Last Friday, Grace Jin Drexel received a short but urgent text message from her father in China, prominent pastor Jin Mingri, asking her to pray for another pastor who had gone missing.
The message said the pastor had been detained while visiting the southern city of Shenzhen. Moments later, Grace received a call from her mother: she couldn’t reach Jin. Within hours, the family realized that Jin himself had also been detained in what activists are calling China’s largest arrest of Christians in decades.
The roundup of at least 30 Christians linked to the Zion Church network — which Jin founded — has triggered alarm among religious freedom advocates worldwide, who fear this may mark the start of an even broader campaign against unregistered churches in China.
For years, China has maintained strict control over religious groups, allowing only state-approved organizations to operate openly. While official statistics list 38 million Protestants and nearly six million Catholics, independent researchers and rights groups estimate that tens of millions more Christians worship in underground churches, also called house churches.
These unregistered churches do not align with state ideologies or the officially sanctioned Three-Self Patriotic Movement and Catholic Patriotic Association, both of which emphasize loyalty to China and the ruling Communist Party.
Government pressure on house churches has been steadily increasing. Church buildings have been demolished, crosses removed from public spaces, and religious apps banned from Chinese online platforms.
A History of Tightening Religious Regulations in China
Since 2005, and again in 2018, the Chinese government has revised and strengthened regulations on religious activities. In 2016, President Xi Jinping openly called for the “sinicisation” of religion — integrating faiths with Chinese socialist values.
The 2018 regulations forced many house churches, including Zion Church, to stop holding public services without government approval. Some congregations moved online, but recent legislation has further restricted that avenue.
In September, authorities introduced a new online code of conduct for religious personnel, allowing only licensed groups to conduct online sermons. This has been widely interpreted as another measure to silence independent churches.
The latest arrests took place across at least ten cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, in a coordinated sweep last weekend. Among those detained was Pastor Jin, taken from his base in Beihai, Guangxi province.
The BBC obtained an official detention notice indicating Jin is being held at Beihai Number Two Prison on suspicion of the “illegal use of information networks.” Many other pastors, church leaders, and members were also detained; some have since been released, but the majority remain in custody.
Corey Jackson, founder of the Christian advocacy organization Luke Alliance, said the nationwide scale and coordination of the arrests were unprecedented.
“We anticipate that this is just the beginning of a larger crackdown,” Jackson said.
These arrests come after several months of increasing pressure on underground churches in China. In May, Pastor Gao Quanfu of the Light of Zion Church in Xi’an was detained on charges of “using superstitious activities to undermine the implementation of law.” In June, multiple members of the Linfen Golden Lampstand Church were sentenced to long prison terms on fraud charges — convictions rights groups say are politically motivated.
According to Sean Long, a Zion Church pastor based in the U.S., this latest operation is a “systematic roundup” meant to intimidate other Christian communities.
“Zion is the chicken — the most influential — and this is meant to scare other Christians and house churches in China,” he said, referencing a Chinese idiom: “killing the chicken to scare the monkeys.”
When asked for comment, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in London said:
“We would like to stress that Chinese citizens enjoy freedom of religious belief in accordance with the law. Meanwhile, all religious groups and religious activities must comply with the laws and regulations of China.”
Earlier this week, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson strongly condemned U.S. criticism of the arrests after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke out.
“We firmly oppose the U.S. interfering in China’s internal affairs with so-called religious issues,” the spokesperson stated.
Human rights organizations warn that China’s policy of suppressing house churches is likely to escalate. Advocacy group Open Doors said the Zion Church arrests were significant because of the church’s size and influence.
“Zion Church was very well known and outspoken. It may have reached a level of organization that made authorities nervous about independent social entities they do not control,” the group said.
With tens of millions of Christians attending house churches across the country, the crackdown on Zion Church is being closely watched as a potential test case for wider action.
The mass arrests of Zion Church members mark a critical moment for religious freedom in China. While authorities frame their actions as legal enforcement, advocacy groups view them as a deliberate attempt to weaken independent faith communities.
As families like that of Pastor Jin Mingri wait for news of their loved ones, underground churches across China are bracing for what could be the largest religious crackdown in years.
Source- BBC
