ICC Note:
Based on recent Chinese legislation on religion, China Aid is warning house churches to expect “unprecedented suppression.” One of the primary reasons for such concern is Sinicization, a Chinese policy that encourages all religions, beliefs, and ideologies to submit to the Chinese state. The government is afraid of any ideology or belief, like Christianity, that can unite a large number of people outside of the Chinese state.
1/30/2017 China (Premier) – House churches in China are being told to expect “unprecedented suppression” in a new report which is warning of a “major turning point” in the treatment of believers.
China Aid fears Chinese Christians will suffer under a “shift” in government policy, away from encouraging believers to “mutually adapt with socialism” to forcing them to conform to the government’s agenda.
It said: “We have good reasons to worry that the major religions in China, especially house churches and underground Catholic and Protestant churches, will suffer the most unprecedented suppression under the name of the ‘transforming into the Communist Party of China’ since the Cultural Revolution.”
China Aid says a policy of Sinicization – encouraging submission to dominant Chinese state and culture – by president Xi Jinping marks a significant departure from former president Jiang Zemin’s approach.
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