More than 1,000 police officers, SWAT units, and paramilitary forces descended on Christian congregations across China’s Zhejiang province in mid-December, conducting mass arrests days before Christmas. The raids, which began before dawn on December 13 in Yayang Town, Wenzhou City, represent the most aggressive crackdown on house churches in months. Hundreds of believers were detained in the first 48 hours alone. Roads to churches were blocked, belongings confiscated, and entire communities left under police surveillance. The timing was deliberate. The Communist Party staged a million-yuan fireworks display in the town square on December 15 to mask the raids, circulating videos online with slogans like “Listen to the Party, follow the Party” while deleting posts from Christians describing what was happening.
The crackdown extends far beyond Wenzhou. Since September, Chinese authorities have detained nearly 100 Christians across multiple provinces, targeting the Zion Church in Beijing, the Light of Zion church, and the Golden Lampstand Church network. Pastors and congregants face charges of fraud, illegal use of information networks, and disrupting public order. The accusations are fabricated. No complaints came from church members about mishandled funds. No crimes were committed. The real offense is refusing to submit to Communist Party control.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned the arrests, calling on Beijing to “allow all people of faith, including members of house churches, to engage in religious activities without fear of retribution.” The US Commission on International Religious Freedom has repeatedly urged President Trump to designate China as a country of particular concern for its brutal oppression of religious communities.
Communist China has intensified its “sinicization” campaign under Xi Jinping, demanding that all religions align with Party values. Churches must display the Constitution, national laws, and Communist propaganda. The five-star flag must hang inside sanctuaries. Religious practice must serve political directives.
Christians in Yayang Town resisted these demands for over a decade. When officials tried to remove crosses from church buildings in 2014, believers organized rallies and confronted police. When authorities attempted to install surveillance cameras in 2017, congregants refused, leading to violent clashes. When the mayor led a group to dismantle church gates in June to raise the Chinese flag on church property, members protested the violation of religious space. Two church leaders, 58-year-old Lin Enzhao and 54-year-old Lin Enci, became primary targets for their role in defending their congregations. They now appear on wanted posters, accused of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble,” a standard charge deployed against religious and political dissidents. The reward offers payment for information leading to their capture.
Following the mass arrests, the Communist Party staged an “Elimination of Six Evils” demonstration, deploying SWAT officers and riot police to intimidate remaining Christians. Police stationed vehicles at the homes of known believers, disrupted communications, and went door-to-door pressuring church members to denounce Lin Enzhao and Lin Enci. Government propaganda campaigns spread defamatory rumors, portraying Christians as unpatriotic cultists. Posters described the community as a criminal organization.
This is the choice Chinese Christians face today. Register with the state, display Communist propaganda, submit religious practice to political control, or worship in secret and risk arrest.
Approximately three percent of China’s population identifies as Christian according to official estimates, a figure that has remained stable despite church growth efforts. The number is likely higher. As persecution intensifies, fewer people risk public identification. A 2018 survey suggested seven percent of Chinese believe in the Christian God. Underground congregations operate in decentralized networks, meeting in homes, rotating locations, communicating through encrypted channels. Families are separated. Some flee overseas while loved ones remain detained, facing interrogation, forced “anti-cult” programs designed to break their faith, and prison sentences on fabricated charges.
Bob Fu, founder of ChinaAid and Senior Fellow for International Religious Liberty at the Family Research Council, stated: “The massive pre-Christmas assault on churches in Wenzhou is a chilling reminder that the Chinese Communist Party fears the light of Christ most when it shines brightest. To raid churches days before Christmas is not only an attack on Christians – it is an assault on human dignity, conscience, and the hope that faith brings to a wounded world.” He added: “History teaches us that no regime has ever succeeded in extinguishing faith through force. These pre-Christmas attacks will only strengthen the resolve of China’s house churches and further expose the moral bankruptcy of state-sponsored persecution.”
As hundreds of Chinese Christians spend Christmas in detention this year, facing charges that criminalize their faith, the watching world must respond. Silence is complicity. Indifference is betrayal. The persecution of believers anywhere concerns believers everywhere. Western Christians who worship freely have a responsibility to speak for those who worship in chains. Governments that claim to defend human rights must impose consequences on regimes that systematically violate them.
The Communist Party’s war on faith reveals its deepest fear: that truth is more powerful than propaganda, that conviction outlasts coercion, that the kingdom of God will outlast the kingdoms of this world. Lin Enzhao and Lin Enci, now hunted as criminals for defending their church, stand in the tradition of every believer who refused to bow before earthly power. Their resistance testifies that some things matter more than safety, more than comfort, more than life itself. That testimony echoes across borders and through centuries, reminding us that faith is not a private preference but a public declaration: We will serve the Lord.