Persecution of Christians in China: as we have reported here for quite some time, the Chinese government is in the midst of an all-out campaign to turn Christianity into a weak religion that is entirely subservient to the Chinese Communist Party, and that doesn’t teach anything that would lead Chinese people away from Communist Party dogma. In fact, the government is trying to turn the Church into another organ for its propaganda; hence the war on the livestreaming of Christian services that are unfiltered by party dogma, as reported in this story.
This is a matter of grave concern for Orthodox Christians in China and all other Christians as well. Holy Orthodoxy in China predates this war on Christianity. It has a three-hundred year history in China, with the first Orthodox Christians coming into the country in 1685. In the 1980s, the Chinese Orthodox Church began to experience a revival.
Pray that it not be snuffed out. The Order of Saint Andrew, Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, requests once again that the Chinese government end these repressive measures, grant official recognition to the Chinese Orthodox Church, and give full religious freedom to all the Christians of that nation.
For previous ChristianPersecution.com coverage of the persecution of Christians in China, see here.
“Authorities in China prevent pastors live-streaming services despite Covid-19 shutdown,” Barnabas Fund, April 7, 2020:
Authorities in China are maintaining their crackdown on churches online, even during Covid-19 lockdown restrictions, preventing Christians from accessing live-streamed church services.
“Our first and only online gathering was blocked by the government soon after it started,” said a pastor of an unofficial house church in the south-eastern province of Jiangxi. The church had suffered police harassment before the coronavirus outbreak, and was forced to change venue at least five times.
In the eastern province of Shandong, a pastor’s online service was stopped less than 20 minutes after it started on 9 February. A few days later, he unsuccessfully attempted another online platform….
The authorities are deploying, “Measures for the Management of Religious Information on the Internet” to prevent churches live streaming, which included a ban on uploading videos to the internet that violate “national religious policies” introduced in January 2019.
