Persecuting the province

Since the Chinese government implemented strict new religious regulations in February, churches in Henan province in central China have felt the brunt of a crackdown: In the past few months, authorities have closed house churches, demolished crosses, banned minors from attending church, and forced believers to take down Christian decorations from their homes.

The Communist government likely chose to make an example of Henan because of its large Christian presence. Henan is the epicenter of China’s house church movement: Three of the country’s largest house church networks started in the province. It’s the same reasoning behind the government’s cross demolition campaign in Zhejiang in 2014, as Zhejiang also has a large Christian population, especially in the city of Wenzhou, known as “China’s Jerusalem.”

In Henan’s city of Zhoukou, authorities have banned anyone under 18 from attending church, asked pastors to start each service with the singing of the national anthem, and barred Christians from hanging Christian couplets on their doors during Chinese New Year, according to U.S.-based ChinaAid. Authorities threatened to take away welfare benefits for low-income residents who profess faith and pressured Chinese Communist Party members to stop attending church.

In Henan’s city of Zhoukou, authorities have banned anyone under 18 from attending church.

In Anyang city, a neighborhood committee released a notice announcing all Christian, Buddhist, Taoist, and Muslims groups must register with the city government. Yet authorities have only targeted unregistered Protestant and Catholic house churches, an anonymous Christian told ChinaAid. In many regions, police have gone door to door shutting down house churches, closing more than 100 in the city of Nanyang alone.

Many of these orders now come from the village or neighborhood levels. In March, the Chinese government dissolved the Religious Affairs Bureau and put religion under the direct control of the Communist Party. President Xi Jinping considers religion a threat to national security, as it has led to the fall of communism in the Soviet Union, Poland, and Czechoslovakia. The power to carry out religious regulation is now extended to lower-level officials, allowing for tighter control over house churches.

Government-sanctioned Three-Self churches have also felt the heat: Authorities ordered a newly built Three-Self church in Luoyang city to take down its cross, which cost more than $3,000 to construct. Parishioners refused, and are contemplating their next steps. In Lushan County, authorities forced Christians from Three-Self churches to attend an ideological reorientation training where they announced that all churches must display Chinese flags, children under 18 could not enter churches, and religious posters could not appear on local buildings, according to ChinaAid.

Authorities also razed an underground Catholic church and priest’s home in Hutuo village, according to Union of Catholic Asian News. In the same village, parishioners found the tombstone of Bishop Li Hongye destroyed. Other Catholic churches say police have confiscated prayer books, songbooks, and Bibles. Chinese police have reportedly parked cars outside churches to ensure children do not enter the parish, and have closed a Catholic kindergarten for failing to meet safety standards and operating without a license.

Big characters at Peking University

In a bold move, students at Peking University in Beijing taped large handwritten posters onto a campus bulletin board in support of fellow student and activist Yue Xin. Yue has demanded school officials disclose information regarding a case of purported sexual harassment and rape by professor Shen Yang in the 1990s that led to a student committing suicide. Yue said that once she began petitioning the school to release information on the professor, who lost his teaching position after the scandal broke, school officials harassed and intimidated her, even persuading her parents to ground her. Big-character posters are a form of political expression that was used by Chairman Mao Zedong in the Cultural Revolution as well as by democracy activists in 1978 during the Democracy Wall Movement. Peking school officials quickly took down the posters and censored the term “Peking University” online.