In a sweeping nationwide assault on religious freedom, Chinese authorities have launched what appears to be a coordinated “nuclear” crackdown on underground Christianity, with mass arrests at an influential church and the violent demolition of a major cathedral, signaling a dramatic escalation in the Communist Party’s war on faith.
The Early Rain Covenant Church, one of China’s most prominent independent Protestant congregations, reported that police raided homes and its office in Chengdu on Tuesday, detaining nine leaders in what the church called a “concerted operation.” While five were later released, four remain in custody, including the church’s current leader, Li Yingqiang, and his wife, fulfilling Li’s own prophecy from a November letter to members where he “sensed a storm gathering.”
Simultaneously, more than 1,000 miles away in the coastal city of Wenzhou—known as “the Jerusalem of China” for its high concentration of Christians—authorities deployed bulldozers, cranes, and hundreds of armed police to demolish the Yayang Church. Video obtained by the monitoring group ChinaAid shows the violent dismantling of the building, with residents reportedly driven away and banned from recording the destruction.
This one-two punch against two major church networks in different provinces reveals a central government strategy of total ideological control.
