A large church in China that has regrouped and spread after authorities dismantled it in 2018 has faced renewed detentions and closures in the past few weeks, rights monitor Bitter Winter reported.
Security agents stopped a Sunday worship service of a Beijing Zion Church branch in Guiyang, Guizhou Province on June 1 and took all in attendance into custody. Elder Yao Yong and Brother Mao Yue received sentences of 15 days of administrative detention each, according to Bitter Winter.
In Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province, police on June 3 visited the homes of Beijing Zion church coworkers to verify their ID cards, and in Anhui Province, local authorities on May 30 detained Pastor Gao Le of Hefei Zion Church for five days.
“During the raids, they searched the homes of his congregation and confiscated their books,” Bitter Winter reported.
In the national central city of Chongqing, authorities have closed three Zion churches, and police also have visited churches in Hangzhou, Ningbo, Guiyang, and other areas, according to the rights outlet.
“This is a coordinated police campaign aimed at dismantling the Zion Church nationwide,” Bitter Winter stated. “Beijing Zion Church used to be the largest house church in the city. Despite being raided and banned by authorities in 2018, its members have continued to gather, facing regular arrests and harassment while frequently changing locations to evade police detection.”
Branches of Beijing Zion Church have been created in several cities and provinces. Established in 2007, the church first faced pressure from authorities for expressing support of the persecuted Shouwang Church. In June 2018, officials installed facial recognition systems outside Beijing Zion Church’s building along with listening devices.
“The police would track down believers at their workplaces or homes and coerce them into signing guarantees that they won’t participate in Zion Church congregations anymore,” Bitter Winter reported.
The government dismantled the church’s online messaging services, repeatedly cancelling them each time the church created new accounts. Authorities also tapped the mobile phones of congregation members and pastors, according to the outlet.
“In July [2018], the authorities tried to bribe a pastor who had a family member in the hospital,” Bitter Winter stated. “They told him, ‘If you promise to cooperate with us, the illness your family is spending tens of thousands of RMB on can be cured by us for just a few thousand RMB.’”
Authorities interrogated another five pastors and 12 preachers, with one official asserting that the government had snuck a “mole” within the congregation to obtain information.
Officials later succeeded in pressuring the church’s landlord to terminate their lease. When the church refused to vacate the property, Beijing’s Chaoyang District civil affairs bureau in 2018 issued a notice that the church was banned, and its “illegal promotional material” was confiscated on grounds that it violated the new Regulations on Religious Affairs, according to Bitter Winter.
Prison Conditions
In Xi’an, Shaanxi Province, the son of a pastor and wife serving a seven-year prison sentence since 2021 provided an update on their condition after previously reporting his father had been tortured by authorities and subject to beatings by inmates for failing to meet their demands for “protection money.”
Pastor Chang Yuguang, also known as Chang Yuchun, and his wife Li Chenhui were convicted of “illegal business operations” for printing Christian books without authorization, Bitter Winter reported. Their son, Chang Shengyi, had previously stated that authorities had refused to examine injuries resulting from beatings by prison officials two years ago.
Chang Shengyi told rights organizations that he was able to meet with his father on March 18 and learned that prison officials had taken him to have his injuries examined, according to Bitter Winter.
“However, because it had been two years, three assessment agencies refused to conduct the assessment, saying that the process was too complicated and the workload was too heavy,” Chang Shengyi stated.
He added that he was able to hold his father’s hand through a small window for the first time in more than four years.
“My father has now been transferred to a prison area with relatively low population turnover, so there is no need to worry about him being retaliated against,” he said.
Chang Shengyi stated in the letter to rights organizations that after being allowed to meet with his mother on March 17, he learned that she often feels headaches and dizziness, “and even fainted repeatedly when working in the kitchen.”
“She feels dizzy from time to time, and even feels pain when lying down in the wrong posture,” he stated. “It’s just that since my mother first reported this in November 2023, the prison only said that she would queue up for a CT scan, but she has not been examined yet.”
He reported the situation to the warden of his mother’s prison area, who said she would determine what to do next, he added.
“When I saw my parents these two days, they also expressed their special gratitude for everyone’s thoughts and prayers for them,” he stated. “Sometimes they are even notified of receiving some letters or postcards, but unfortunately, because of the faith-related content, they cannot see most of them.”
China ranked 15th on Open Doors’ 2025 World Watch List of the 50 countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian.
