[Faith-talk] Fwd: In China, a Crisis Between Church and State Unfolding

[Amy Ragain]

lets all pray for these pastors and their churches!


> Nineteen Chinese pastors have joined together to send a remarkable petition
> to the National People’s Congress on behalf of one of Beijing’s largest
> underground churches. The Shouwang church is the most recent target of
> Communist authorities’ crackdown on the unauthorized house church movement
> that now numbers some 50–70 million Chinese Christians.
> The Shouwang church began in a home but has grown to 1,000 members in recent
> years, with many well-educated and affluent congregants. Forced out of
> rented meeting space in 2009, the church bought its own property—only to be
> denied access by the government. Ousted from rental space once again this
> spring, the congregation has sought to meet outdoors. But their worship
> services have been disrupted, and hundreds were detained by police on Easter
> Sunday. Pastor Jin Tianming and other church leaders are under house arrest
> to prevent them from leading services.
> As The New York Times noted, the crisis is “stirring up the tens of millions
> of Chinese believers who have come to place more faith in Christianity than
> in the atheist Communist Party.” That has led to the bold petition—which the
> Times reports was drafted by Xie Moshan and Li Tianen, “patriarchs of the
> house church movement, who have each spent more than a decade in Chinese
> prisons.”
> Their petition goes beyond calling for redress of one church’s afflictions.
> “We believe that the Shouwang Church incident is not an individual, isolated
> episode that happens to a single church but rather a typical phenomenon in
> respect of the conflict between state and church during the period of social
> transition.”
> That conflict between state and church, the pastors argue, can be resolved
> only with official recognition of religious liberty, an essential step to
> ensure the freedom, stability, and prosperity of the nation.
> The petition argues, on the basis of the Chinese constitution and the
> Universal Declaration of Human Rights, for robust religious
> liberty—including “freedoms of assembly, association, speech, education and
> evangelism”—for congregations outside the network of state-sanctioned
> churches.
> Two weeks ago, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom once
> again identified China as a “country of particular concern,” ranking it
> among the most serious violators of religious liberty worldwide.
> Now the anxious Communist regime has forced the Shouwang showdown with a
> courageous congregation that is well-connected and whose allies have
> articulated a strong political philosophy, patriotism, and good will. How
> the regime reacts to this position of moral strength and sound reasoning
> about the path to freedom and prosperity will tell the world much about
> China’s future.
> Read more about Chinese church leaders’ efforts to achieve greater religious
> liberty. 
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
> Almost Half of Americans Attend Church Regularly  
> 
> Nearly fifty percent of American adults attend church services at least once
> a month. However, church attendance overall is on the decline in the past 40
> years.  
> 
>  
> 
> U.N. Day of the Family: A Reminder of Civil Society’s Cornerstone 
> Collette Caprara 
> 
> Religious Freedom in America: An Idea Worth Sharing
> Jennifer Marshall 
> 
> Why Does Religious Freedom Matter?
> Jennifer Marshall
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> 
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