VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI insisted Saturday on his right to ordain bishops as he consecrated a Chinese prelate in an implicit challenge to attempts by China’s official church to ordain bishops without his approval.

Monsignor Savio Hon Tai-Fai, a 60-year-old Hong Kong prelate recently named to the No. 2 spot in the Vatican’s missionary office, was one of five bishops ordained by Benedict in St. Peter’s Basilica.

His elevation comes amid a new low point in relations between the Holy See and Beijing over the Chinese state-backed church’s ordination of bishops without papal consent.

Benedict didn’t refer specifically to China in his homily but insisted in general on the duty and need for the pope to name bishops to ensure apostolic succession. He said one of the key jobs of a bishop is to ensure that there is an “uninterrupted chain of communion” with the apostles.

“You, my dear brothers, have the mission to conserve this Catholic communion,” Benedict said. “You know that the Lord entrusted St. Peter and his successors to be the center of this communion, the guarantors of being in the totality of the apostolic communion and the faith.”

He added: “Only through communion with the successors of the apostles are we in contact with God incarnate.”