{"id":1346,"date":"2011-05-05T12:22:42","date_gmt":"2011-05-05T16:22:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/?p=1346"},"modified":"2011-05-05T23:28:16","modified_gmt":"2011-05-06T03:28:16","slug":"pray-for-china-s-christians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html","title":{"rendered":"Pray for China’s Christians; they’re suffering a new attack by the Communist government"},"content":{"rendered":"
\ufeff<\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>
Chinese Christian arrested<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Chinese government may\u00a0have picked the wrong target as they scramble to prevent the Middle East’s\u00a0“Jasmine Revolution” from spreading to China.<\/p>\n

According to reports, they are\u00a0going after China’s millions of Christians.<\/p>\n

Since most Chinese Christians worship in underground congregations, estimates of their numbers range wildly from 60 million to 150 million. However, it is widely accepted that the Chinese church is the largest\u00a0in the world — eclipsing the United States’ worshipers.<\/p>\n

“China\u2019s security establishment is in a ruthless mood at the moment,” writes the London Daily Telegraph<\/em>,\u00a0“taking on the ‘tall poppies’ of the law, the media, the blogosphere and the arts without apparent fear of a backlash from a public that instinctively knows the value of compliance, and the price of defiance.”<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
An underground Bible study<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“However,” observes reporter Peter Foster,\u00a0“there is another, much larger grouping, that is also heading for a collision with the ‘Goon State’ (that\u2019s The<\/em> Economist<\/em>\u2019s label) and with potentially much more serious consequences \u2013 the millions of Evangelical Christians who choose to worship outside China\u2019s official churches.”<\/p>\n

“The news out of China grows worse as reports of the arrest, detention, harassment, and beatings of Christians come from across China,” writes author Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. “Central to this crackdown is the paranoia of the Communist Party. One of the hallmarks of democratic societies is the existence of thriving ‘mediating institutions’ between the individual and the brute power of the state. In the United States, these mediating institutions include everything from the PTA to your local church and the neighborhood reading club.<\/p>\n

“One dimension of the Communist Party\u2019s idolatry is that it allows no mediating institutions between its power and the individual,” notes Mohler.\u00a0“It greatly fears these organizations, especially the church. One reason \u2014 Christians in China now outnumber members of the Community Party.”<\/p>\n

To read more about China’s persecution of a Christian lawyer, CLICK HERE<\/a><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>
One of the larger "house churches" meeting illegally<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

China has attempted to regulate Christianity by establishing the “Three-Self Patriotic” churches — both Protestant and Catholic. The Catholics are prohibited from having any contact with the Vatican. Millions have just quietly refused. Their priests and bishops are regularly detained by police, subjected to house arrest and accused of being unpatriotic.<\/p>\n

They say they are just taking very seriously Jesus’ command to render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, but to God that which is God’s — and where and how they can worship is no business of the Chinese Communist Party.<\/p>\n

To read more about China’s persecution of Catholics CLICK HERE<\/a><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, in traditional Chinese style, they do not openly denounce their oppressors, just quietly ignore the edicts, knowing that this, too, shall pass.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Praying at a makeshift "house church" altar<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But those in power in China have no intention of passing very soon.<\/p>\n

For the last four weeks one of Beijing’s largest unofficial Protestant churches, the Shouwang church, has been in a standoff with police over its desire to worship free from state control.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of its members have been\u00a0detained and its leaders put under house arrest. More than 1,000 members regularly have met at various locations — with the Chinese police hounding at their heels, pressuring their landlords to cancel their leases, even intimidating the owner of a business tower to refuse to hand over the keys to the floor of a building the church bought for $4.5 million raised by its members.<\/p>\n

To read more about the Shouwang church, CLICK HERE<\/a><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Older worshipers in a "Three-Self" official church<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So, the church announced that it would meet outside in a public plaza. The government\u00a0is apparently worried that any large public meeting could turn into popular defiance of the sort this spring that has deposed despots in Egypt, Yemen and Tunisia — and which is threatening dictators in Bahrain, Libya and Syria. Church members were rounded up. Leaders were stopped at their houses by police — not allowed to show up at the announced meeting place. The pastor and his wife were jailed.<\/p>\n

\u201cReligious persecution is always abhorrent, but in this case it\u2019s also a political blunder,\u201d notes the Wall Street Journal<\/em>. “The incident is a microcosm of the wider problems caused by China\u2019s crackdown. Beijing insists it wants to promote a harmonious and stable society. Yet by arresting prominent activists for no apparent reason, the security forces are doing the opposite: Those who were once content to live quietly with the Party\u2019s restrictions on free expression are now compelled to speak out.”<\/p>\n

CLICK HERE\u00a0to read about China’s oppression of its Nobel Peace Prize winner<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Word is spreading that the Chinese\u00a0government is preparing to take \u201cnew measures\u201d against the Shouwang and other unofficial\u00a0congregations\u00a0such as\u00a0the New Tree Church of Beijing.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
A Bible study -- with windows covered to deter police attention<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Many Christians left the “Three-Self Patriotic” churches decades ago. The government often bars children from attending — maintaining that teaching religion to an under-age person is a form of child abuse.<\/p>\n

Any time an effective pastor started attracting large crowds, he\u00a0seemed to be\u00a0transfered to a small church in the Chinese equivalent of rural Alaska. The government monitors the content of sermons — and\u00a0recommends that preachers on the government payroll to\u00a0speak out in\u00a0favor of various government projects and policies.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Bible study at an illegal "underground" church<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It is not yet clear what measures the Chinese government plans against the unofficial churches.<\/p>\n

“But if the State really is seeking a confrontation with the house church movement,” warns the Telegraph,<\/em>\u00a0“then it is bearding a far bigger and potentially dangerous tiger than the liberal fringes that it has attacked so far.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“This may come as a surprise to some in the West,” says the Journal.<\/em>\u00a0“Until recently, Beijing had played a skillful game of applying the screws just enough to keep everybody in line while easing state control over most aspects of people\u2019s lives, including employment, choice of a spouse, housing, religion and even the ability to criticize the government in limited terms.<\/p>\n

“International human rights advocates had to admit that most Chinese enjoyed greater freedom than ever before, and many foreigners downplayed arrests of dissidents as aberrations against a general trend of liberalization.”<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Jailed Pastor Wang<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In an incident that is playing out far too often, Pastor Wang Dao of Beijing’s Liangren Church was arrested when plain-clothed and uniformed officers of the Public Security Bureau, one of China’s main law enforcement agencies,\u00a0 barged into\u00a0a restaurant in Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong province,\u00a0reported the\u00a0Christian rights group China Aid Association.<\/p>\n

The church leader\u00a0had been\u00a0“meeting with twelve brothers and sisters for a meal,”\u00a0reported China Aid,\u00a0quoting eyewitnesses in the restaurant\u00a0who said\u00a0policemen “threw Pastor Wang violently to the ground without showing any official documentation and rushed him outside to a waiting vehicle, shoving him into the back seat as they tore off down the street.”<\/p>\n

The new campaign against Christians, says Mohler, means\u00a0\u201cthose who doubted the Communist Party\u2019s sincerity were right all along.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
A Chinese child illegally learning about Jesus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Telegraph<\/em> lists\u00a0four reasons why China\u2019s paranoid leaders “might want to proceed with caution:”<\/p>\n

“1. Sheer weight of numbers,” writes the Telegraph.<\/em>\u00a0“The lawyers, bloggers and artists are few. China\u2019s unofficial Christians number into their millions. They are a mass movement.<\/p>\n

“2. The persecuted have a righteous God on their side. Already the rhetorical temperature is rising, with one Shouwang pastor describing the government as an agent of ‘Satan’ seeking to destroy God\u2019s Church. As Christian martyrs have shown over the centuries, including in China, the religiously motivated are prepared to go to great lengths to defend their faith.<\/p>\n

CLICK HERE to read about the strength of North Korea’s horribly persecuted\u00a0Christians<\/a><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“3. The Americans really won\u2019t like it. Despite some international condemnation, China\u2019s leaders haven\u2019t suffered meaningful repercussions for their recent \u201cbacksliding\u201d on human rights. The sufferings of artists and lawyers don\u2019t really gain much political traction, but not so the Christians who are a powerful political lobbying force in the US. A widespread persecution holds the very real risk of poisoning a relationship with Washington that, for all its ups and downs, is still Beijing\u2019s number one foreign policy priority.<\/p>\n

“4. The apparent justice of the Christian\u2019s cause. The House Church movement in China is explicitly not revolutionary. It disassociates itself from all talk of Jasmine protests and rejects (perhaps somewhat disingenuously) all suggestion that it is an agent of ‘Foreign Forces’ \u2013 i.e. U.S. missionaries who work to subvert the State. The groups profess great loyalty to the State in earthly affairs \u2013 which is to say, the churches are happy to pay their taxes, comply with health and safety inspections etc etc \u2013 but in matters spiritual they will submit to only one master: The Lord Jesus.”<\/p>\n

To watch a video about the underground church smuggled out of China, CLICK HERE<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
"House church" members worshipping illegally<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

“The potential for trouble,” writes Foster,\u00a0“was brought home to me recently in a conversation with someone intimately connected with the Christian movement in China who was definitely worried about where the current confrontations might lead. The House Church is avowedly and deliberately non-political, he said, but its congregations are loyal first to God and then their pastors. In the end, the faithful will do what their Pastors tell them to do.<\/p>\n

That, of course, is exactly what the Chinese State fears, notes Foster.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“But it may yet regret forcing the issue and discovering how far some Christians are prepared to go in defence of their faith.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\ufeff The Chinese government may\u00a0have picked the wrong target as they scramble to prevent the Middle East’s\u00a0“Jasmine Revolution” from spreading to China. According to reports, they are\u00a0going after China’s millions of Christians. Since most Chinese Christians worship in underground congregations, estimates of their numbers range wildly from 60 million to 150 million. However, it is…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":270,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,97,84,83,149,12,153],"tags":[154,416,413,415],"class_list":["post-1346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bible","category-catholic","category-children","category-inspirational","category-persecution","category-prayer","category-underground-church","tag-china","tag-christians","tag-persecution","tag-underground-church"],"yoast_head":"\nPray for China's Christians; they're suffering a new attack by the Communist government - On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pray for China's Christians; they're suffering a new attack by the Communist government - On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\ufeff The Chinese government may\u00a0have picked the wrong target as they scramble to prevent the Middle East’s\u00a0“Jasmine Revolution” from spreading to China. According to reports, they are\u00a0going after China’s millions of Christians. Since most Chinese Christians worship in underground congregations, estimates of their numbers range wildly from 60 million to 150 million. However, it is…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-05-05T16:22:42+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-05-06T03:28:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/files\/2011\/05\/china-arrest.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Pray for China's Christians; they're suffering a new attack by the Communist government - On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Pray for China's Christians; they're suffering a new attack by the Communist government - On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars","og_description":"\ufeff The Chinese government may\u00a0have picked the wrong target as they scramble to prevent the Middle East’s\u00a0“Jasmine Revolution” from spreading to China. According to reports, they are\u00a0going after China’s millions of Christians. Since most Chinese Christians worship in underground congregations, estimates of their numbers range wildly from 60 million to 150 million. However, it is…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html","og_site_name":"On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars","article_published_time":"2011-05-05T16:22:42+00:00","article_modified_time":"2011-05-06T03:28:16+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/files\/2011\/05\/china-arrest.jpg"}],"twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html","name":"Pray for China's Christians; they're suffering a new attack by the Communist government - On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/files\/2011\/05\/china-arrest.jpg","datePublished":"2011-05-05T16:22:42+00:00","dateModified":"2011-05-06T03:28:16+00:00","author":{"@id":""},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/files\/2011\/05\/china-arrest.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/files\/2011\/05\/china-arrest.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/2011\/05\/pray-for-china-s-christians.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Pray for China’s Christians; they’re suffering a new attack by the Communist government"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/","name":"On the Front Lines of the Culture Wars","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Rob Kerby","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/author"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/270"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1346"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1346\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1363,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1346\/revisions\/1363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/on_the_front_lines_of_the_culture_wars\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}