Between the government-controlled “red market” of religion and the banned and persecuted groups of the “black market,” lies the vast area of the religious “gray market,” including churches and temples that are neither legal nor explicitly banned as xie jiao and a...
Additional information has emerged about the arrest of 71 believers in Henan’s Shangqiu city. Earlier in August, Bitter Winter reported about the arrest of 71 Christians from a house church in Henan. We have received information that one of them was tortured and ten...
“Official” or “government-controlled” religions are often mentioned in China. Five religious bodies are indeed authorized by the regime, although even their liberty is limited. Massimo Introvigne Bitter Winter readers often encounter news about “government-controlled”...
A family of three who are all members of The Church of Almighty God were detained during the “Operation Thunder” in Liaoning’s Dandong city. As Bitter Winter reported earlier, on June 26-28, a full-scale “Operation Thunder” was implemented in Liaoning Province,...
A believer was arrested in 2015 and sentenced to two years in jail for believing in a heterodox religious movement. Article 300 of the Chinese Criminal Code states that “using” a xie jiao (heterodox teachings) is a crime punishable with jail penalties from three to...
The current list of xie jiao, compiled by Hong Kong scholar Ed Irons Since the late Ming era, China has used xie jiao to designate religious movements the government does not like. Their repression has always been brutal, but what a xie jiao is, is far from being...
Dai Xiaoqiang, a pastor from Zhejiang Province, discloses details of being detained in a water dungeon. In June 2015, the local police of Qianxi arrested and detained Dai Xiaoqiang, a pastor in a house church in Hangzhou, in the Guiyang airport. He was accused of...
A university student and a member of The Church of Almighty God in Liaoning Province was arrested because of her faith and was later forced to quit her studies. On June 27, 2018, five officers from a police station in Jinzhou city, Liaoning Province burst into a...
Since the arrests of reporters did not stop Bitter Winter, China escalates the campaign against our magazine and adopts extraordinary measures to prevent the leaks of secret documents. Bitter Winter reported on August 1 that several reporters that have sent...
Stories of three elderly Chinese Christians in Jilin Province and how they were persecuted for their belief. In the spring of 2015, Xiao Hong arrived home from the Tumen city market when three police officers apprehended her in plain clothes. She was arrested without...