{"id":23393,"date":"2017-06-27T08:11:29","date_gmt":"2017-06-27T08:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.acnmalta.org\/?p=23393"},"modified":"2017-06-28T07:44:36","modified_gmt":"2017-06-28T07:44:36","slug":"china-church-destroyed-christians-detained-henan-province-acn-malta","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acnmalta.org\/_oldsite\/2017\/06\/27\/china-church-destroyed-christians-detained-henan-province-acn-malta\/","title":{"rendered":"CHINA &#8211; Church destroyed and Christians detained in Henan province &#8211;\u00a0ACN Malta"},"content":{"rendered":"<style type=\"text\/css\"><\/style><h2><span style=\"font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16pt; color: #000000;\"><strong>CHINA &#8211;\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Church destroyed<\/strong><strong> and<\/strong><strong> Christians detained in<\/strong> <strong>Henan province<\/strong><strong>\u00a0 <\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">China Aid, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to promoting religious freedom and human rights for Christians in China, reported that local authorities in Henan province destroyed a Christian church last month. 300 police officers and inspectors turned up for the demolition of Shuangmiao Christian Church in Shangqiu, which was still under construction.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cThe church was completely razed, and a church member likened the scene to the Japanese invasion of China during World War II,\u201d China Aid said. Parishioners who tried to stop the demolition were beaten<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">and \u201cpushed to the ground.\u201d \u00a0Church property, as well as that of parishioners and construction workers, was confiscated. 40 parishioners were detained, although no one has yet been formally arrested.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The authorities claim that they ordered the church demolition because it was deemed an \u201cillegal structure.\u201d\u00a0 The Chinese Communist Party also claimed that the church had failed to pay a \u201croad usage fee\u201d that villagers wanted imposed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Previously, when the church\u2019s pastor had tried to discuss the matter with officials he was detained for \u201cfalse charges of assaulting the police station, limiting the freedom of others, and attacking a village representative.\u201d After the attack, he is still in detention though has not yet been formally arrested.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Persecution of Christians in China varies in different provinces, but Henan has seen an increase in recent years. In April 2016 Li Jiangong, a pastor in Zhumadian, another city of Henan province, lost his wife when the couple tried to save their house church from being bulldozed in a government-ordered destruction of the church. He \u201cbarely escaped\u201d death, according to the most recent annual report from the US Commission on International Religious Freedom.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Zhejiang province is another region where Christians face persecution &#8211; over 1,500 churches have been desecrated or demolished and remaining churches in Zhejiang are no longer allowed to display crosses.\u00a0 Christians , including clergy, \u00a0there have been imprisoned for protesting about removal of crosses from churches.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">As China\u2019s leader Xi Jingping has further consolidated power and attempts to impose even tighter control on religion the situation of religious freedom in China has deteriorated considerably in recent years. Religious leaders and human rights activists have been harassed and detained, and churches, especially Christian house churches, have been targeted for destruction or vandalism.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Aid to the Church in Need highlighted this in its 2016 <em>Religious Freedom in the World<\/em> report.<\/span><\/p>\n<h6><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>ACN Malta<\/strong><\/span><\/h6>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CHINA &#8211;\u00a0Church destroyed and Christians detained in Henan province\u00a0 &nbsp; China Aid, an international non-profit organisation dedicated to promoting religious freedom and human rights for Christians in China, reported that local authorities in Henan province destroyed a Christian church last month. 300 police officers and inspectors turned up for the demolition of Shuangmiao Christian Church&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":23395,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-e-newsletters"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>CHINA - Church destroyed and Christians detained in Henan province -\u00a0ACN Malta - Aid to the Church in Need (Malta)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/acnmalta.org\/_oldsite\/2017\/06\/27\/china-church-destroyed-christians-detained-henan-province-acn-malta\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"CHINA - Church destroyed and Christians detained in Henan province -\u00a0ACN Malta - Aid to the Church in Need (Malta)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"CHINA &#8211;\u00a0Church destroyed and Christians detained in Henan province\u00a0 &nbsp; 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