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The Jinping regime has now focused on underground churches in their attack on Christianity.
A statement published by China Aid, a United States headquartered group monitoring the state of religion inside China, Beijing has increased its crackdown on multiple Christian congregations all over the country.[/tweetit] Authorities have taken a series of punitive measures to curb the rising influence of Christianity, including the shutting down of churches. The Chinese Government has also ordered religious followers to sign specific papers stating they have renounced all faith. For Beijing, this campaign corresponds with the aim to "Sinicize" all major religions.
China Continues the Crackdown on Christianity[/tweetthis]
China Aid's Bob Fu said that churches have already been closed in central Henan province. Even in Beijing, a prominent house church was stopped from providing ecclesiastical services in the first week of September. Fu said such affairs should ignite outrage in the international community as such actions blatantly violate any and all religious freedoms and all beliefs. This crackdown has intensified under the Xi Jinping regime. President Xi Jinping has intensified the curbing of religious freedoms even as the People's Republic of China witnesses a religious revival. According to activists and experts, the current president is engaged in a methodical suppression of Christianity from the time religious freedom was enshrined in the PRC constitution in 1982.
Freedom House, a watchdog group, said that Christian persecution in China continues an old chain of torture. Christians, along with several other religious groups inside China, were persecuted from 2012. Almost a third of Chinese believers were discovered to suffer “high” and “very high” persecution levels. These range from economic exploitation and bureaucratic harassment to violence and even harsh prison terms.
Activists filmed convincing footage of what seemed to be mounds of burning forms and bibles where signers have declared to reject their faith. The believers were allegedly forced by authorities to sign those forms. Those who do not, they were warned, could lose welfare benefits and their children expelled from respective schools.
As per Chinese laws, Chinese citizens who believe in religion must do their worship only in government-sanctioned congregations. The reality is different. Millions of Chinese Christians pray in-house or underground churches which ignores government diktats. The anti-religion drive affected not only Christians but also other adherents of other religions. Approximately one million Uighurs Muslims living in northwest China were detained inside indoctrination camps. They were then compelled to denounce Islam. Their only loyalty, they were told, should be towards the Chinese Communist Party.