Increasing Chinese government pressure on house churches

On Saturday, Yang Kai, the elder brother of Yang Rongli, one of the leaders of the Shanxi Church, which is affiliated with the Golden Lamp House Church, announced in an interview with Radio Free Asia that last year, following the arrest of his brother along with twelve other officials of this church, He does not have any information about them.

He also said in his interview that these people were taken by the authorities during the baptism ceremony on August 5 of last year: "There were 12 people in total, 5 of whom were not in good physical condition."

Golden Lamp Church is a large-scale house church network with tens of thousands of believers. Last year, several church leaders, including Yang Rongli and Wang Xiaoguang, were arrested by authorities and sentenced to seven and three years in prison, respectively. But after that date, their relatives declared that they had no access to them and do not know about them.

Yang Kai also revealed in this interview that the main building of the Golden Lamp Church was blown up by the Chinese authorities.
After their release from prison, authorities blew up the Golden Lamp Church in 2018.

He also stated that all their benefits and social rights have been blocked and confiscated.

Because of the Chinese government's policies against Christians, they are still forced to worship in their homes or in underground churches, and China ranks 39th on the list of the 50 worst countries in the world for persecuting Christians.

According to the report of the China Aid organization, incidents of persecution of Christians have increased by 20% compared to the previous year, so the number of Christians who were imprisoned has increased by more than 150%. Chinese Communist Party authorities have demanded the forced destruction of churches, as well as the removal of crosses and Christian symbols.

 

_{Source: Radio Free Asia}