Shanxi Province, a US-based religious rights group said.
China Aid Association (CAA), which has close contacts with persecuted Christians, quoted "reliable sources" as saying that "30 uniformed young men" entered the church premises in Xi’an city at 6pm on November 22, "with wooden sticks in their hands."
Two hours later, a bulldozer started tearing down the Catholic church, CAA said. It was unclear whether the uniformed men were part of the Chinese security apparatus, and CAA said construction was briefly halted after government officials from the religious affairs bureau came to the site.
But "the evening of November 23, the destruction resumed. Forty uniformed young men armed with sticks started beating the nuns who were defending the church building. 16 nuns suffered eye injuries and/or broken legs," CAA added in a statement to BosNewsLife News Center.
BISHOP DETAINED
Some are still hospitalized, CAA said. News of the incident followed news that Catholic Bishop Jai Zhiguo remained jailed to attend "study sessions" after being detained earlier this month. Two priests arrested with him were released, Catholic Church sources said.
Six priests in Bishop Jai’s diocese of Zheng Ding in Hebei Province were also arrested on November 18.
The Cardinal Kung Foundation, which supports the underground Catholic Church in China said two priests, identified Wan Jin Shan and Gao Lingshen, were "severely beaten during the arrests." Both men were reportedly in their 50s. Priests Guo Zhijun (36) Zhang Ziuchi (60), Peng Jianjun (30) and Zhang Yinhu (45) were also held, human rights activists said.
"HORROR CAMPAIGN"
"Obviously, the intensified horror campaign by the Chinese government to force the underground Church religious and faithful to register with the official Patriotic Church is actively ongoing," said Joseph Kung, the president of the Cardinal Kung Foundation. " I urgently call once again on the Olympic Committee to take note of these arrests and to consider cancelling the Games in China in 2008 in order to preserve its good name and spirit."
Protestant church leaders are also suffering, CAA reported. On Wednesday, November 30, Bejing’s First Intermediate People’s Court formal the trial of Pastor Cai Zhuohua, a prominent
Beijing house church leader, who was November 8, 2005 was sentenced to three years in jail for
printing hundreds of thousands of Bibles and other Christian publications, CAA said.
China’s Communist government has denied human rights abuses and says Christians are free to worship in the state run churches. However religious rights groups say most of China’s up to 80 million Christians do not want state interference in their prayer lives and therefore worship in ‘underground’ house churches. (With BosNewsLife’s Stefan J. Bos and reports from China).
