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Zion Church

• Reaching Out in Love

  

  As the devastation of the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka fades into the memory of the media, the suffering of hundreds remains an ongoing concern for The Voice of the Martyrs Canada. As of May 6th, the total death toll stood at 257, including 40 foreign nationals. The hundreds who survived the attacks continue to face physical suffering, the horror of lost loved ones, and the trauma of witnessing such horrendous violence first hand. (For a previous report on the attacks, go to this page.)

• Opposition Expands and Grows

  

  For months, an ongoing campaign against house churches has resulted in closures throughout the country. As Eric Foley from VOM Korea says, "When China shut down more and more smaller underground churches earlier this year, they watched the world's reaction carefully and found that Christians around the world would do little. This has given them boldness to shut down the largest underground churches."

• Forceful Shutdown of Zion Church

  

  When Zion Church, one of Beijing's largest underground churches, refused to install surveillance cameras which could allow authorities to monitor them, they didn't know it would end with officials storming the church building to forcefully shut it down.

  After the worship service on September 9th, government officials entered the hall where the church members met with orders to close the church and confiscate their "illegal promotional material." In August, authorities had closed seven branches of the Zion Church around the city (see this report). With this latest order, all activities of the church have been officially banned. The church's pastor, Jin Mingri, states, "I fear that there is no way for us to resolve this issue with the authorities."