"In China there are many official church priests who are very loyal to the Vatican and the pope, no different from underground churches, but some priests have been bought, completely unfit," he said.
"There is a church near my house, only 600 meters away, but the priest of that church is completely controlled by the Patriotic Association," he added.
Instead, Dalù would travel 10 miles away from his neighborhood in Shanghai to attend Mass with the priest who catechised him.
"My priest told me if you don't read the Bible you don't know Jesus, so I read the Bible every day," he said.
"With the help of my priest, I began to understand the faith by reading the Bible, and I was completely attracted."
Dalù was baptized in Shanghai on December 20, 2010, at the age of 47.
"When the priest poured holy water on my head, I cried like a baby," he said.
"Never before, like this. After the baptism, I cried at home for three days ... because I knew that I was a sinner and that the baptism washed away all of the sins that I had committed before and I became a new person. This is a great grace."
Like his chosen confirmation saint, St. Paul, Dalù said that he changed a lot after his conversion.
"I have had a bad temper," he said. "After accepting baptism, I began to learn to repent. I got the strength from the Bible, according to Jesus, to learn how to be a husband and father."
"My wife was very surprised by my change. She said that 'keep it like this I will fall in love with you again.'"
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Part of the reason why Dalù thinks he struggled with anger management was that he had felt "marginalized by society for a long time."
The former journalist and radio host had lost his job after reporting on June 4, 1995, on the sixth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests – something forbidden to speak of in Chinese media.
"I reminded the listeners on the radio that today was a memorable day, but immediately after the broadcast of the program, I was censored and asked to write an apology, and then within a week I was fired," Dalù said.
"And since then, I became unemployed and I could no longer find a job because there was this record in my personal file," he said.
After his conversion, Dalù was able to apply his journalism experience to work in Catholic communications in Shanghai, where he helped to reprint Gospel readings, personal devotions, and Vatican news on WeChat, China's largest social messaging app.
However, he was once again subjected to intimidation by the Chinese Communist Party officials.