely misunderstanding, so I didn't take it to heart at all."

"That's great, I finally felt relieved. If the two chambers of commerce are unhappy because of yesterday's misunderstanding, it would be really not worth it." Jennifer patted his chest and looked at the foreigner who was still kneeling at the door of the church and said, "That person is Jared, the general manager of the Tianjin Branch of Jardine Co., Ltd. Relying on his wealth and close relationship with the British Concession, he not only oppressed you Chinese business companies, but also other foreign business companies have been bullied by him. Today, the gentleman asked him to make a fool of himself in front of everyone is really pleased."

Xu Changqing neither denies nor admits it, and no longer pays attention to Jennifer's acquaintance. He closes his eyes and quietly waits for the arrival of the mysterious man. Not long after, the church suddenly becomes silent as if he is being used by someone. Then Xu Changqing feels that his body binding technique has been broken. He is shocked, opens his eyes and turns to look at the door. He sees a white-haired old foreigner in the bishop's robe standing in front of the foreigner, his hands gently placed on his head. Jared, the general manager of Jardine Car Company, put his rebellious face and becomes as pious as a saint, holding his fists in his chest, muttering words in his mouth, as if praying.

When he saw the bishop's appearance, Xu Changqing showed a surprised expression. He was not surprised because the man could break his body binding technique, but because the man was an old friend he was very familiar with but had not met for a long time. The old foreigner helped Jared, who had already removed the spell, and then let him sit on the horizontal chair next to him. Under the guidance of the two little boys, he walked towards the podium in the middle of the church. The two little boys held a long wooden pole with an incense burner in their hands. As they walked, the incense burner drew circles on the heads of the church on both sides of the church. All the church members got up from the chair and knelt quietly on the kneeling cushions prepared, put their hands on the backrest of the chair in front, praying devoutly, and even the slut Jennifer looked pious.

Everyone in the church knelt down to pray, and Xu Changqing, who had always sat still, seemed particularly abrupt. The old bishop soon noticed him, smiled at him, blinked his eyes like a child, then returned to his solemn appearance, walked to the podium, and began the sermon of the day.

Xu Changqing didn't listen to what the old bishop was saying, he was always wondering what was going on. It was clear who invited him now, but what he didn't understand was that when he finally met the old foreigner, he was still an ordinary parish priest, but it took him ten years to become a bishop, and he was also a cardinal in a red robe, which was really puzzling.

Before he knew it, the preaching for about an hour had been finished, and then the church choir sang hymns. After the hymns were finished, everyone stood up, saluted to the bishop on the podium, and turned around and left. Jared, who had gradually recovered, saw Xu Changqing sitting peacefully in the church, and he didn't understand that he was just messing around, but he couldn't do anything to him. He could only glar at Xu Changqing fiercely, then turned around and left the church angrily.

When the people in the church were almost gone, Xu Changqing stood up and walked slowly to the bishop. Surprisingly, he hugged the old man's body like a good friend, and said with a smile: "Long time no see! Father Matthews."

"Long time no see! Changqing." Bishop Matthews unexpectedly greeted Xu Changqing in extremely pure Chinese, and then blessed the last few people, and said, "Go to the back! This is not a place to speak."

After saying that, he ordered the two interns of the lecturer to clean the ground, and turned around and led Xu Changqing into the residence behind the church. On the way, he met several original priests of the church. After saluting Bishop Matthews, they all looked at Xu Changqing in surprise. The expression on his face seemed to be unclear why the Cardinal let a Chinese enter the back of the church. They did not understand that Xu Changqing and Bishop Matthews were both friends and teachers and students. Xu Changqing almost became Bishop Ma Xiong's godson, and almost all of Xu Changqing's Western learning knowledge, including language, geography, history, and theology, were taught by Bishop Matthews.

At that time, after Western guns and cannons opened the door to the land of China, in addition to opium, Western learning, and foreign merchants entered China, there were also missionaries along with the warships. The Western Holy See joined forces with the Western secular army to send a large number of missionaries into China, hoping to make it the Oriental Diocese of the Holy See. Matthews was one of the missionaries sent to China under that environment. His other hidden identity was the monk elder of the Western Church, responsible for finding the lost church holy relics before the clerical exorcists in the Western Church, and then bringing them back to the Western Secretariat to seal them.

Father Matthews learned from some insiders that Xu Changqing's sect had been entrusted by Zeng Guofan to search the entire Tianjing. He thought that instead of blindly searching, it would be better to go to Chen Jiachong to find clues from the notes of Xu Changqing's sect. Perhaps it was fate that Xu Changqing's master and Father Matthews met unexpectedly at Chen Jiachong's inn, and they hit it off at first sight. Xu Changqing's master did not refuse Father Matthews' request to read the notes of the book. It was at this time that Father Matthews learned that there was an unknown mysterious world on the land of China.

Afterwards, the tragic incident of the Guan family's thirty-eight righteous men happened, and the entire world of practice was shocked. They began to deal with Western missionaries in their own way. A large number of missionaries were killed, forcing the Western Holy See to give up their expansion plans and concentrate the remaining missionaries in the coastal concessions to protect them. In this case, Father Matthews, who went out to look for the church's holy objects, was also threatened by his life. Although he was one of the best priests in the West, he did not have much ability to resist those strange and strange magical techniques. In the end, he fled back to Chen Jiachong and was rescued by Xu Changqing's master.

Later, while recovering from his injuries, Father Matthews usually taught Western learning in Chen Jiachong, teaching Chen Jiachong's children Western learning. At that time, because it was rumored that missionaries cannibalize people, there were very few people coming to Western learning, only the Chen family and the children living in the Chen family, and Xu Changqing was one of them. In addition, in the school, there were only four people who actually accepted all the Western learning taught by Father Matthews, Xu Changqing, Chen Jingguo, Chen Fan and Sheng Qingping, which was also pleaded with. Among these four, Xu Changqing was the one who learned the best. He absorbed all the knowledge in Father Matthews' mind like a sponge. Father Matthews also loved him from the bottom of his heart. He had repeatedly asked Xu Changqing's master to accept Xu Changqing as a child, but they were all rejected by Xu Changqing's master on the grounds that he only worshiped the Three Pure Land and did not worship other things.
Chapter completed!