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Posted by ReligiousLiberty.TV / February 21, 2022

In 2014 Russia used religious controls in an attempt to diminish Crimea’s identity. It plans to do the same in Ukraine.

How could a Russian military movement into Ukraine affect religious liberty? Ukraine is an independent European country with a population of 41.2 million people, about the size of Texas. In 2014, Russia gained control of the northern Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea (https://religiousliberty.tv/explainer-what-is-happening-in-ukraine.html). At the time, Russian forces were amassed along the border under the pretext of protecting Russian citizens in Ukraine. On February 28, 2014, Russian troops occupied key posts, buildings, airports, and other assets in Crimea.

At the time, China supported Russia, and the United States opposed Russia. John Kerry, the U.S. Secretary of State, went to Kyiv and promised a $1 billion loan guarantee for Ukraine to decrease the effect of energy subsidy cuts that could drive Ukraine back to Russian control.

Now, eight years later, Russia controls Crimea and aims to take over the rest of Ukraine. To understand the impact on freedom of religion in Ukraine, it helps to see what has happened in the Russian-controlled regions of Crimea and Donbas.

Under Ukraine’s law, there is a guarantee of religious freedom, but religious groups need to be officially registered. In Crimea, the Russian government has reportedly detained and imprisoned Jehovah’s Witnesses and has taken buildings belonging to the group. In 2018, Russian media claimed that a mass shooter’s mother was a member of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and have reportedly referred to the church as taking a “pro-fascist” position. 

“Moscow sees religion as a key front in the battle to control both Crimea and Donbas, and to project influence into the rest of Ukraine.” Ambassador John Herbst

They have also arrested several Muslim Crimean Tatars claiming they are affiliated with a fundamentalist group. According to the U.S. State Department, two Muslims were arrested and denied medical assistance.

Some Greek Catholic churches have reportedly been seized. As of 2018, the United States continued to press for Russian authorities occupying Crimea “to return confiscated property and release prisoners incarcerated for their religious or political beliefs.”

In 2020, Ambassador John Herbst, former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, spoke about the state of religious freedom in Crimea and Donbas, also annexed by Russia. He said that Russia’s goal was to target and reduce the influence of Ukraine’s culture with a focus on religion and language. He said, “Since the annexation of Crimea, Moscow has applied Russian law towards this end; denying or revoking registration to Ukrainian parishes, seizing churches and handing them over to the Moscow Patriarchate, using blandishments and threats with the Kyiv Patriarch and then Ukrainian Orthodox Church priests either to leave their church or to inform on fellow clergy.”

When Russia invaded Crimea, there were 46 Kyiv Patriarch Churches, but by the end of 2014, there were only 9, and then it dropped to 6 by the end of 2019.

In Donbas, the situation is even worse, according to Herbst. “Initially, groups not belonging to Russia’s traditional religions were forbidden to conduct religious activities. Many places of worship, including prayer houses and temples were seized by armed groups and the arrest and harassment of other believers, including the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, the Greek Catholic Church and Protestant groups. Then, representatives of these groups were required by law to register, with criminal liability for the failure to do so. Yet, in the Luhansk Peoples Republic (LPR) the authorities rejected all Protestant registration application and re-registration requests from Baptists, Seventh Day Adventists and Pentacostals. It also required OCU parishes to affiliate with the M.P. Such policies drove many of these believers out of the LNR and the Donetsk Peoples Republics (DPR).”

Herbst said there were two reasons why the imposition of Russian law on Crimea and Donbas was disastrous. First, Russian law was more authoritarian and allowed the government to exert control of religion. Secondly, “Moscow sees religion as a key front in the battle to control both Crimea and Donbas, and to project influence into the rest of Ukraine. That gives it a geopolitical motivation to repress and control the OCU, the Greek Catholic Church, Protestants and religious organizations associated with the Crimean Tatars, and to target some activists as religious extremists.”

In September 2014, an Adventist pastor in Horlivka, which has been mostly under the control of pro-Russian forces, while some suburbs remain under Ukrainian control, was abducted at gunpoint as he was conducting a communion service. The gunmen forced him to close the church and get into a car. After 20 days, he was released and reunited with his family.

In 2016, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom released a statement on the impact that Russia had on Crimea’s religious freedom. The statement said, ““Russia has spread its net of intolerance to Crimea and freedom of religion or belief has been its victim. The international community must not be silent in the face of these abuses. Moscow must reform its anti-extremism law, cease its application to Crimea, grant legal status to the 1,500 religious groups that operated before the Russian annexation, and stop harassing religious minorities and those the Moscow Patriarchate views as rivals.”

We will continue to keep Ukraine and the people of Europe in our prayers as this situation threatens regional if not global stability.
https://religiousliberty.tv/russian-occupation-will-harm-religious-freedom-in-ukraine.html

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Issued on: 24/01/2022 - 12:22

Helsinki (AFP) – A Christian Democrat MP said Monday she is defending "freedom of speech and religion" on the first day of her hate speech trial in Finland over social media posts condemning homosexuality.

Paivi Rasanen, a former interior minister and Christian Democrats leader, denies all four charges of incitement against a minority group, which relate to a radio show appearance and online writings about same-sex relationships.

Rasanen described homosexuality as a "psychosexual developmental disorder" and said that homosexual people are "dysfunctional".

One charge related to a June 2019 tweet in which the long-time parliamentarian criticised the Finnish Lutheran church for partnering with that year's Pride celebrations, accusing the organisation of "elevating shame and sin to a subject of pride".

The post was accompanied by a photo of a New Testament passage which described homosexual acts as "shameful" and "unnatural".

"The statement is an affront to the equality and dignity of homosexuals and is likely to provoke contempt, intolerance and even hatred towards homosexuals," prosecution documents seen by AFP said.

Prosecutors called for the MP to receive a fine relative to her income which could exceed 13,000 euros.

A group of supporters had gathered outside Helsinki District Court on Monday morning, where Rasanen arrived carrying a bible.

She told waiting media she felt "honored to be defending freedom of speech and religion."

"I hope that today it can become clear that I have no wish to offend any group of people, but this is a question of saving people for eternal life," Rasanen said.

Judges on Monday refused her legal team's application to drop one of the charges on the basis that it contravenes the right to freedom of religion set out in the European Convention of Human Rights.

Bishop Juhana Pohjola also faces incitement charges for publishing Rasanen's writings on the website of Finland's Luther Foundation.

When she was interior minister between 2011 and 2015, Rasanen voted Finland's current incitement laws through parliament.

"It never occurred to me that my own writings could one day be illegal," Rasanen said on Monday.

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220124-finnish-ex-minister-in-court-over anti-gay-bible-tweet

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Michael Foust | ChristianHeadlines.com Contributor | Wednesday, March 2, 2022

An Edwardsville, Illinois, university violated a Christian student’s constitutional rights by ordering her not to have contact with three students who disagreed with her faith-centric viewpoint, according to a legal organization.

Alliance Defending Freedom sent a letter late last month to Southern Illinois University Edwardsville after it ordered Maggie DeJong, a student in the master’s in art therapy counseling program, from having “any contact” or “indirect communication” with three students. The students, according to ADF, complained to the university that her viewpoint would not be “welcome or appropriate.”

The university offered no basis for the orders, which “limit her speech and physical presence on and off campus” through the end of the semester, the letter says. Further, the letter says the university acknowledged DeJong’s conduct did not violate university policy. According to the letter, the university said the non-contact orders were to “prevent interactions that could be perceived by either party as unwelcome, retaliatory, intimidating, or harassing,” according to the letter.

“Universities, especially classrooms where topics are supposed to be vigorously debated, should be marketplaces of ideas, not an assembly line for one type of thinking,” said Tyson Langhofer, senior counsel and director of the ADF Center for Academic Freedom. “Maggie has always respectfully expressed her viewpoint in class, which every student is entitled to do under the First Amendment. The university must immediately rescind the no-contact orders and revise its policies to adequately safeguard students’ constitutional rights.”

Langhofer told The Daily Citizen that DeJong’s Christian beliefs are the source of the dispute. At one point, Maggie informed a fellow student that “her personal beliefs are grounded in objective truth by the gospel of Jesus Christ,” according to The Daily Citizen.

The no-contact orders have prevented DeJong from “fully” participating in her educational activities, the letter says. Because of the orders, she cannot fully participate in classes with the three students. She also cannot participate in group chats in which any of the three students are present.

The orders violate DeJong’s free speech protections as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, the letter says. The letter says legal action is possible if the university does not withdraw the orders.

https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/michael-foust/university-orders-christian-student-not-to-talk-to-students-who-disagree-with-her.html

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Michael Foust | ChristianHeadlines.com Contributor | Tuesday, January 25, 2022

A Finnish Christian politician who faces possible prison time for a Bible affirming tweet said Monday ahead of her trial that she was concerned about the “eternal life” of individuals when she wrote the social media post.

Paivi Rasanen, a member of Finland’s Parliament and a former interior minister, is charged under the country’s hate speech law with “incitement” against a minority group for statements she made about LGBT individuals. One of those was a 2019 tweet in which she included a verse from Scripture and criticized the Finish Lutheran Church for “elevating shame and sin to a subject of pride” after the denomination supported Pride Week.

Prosecutors said the Bible-based statement “is an affront to the equality and dignity of homosexuals and is likely to provoke contempt, intolerance and even hatred towards homosexuals,” according to Agence France-Presse.

She could be sent to prison if found guilty, although prosecutors are asking the court to fine her, the BBC reported.

On Monday, she told the media she was “honored to be defending freedom of speech and religion.”

“I hope that today it can become clear that I have no wish to offend any group of people, but this is a question of saving people for eternal life,” she said.

The other charges against her involve a 2004 article she wrote describing homosexuality as a psychosexual development disorder.

“It never occurred to me that my own writings could one day be illegal,” she said Monday.

Rasanen’s defense is supported by Alliance Defense Fund International. Her attorneys have “urged the court not to impose their own theological interpretation of Scripture on to citizens by criminalizing traditional Christian views on marriage and sexuality,” ADF International said.

A guilty verdict, ADF International said, “would appear as a de facto criminalization of the Bible verses tweeted by” a politician.

A conviction would “set a new European low bar for free speech standards,” said Paul Coleman, executive director of ADF International.

https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/michael foust/prison-for-a-pro-bible-tweet-christian-legislator-goes-on-trial-in finland.html

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Michael Foust | ChristianHeadlines.com Contributor | Wednesday, February 2, 2022

A Michigan high school student who was allegedly suspended for calling homosexuality a “sin” and for failing to report his classmates’ inappropriate jokes filed a federal lawsuit last week, claiming the school’s actions violated his constitutional rights.

David Stout, a junior at Plainwell High School in Plainwell, Mich., was suspended for three days last fall for allegedly violating the school’s bullying/cyberbullying/harassment policy.

Stout, though, says he was only humbly stating his Christian beliefs and that the conversation was private. Stout is a member of the football team and the band.

The Great Lakes Justice Center is representing the family.

“My client’s religious speech and beliefs should be treated with tolerance and respect,” said David A. Kallman, senior legal counsel with the Great Lakes Justice Center. “Public schools may not violate the constitution and enforce a heckler’s veto of student speech. Nothing David did caused any disruption or problem at the school. He has the right to express his opinion in accordance with his sincerely held religious beliefs, without vilification or punishment from the government for holding to those beliefs.”

The controversy began in April 2021, when Stout was involved in an offcampus text conversation with a friend who asked him his thoughts about a classmate “being gay.”

“Plaintiff stated that the Bible teaches that homosexual conduct is a sin and in the Christian context that God created only two biological genders – man and woman,” the lawsuit says. “Plaintiff stated that while homosexual conduct is a sin, however, everyone is a sinner due to freewill choices, and he would pray for them ‘to repent and follow Jesus.’ He also shared that he would extend love toward them because ‘God commands’ it, as ‘Jesus died on the cross for them and extends His love toward them, and all they have to do is accept it.’”

tout’s friend was offended by his beliefs and eventually ended the conversation.

That conversation and an incident at a band camp formed the basis of the school’s suspension, the lawsuit says. The band camp episode took place in July 2021, when two freshmen band members began telling “inappropriate and immature racial and homophobic ‘jokes’ loud enough for all to hear.” Stout chuckled at the first joke, after which he “politely but firmly stated that they needed to stop.” When they continued, he said, according to the lawsuit, “Enough! You need to stop!” School officials blamed Stout for the jokes because he is a section leader, the lawsuit says.

Meanwhile, the band director allegedly told Stout he “must stop all further conversations regarding his religious beliefs with other students because if any student overheard them, they might feel offended and unsafe,” the suit says.

Stout is asking the court to declare the school’s actions unconstitutional and order the school to clear his record. He is represented in court by his parents.

He had never been disciplined, suspended or expelled before the incident, the lawsuit says.

“Plaintiff’s private text/chat messages and conversations voicing his personal and religious opinions on homosexual conduct were rooted in historic religious doctrine,” the lawsuit says. “... Plaintiff is a Christian, who adheres to the teachings of the Bible and is morally bound to follow the universal, consistent moral teaching of the Christian faith. Further, Plaintiff finds his dignity, personal identity, and autonomy in the exercise of his sincerely held Christian religious beliefs.”

Stout’s father, David J. Stout, defended his son.

“We have always taught our son to be respectful of everyone’s opinion and to be polite to others, as he was here,” the father said in a statement . “However, tolerance is a two-way street. David is entitled to properly express his faith and beliefs without being disciplined and suspended by Plainwell schools. We trust the court will uphold David’s constitutional rights, and his school record will be cleared.”

https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/michael foust/school-suspends-christian-student-after-he-calls-homosexuality a-sin-lawsuit-says.html

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Milton Quintanilla | Contributor for ChristianHeadlines.com | Friday, February 18, 2022

A spokesperson for the Christian persecution watchdog group The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) warned that the Chinese government is currently attempting to rewrite the Word of God in accordance with communist values.

"This is a project that the Chinese Communist Party announced in 2019. At the time, they said it would be about a 10-year process … to release a new translation of the Bible," VOM spokesman Todd Nettleton told Faithwire in a recent interview.

He noted that the reimagined Scriptures would include a variety of principles, including Confucianism and Buddhism.

"This new translation … would really support the Communist Party," Nettleton added.

In a recent post on Facebook, VOM pointed out that the CPP's revisions of the Bible will include "'core socialist values" and the removal of passages that "do not reflect communist beliefs."

One example of the changes was revealed in a high school textbook released in September 2020. In the textbook, the CCP changed several verses in John 8, VOM said in a social media post. As the biblical story goes, Jesus forgives an adulterous woman despite the Pharisees' calls to stone her to death under Mosaic law.

The Voice of the Martyrs - USA

about a month ago

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) announced plans to update the Bible to “keep pace with the times.” The revisions will include adding “core socialist values” and removing passages that do not reflect communist beliefs. In a textbook for high school students released in September 2020, the authors included a passage from John 8, as revised in their new version. #prayforchina2022

The CCP's translation, however, alters the story where Christ ends up stoning the woman, as He admitted, "'I am also a sinner.'"

Nettleton told Faithwire that he found it shocking that the rewritten passage diminishes Jesus' divinity.

"In one sense, it's just like so arrogant to think, 'I'm going to rewrite the story of Jesus'… but then you think about denying the deity of Christ," he said. "If Jesus is a sinner, then he's not God."

He went on to note that the purpose of the revisions is to demonstrate the CCP's attempt to lessen Christianity's influence on some of its citizens.

"The issue for the Chinese Communist Party is control. It is always about control," Nettleton explained. "And they see the … Christian message as something that would take control away from the communist party."

The VOM spokesperson added that the Chinese government's goal is for the people to wake up every day and ask, "How can I serve the party today? How can I be a good communist today?"

Amid the CCP's revisions of the Scripture and a lack of unaltered Bibles, VOM hopes to send more copies of God's Word to fellow believers in China.

"That's one of the reasons why Voice of the Martyrs and other groups are so committed to delivering Bibles into China – even smuggling Bibles into China – because it's not available," he said. "One of the things I hope about this new translation is that it will backfire, and people will wonder, 'Why was it so important for the Chinese government to retranslate the Bible. Why was it so important for them to change this?'"

Voice of the Martyrs, along with other religious freedom groups, recently urged believers to boycott the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics due to China's persecution of Christians and other religious minorities.

https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/milton quintanilla/chinese-government-is-rewriting-the-bible-with communist-principles-watchdog-group-warns.html

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By Michael Gryboski , Mainline Church Editor

An employee for a delivery service in Florida who was fired when he refused to work a Sunday shift to attend worship service has won an antidiscrimination case against his former employer.

Tampa Bay Delivery Service, an Amazon delivery service provider based in the Tampa Bay area, will pay $50,000 in relief and oversee changes to its workplace environment to settle a religious discrimination lawsuit.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission brought the complaint on behalf of an unnamed worker who had been fired when he attended church instead of his shift.

According to an EEOC statement , the delivery service had scheduled the employee for a shift on a Sunday even though he had made it clear earlier that he could not work Sundays.

The EEOC argued that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 bars discrimination based on religion and "requires employers to reasonably accommodate an applicant’s or employee’s sincerely held religious beliefs unless it would pose an undue hardship."

The consent decree resolving the lawsuit was approved by a federal judge.

In addition to the $50,000 the delivery service will pay in relief, the company must also train staff to avoid religious discrimination and appoint a “religious accommodation coordinator.”

“We commend Tampa Bay Delivery Service for working collaboratively with EEOC to resolve this lawsuit,” said Robert E. Weisberg, the regional attorney for the EEOC Miami District.

“The company’s willingness to address EEOC’s concerns will help in preventing future employees from being forced to choose between employment and a religious belief.”

The EEOC filed the complaint last September in the U.S. District Courts for the Florida Middle District. Judge Charlene Edwards Honeywell presided over the case.

In 2019, 60-year-old Haitian immigrant Marie Jean Pierre was awarded $21 million in punitive damages after being fired from her job as a dishwasher by the Conrad Hotel in Miami.

Pierre worked at the hotel from 2006 until 2016. She was fired for refusing to work on Sundays even though she had gotten coworkers to cover her shifts by trading workdays with them.

“I love God. No, I can’t [work on] Sunday because Sunday, I honor God,” said Pierre in an interview with local media outlet NBC 6 South Florida in 2019.

The hotel had claimed that Pierre had been dismissed for misconduct, negligence and “unexcused absences,” alleging that the company was unaware of her reasons for not working Sundays.  

https://www.christianpost.com/news/amazon-provider-pays-50k-for firing-employee-work-sundays.html

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By JOHN FLESHER
March 6, 2022

TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (AP) — They railed against politicians, conducted military-style exercises and spoke darkly of confronting tyrants scheming to seize their guns and enslave them.

Yet historian JoEllen Vinyard says the “citizen militia” activists she got to know in the 1990s didn’t seem like the types who would abduct a governor or stage a coup.

“I don’t think they were dangerous,” said Vinyard, an Eastern Michigan University professor emeritus and author of a book about far-right movements in the state. “They reminded me of the good old boys I knew growing up in Nebraska.”

But as four men charged with conspiring to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer go on trial Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Grand Rapids, Vinyard and other political extremism scholars say things have changed in recent years. Their arrests came about three months before the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection that led to charges against many right-wing extremists and militants.

In contrast to militants from before, who mostly avoided bloodshed with the horrific exception of the Oklahoma City bombing, some modern successors have taken a more radical and potentially violent turn.

“This is a different type of domestic terrorism phenomenon than we’ve faced in previous decades — completely different from anything I’ve observed,” said Javed Ali, a University of Michigan professor who served with the FBI and intelligence agencies.

“You’ve got all these points on a very diverse threat spectrum — not centralized in any one corner, no single groups, no national leadership, completely disorganized and disaggregated,” Ali said. “It’s difficult for law enforcement to spot these threats. The Whitmer plot is a case in point.”

The alleged kidnapping conspiracy involved members of a little-known cell called the “Wolverine Watchmen” and others who attended a July 2020 meeting in Ohio of selfstyled “militia” leaders from several states, according to court documents.

They were angry about pandemic lockdowns and other policies they considered dictatorial, investigators said. Some had joined a protest months earlier at the Michigan

Capitol in Lansing , where armed demonstrators faced off with police and some carried guns into the Senate gallery.

Federal prosecutors in October 2020 charged six suspects in the alleged plot, including Ty Garbin and Kaleb Franks , who have pleaded guilty. Garbin received a sixyear prison term; Franks will be sentenced later.

The other four defendants are Adam Fox, Daniel Harris, Brandon Caserta and Barry Croft Jr. All are Michigan residents except Croft, who is from Delaware.

Eight other men accused of aiding the conspiracy have been charged in state court.

The Wolverine Watchmen are among the small, secretive groups that have appeared in Michigan since the initial burst of paramilitary activism faded, Ali said.

They began recruiting members on Facebook in November 2019 and communicated through an encrypted messaging platform, according to a state police affidavit. It said they held firearms training and tactical drills to prepare for “the boogaloo,“ an anticipated “uprising against the government or impending politically motivated civil war.”

The scheme against Whitmer was hatched the following summer during a meeting at which Watchmen discussed invading the statehouse and using explosives to distract law enforcement, Garbin acknowledged in his plea agreement.

They considered executing the Democratic governor or putting her on trial, eventually deciding to abduct her at her family’s vacation home in northern Michigan, the document said. Informants and undercover agents helped foil the alleged plot.

Vinyard, who attended meetings of self-described militia groups in southeastern Michigan for her research during the 1990s, said threatening language was rare then.

Members had long lists of grievances, some targeting the United Nations and a federal government they believed had exceeded its constitutional authority, she said. But others involved local law enforcement and courts.

“People talked about police harassment, truckers getting stopped by cops, fathers who had not been treated fairly when they got divorced and couldn’t see their kids,” she said.

Norman Olson, an Air Force veteran, gun shop owner and Baptist preacher who initially led the Michigan Militia, said then its members were outraged by deadly sieges involving federal agents at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, and Waco, Texas.

The militia drew international attention after the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, which killed 168 people. Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, convicted in the case, had attended meetings in Michigan. Olson said they’d been kicked out for advocating violence.

By the early 2000s the movement appeared to lose steam, experts said, perhaps because of public revulsion over the bombing, internal strife, the presidency of gun-friendly George W. Bush and a crackdown on terrorism after the 9/11 attacks.

Following President Barack Obama’s election, it resurfaced on a wave of right-wing populism embodied by the Tea Party movement and Donald Trump that crested amid fury at COVID-19 restrictions.

In 2010, the FBI charged nine members of a fundamentalist Christian sect in southeastern Michigan called Hutaree with conspiring to rebel against the government. The judge dismissed most of the case, but it signaled what some observers describe as the rise of a more incendiary segment of the far right.

Even other paramilitary groups were uneasy with the Hutaree and notified authorities, according to a paper by Vanderbilt University sociologist Amy Cooter, who studies rightwing militancy.

Lee Miracle, a longtime leader of the Southeast Michigan Volunteer Militia, urged restraint in a statement on the group’s website after the Wolverine Watchmen arrests in 2020.

“Our capacity for violence, as a free people, should always be well maintained, and kept within reach, but it should always be the LAST option,” said Miracle, who did not return an email seeking additional comment.

But organizations that track the more belligerent groups say they’ve made inroads in Michigan, which has an extensive history as a far-right breeding ground.

The nonprofit Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project says among the most active are newcomers such as the Boogaloo Boys and the Proud Boys, a self-described “Western chauvinist” association. Another is the Michigan Liberty Militia, which had a visible presence at the state Capitol protest.

The movement has splintered into many factions over the years because of leadership rivalries and ideological differences, said retired FBI agent Greg Stejskal, who dealt with the Michigan Militia in its early days. Still, it has remained overwhelmingly white, male and rooted in conspiratorial fear of losing guns and freedom.

“They feel like they’re subjugated, and this is their way of fighting back,” he said.

They’ve kept a somewhat lower profile since the kidnapping arrests and the invasion of the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters seeking to overturn the 2020 election, said Rachel Goldwasser, a research analyst with the nonprofit Southern Poverty Law Center.

The outcome of the Michigan conspiracy trial, she said, may “indicate whether they stay in their foxholes or come out as a force in public again.”

https://apnews.com/article/michigan-gretchen-whitmer-traversetraverse-city-grand-rapids d84520c39c294c641c00053591da263a

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China Bans Kids from Attending Church, Threatens Parents Who Break Law: Watchdog

Michael Foust| ChristianHeadlines.com Contributor | Monday, January 31, 2022

The eyes of the world may be on Beijing for the 2022 Winter Olympics, but the head of a religious liberty watchdog says China's persecution of Christians is nevertheless escalating.

"It is getting worse," David Curry, president and CEO of Open Doors, told Christian Headlines.

China was No. 17 on this year's 2022 World Watch List, which ranks the countries of the world according to the danger level for Christians. The report said Christians "are facing increased pressure from the Chinese authorities," due partially to the "most oppressive and sophisticated" surveillance system in the world.

Chinese Communist Party Chairman Xi Jinping "knows that he cannot stamp out" the nation's Christians, Curry said. There are an estimated 96 million Christians in China, the report says.

"And so he is slowly strangling Christian faith, and he's doing it with high-tech surveillance. They watch, and they track everybody in what they're doing – through facial recognition and other things. Imagine if the IRS owned every camera in every restaurant on every street in America. We would be very concerned that the IRS has that. China has that plus other means of surveilling, and so they have the ability to track and to score behavior."

Christians in China must attend government-approved churches that face heavy regulations, such as the editing of sermons. Because of that, many Christians attend illegal underground churches.

Curry summarized the surveillance strategy like this: "[These two citizens] are going to church too often. Therefore, they're not good communists. Therefore, they should lose their job. They can't fly – they're on a no-fly list."

"And all they did was go to Bible study. That's happening right now in China," he said.

Chinese law does not allow children "under the age of 18 to attend church," Curry said.

"So parents either have to disciple them themselves or sneak them into some sort of Bible study," Curry said. "What happens, in this case, is that the kids may not be let into the college of their choice if they attend Bible study, they may not get jobs, the parents may lose their job. So there's repercussions for this sort of thing."

The pandemic has given the government an excuse to persecute. Although all churches closed during the pandemic, "some churches were forced to remain closed once restrictions began to lift, and were quietly phased out," the report said.

"Christian leaders are generally the main target of government surveillance, and a very small number have been abducted," the report said. "Converts from a Muslim or Buddhist background from minority ethnic groups arguably face the most severe violations of religious freedom, because they are persecuted, not only by the authorities, but also by their families and communities."

https://www.christianheadlines.com/contributors/michael-foust/china bans-kids-from-attending-church-threatens-parents-who-break-law watchdog.html