amid reports that one of their jailed leaders and two other imprisoned Christian relatives will receive a new court verdict for printing hundreds of thousands of Bibles and other Christian publications.
Pastor Cai Zhuohua, his wife Xiao Yunfei and her brother Xiao Gaowenone, received a combined prison sentence of nearly seven years in prison November 8, on charges of "illegal business practices" after security forces raided a warehouse where they reportedly discovered 237,000 copies of the Bible and other Christian publications in September last year.
A fourth member of the family, Hu Jinyun, was also asked to appear, although she escaped sentencing in the first trial, human rights watchers said. The verdict is to be handed out by the First People’s Intermediate Court of Beijing on Tuesday, December 20, said the US-based religious rights group China Aid Association (CAA) in a statement to BosNewsLife.
It comes after a second trial was unexpectedly launched in late November, apparently under international pressure, after Pastor Cai and his relatives were allegedly forced to withdraw an appeal, BosNewsLife monitored. During his time in detention he and his relatives were apparently tortured.
90 TIMES INTERROGATED
CAA, which has close ties with house churches in China, said that before his initial sentence of three years imprisonment Pastor "Cai was interrogated at almost 90 times by both the State Security Bureau and the Public Security Bureau." It quoted "one sympathetic officer" as telling CAA that "because of the heavy handed interrogation held at midnight every time, pastor Cai’s both legs were seen trembling whenever his name was called."
Co-defendant Hu Jinyun, who was released, said the "four convicted were forced to sign their names in blank paper with different dates. Every time, a electric shock baton was used to threaten them," CAA reported.
It added that "both Cai’s mother and Ms. Hu had been under closely surveillance by about a
dozen plain-clothed police offers. They were cursed as “betrayer of the country’ because they accepted interviews by overseas media."
Cai, calling from prison, "rebuked" his mother this month "not to make further noise for his case," CAA claimed. It seemed the pastor was forced to make that telephone call, the group added.
WORLD WATCHES
"The whole world will watch this case closely," said CAA President Bob Fu, a close friend and former co-worker of Pastor Cai. "This will be seen a litmus test on whether Chinese citizens are indeed having true religious freedom or not." As the date with the court approached, house churches prayed for these and other persecuted pastors. Their ‘Lights of Christmas’ prayer initiative focuses on providing round-the-clock prayers for 1,225 Chinese pastors and their families.
US-based WorldServe Ministries backs the initiative to encourage Christians outside China to participate in the prayer sessions. When imprisoned pastors "are forced to do hard labor – making bricks, mining coal, putting together cigarette lighters…and even assembling Christmas lights," the organization said on its website.
"The same Christmas lights we use to celebrate the Savior’s birth are being used to punish Chinese pastors who have risked everything to share Jesus to the largest people group on earth…" said WorldServe Ministries, which has investigated persecution of Christians in China and other areas.
"Instead of boycotting these items, house church leaders in China have asked that we use our Christmas lights as reminders to pray that they have the strength to stand firm for the Savior during their suffering, and for the Lord to protect and care for their families."
Most of the estimated 80-million Christians are believed to gather in ‘underground’ house churches, named this way as they receive no permission for official church buildings. China’s government has denied human rights abuses and claims that Christians are free to worship within state approved denominations. (With reports from China and BosNewsLife Research).
