Reports are emerging of an ongoing, massive campaign by Chinese police to crack down and arrest hundreds of Chinese house church members in Taishun County, Wenzhou City, in Zhejiang Province.

The latest crackdown on China’s house churches occurred between Dec. 13-18. Local witnesses reported via social media and other networks of multiple checkpoints, roving police patrols, and cash rewards being posted for the capture of house church leaders.

More than 100 local house church members were reportedly detained and eventually arrested during this six-day suppression. Police also asked the public to provide information and offered monetary rewards, so Christians could be arrested, for allegedly disputing land seizures and the removal of Christian symbols and crosses in Taishun County.

This latest bout of persecution for Chinese Christians comes after months of tension between local authorities and house church leaders. Communist authorities insist on installing Communist symbols in churches, removing Christian symbols like crosses, and enforcing a new Communist-driven education policy.

The Chinese government, led and controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, considers Christianity a threat to the state’s authority. Consequently, it wages an intense campaign of persecution against house churches that aren’t part of the state-led “religious” bodies such as the Catholic Patriotic Association or the protestant Three-Self Patriotic Movement. These state-led religious institutions serve as mouthpieces for the government’s propaganda.

Please continue to pray for those Christians detained and arrested, and for those facing these unjust policies and persecution from police and communist authorities.

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