Nine Christians Detained As Beijing Escalates War on the Underground Church

There is a lie that polite Western diplomats love to tell themselves. It goes something like this: China is complicated, reform is incremental, and engagement will soften the edges. That lie collapses the moment you look at what is happening right now to Christians inside the People’s Republic of China.

This week, that collapse came in the form of armed police, prison vans, and bulldozers.

In Sichuan province, authorities arrested at least nine Christians connected to the Early Rain Covenant Church, one of the most well-known underground churches in the country. Its leader, Li Yingqiang, was taken along with elders, preachers, deacons, and even family members. Homes were raided. Church offices were searched. Phones went dead. Some detainees were later released, but several remain in custody and unreachable. Others are under house arrest, which in China means prison with better lighting.

There was no public charge. No explanation. No due process. Just the quiet efficiency of a state that understands exactly what it is doing.

This was not a random sweep. Church members described it accurately as a coordinated action aimed at decapitating leadership. If you remove the shepherds, the thinking goes, the sheep scatter. That logic is as old as tyranny itself.

Christian persecution in China surprises absolutely no one. However, it has become all too familiar and unacceptable for us in the West to simply shrug and say, "That's just the way it is." Given President Trump's recent responses to Christian persecution in Nigeria, I pray he will be moved to stand tall against China, regardless of trade ramifications.

A thousand miles away in Wenzhou, authorities escalated even further. Hundreds of armed police and special forces surrounded Yayang Christian Church. Residents were driven away. Phones were forbidden. Cranes and bulldozers were staged like a military parade. The message was unmistakable: submit or be erased.

Update on Yayang Church:
Part of the church building is being destroyed forcefully by the CCP govt on January 6. pic.twitter.com/wnduGjespA
— Bob Fu 傅希秋 (@BobFu4China) January 6, 2026

Dr. Bob Fu of ChinaAid called it what it is. State-sponsored religious persecution. When a government mobilizes riot police and heavy equipment against a peaceful congregation, it is not enforcing laws. It is enforcing ideology.

And that ideology has a name.

President Xi Jinping calls it Sinicisation. It sounds academic. It sounds harmless. In practice, it means every expression of faith must bow to the Chinese Communist Party. Sermons must align with party doctrine. Churches must register under state control. Pastors must preach only through government-approved platforms. Scripture itself must be filtered, reframed, and neutered.

There are two kinds of churches in China. The Three Self churches, which operate with government permission and government supervision, and the underground or house churches, which operate under the conviction that Christ, not the Party, is Lord. The latter have been targeted for decades, but the crackdown has intensified. The internet is now tightly regulated. Clergy are warned not to attract attention. Evangelism is treated like a contagion.

The Early Rain Covenant Church knows this well. In 2018, its founder, Wang Yi, was arrested along with more than a hundred others. He was later sentenced to nine years in prison for subversion. His crime was preaching the gospel without state approval. That is all.

What stands out in this latest wave of arrests is not just the brutality, but the clarity. The CCP is no longer pretending to tolerate independent faith. It is openly moving to crush it.

And where is the international outcry?

Muted. Careful. Managed.

We issue statements. We express concern. We keep trade flowing. We schedule summits. We talk about cooperation. Meanwhile, Chinese believers are dragged from their homes, churches are dismantled piece by piece, and crosses are wrapped in scaffolding like crime scenes.

A prayer letter released from Early Rain Covenant Church quoted 1 Peter. It reminded its congregation to rejoice in suffering and receive the blessing for being insulted for the name of Christ. That kind of faith should humble a comfortable Western church that complains about zoning laws and social media bans.

But prayer alone is not enough.

Dr. Fu is right to call for action. The United States should not reward repression with diplomatic normalcy. Diplomacy with Beijing while pastors rot in prison sends exactly the wrong message. Silence is not neutrality. It is permission.

Here is the uncomfortable truth. The Chinese Communist Party is not afraid of Christianity because it is violent. It is afraid because it is loyal to a higher authority. Faith creates moral clarity. It creates courage. It creates communities that cannot be fully controlled. That is why the state moves so aggressively against it.

History has shown that no regime can extinguish faith through force. The Soviet Union tried. Mao tried. They all failed. The church survives. Often underground. Often bloodied. But alive.

The question is not whether Chinese Christians will endure. They will.

The question is whether the free world will have the courage to stand with them, or whether we will keep pretending that bulldozers and prison cells are just part of doing business with Beijing.

Editor’s Note: Thanks to President Trump and his administration’s bold leadership, we are respected on the world stage, and our enemies are being put on notice.

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