Issues@Hand

AFA initiatives, Christian activism, news briefs

September 2020 – A religious liberty watchdog has reported that China, from January to April, forcibly removed crosses from 250 churches across the country. Officials gave various reasons for the removals, claiming that the crosses might fall and injure someone or that they were “too tall, too large, too wide, or too eye-catching.”

In 2018, Rev. Bob Fu spoke at a U.S. House Foreign Affairs hearing regarding the increasing persecution in China. Fu, founder of a persecution watchdog organization called China Aid, testified that China has enacted a five-year plan to “convert” Christianity into a religion more compatible with socialism.

Part of this plan is rewriting the Bible, including a retranslation of the Old Testament. Fu stated that such a translation would summarize Old Testament Scriptures with Buddhist and Confucian teachings added in. After commenting on the thousands of crosses that have been torn down in China, Fu said that churches containing crucifixes on the inside are also forced to display pictures of Chinese rulers, such as Chairman Mao.

christianpost.com, 9/28/18;
christianheadlines.com, 6/9/20