A Chinese pastor was sentenced to a year of jail time after being found guilty of disrupting social order by a jury after a trial that lasted for 6 hours.
The name of the Christian pastor is Huang Yizi, who is married and has one son. Yizi gathered a group of parishioners together and demanded answers from the Chinese officials who removed town crosses from nearly 400 Zhejiang rooftops and beat around 50 of the parishioners when they attempted to stop the authorities from removing a cross from the Salvation Church, which is a protestant church in Pingyang County. The incident took place in July of last year, and he was arrested and taken away by the authorities.
Pray for Huang Yizi a Chinese Pastor who protested the removal of crosses from churches – he could serve 7 years in jail #GodsPrayerRoom
— Bruce (@itsbygracealone) March 27, 2015
Supporters of Yizi claim that the charges were “trumped up.” 40-year-old Yizi’s lawyer, Zhang Kai feels the entire trial was “manipulated” by the Chinese authorities and informed the media that his client is going to appeal the verdict.
There were about 1,000 Christians supporting Yizi who gathered outside of the courthouse in Zhejiang. Last year, Yizi claimed that he was actually grateful to God for giving him a chance to be imprisoned for speaking up against church and cross demolitions in his hometown of Zhejiang.
The 400+ churches that were affected by the campaign of demolitions that lasted for a year saw elderly Christian followers consistently attempting to defend their churches from security guards and demolition teams.
Chinese authorities insisted that the Christian churches were not being targeted. They asserted that the actions were being taken against any and all buildings that were considered “illegal structures” and were violating zoning laws.
Pastor Yizi was a preacher at the Fengwo Church in Pinyang County. Several days after he was arrested, the Salvation Church’s cross was taken down as a part of the demolitions.