Chinese Underground Church Leaders Detained During Sunday Service Raid
On Sunday, armed police entered the Early Rain Covenant Church in Jiangyou, Sichuan province, and seized more than 30 members and two senior pastors during a Sunday service. The raid was carried out by an estimated 50 officers, including a SWAT team, who surrounded the hotel ballroom where the congregation had gathered.
The early raid was reported by the church’s official statement on Telegram. The statement confirmed that the leaders Yan Hong and Wu Wuqing were detained, while the remaining congregation—many of them children and the elderly—were escorted away in police vehicles and questioned in a detention centre.
According to the church, officers tried to get the remaining congregants to sign an affidavit in exchange for their release, but the officials did not reveal what was contained in that document. The congregants refused, and the officers eventually released them at 18:00. Remaining interrogations lasted until the late evening.
Founder Pastor Wang Yi was previously detained in 2018 and is serving a nine‑year jail term for “inciting subversion of state power” and “illegal business operations.” More recently, Yan Hong and Wu Wuqing had been summoned by police in January for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble.”
Chinese authorities never responded publicly to the statement from Early Rain Covenant, leaving the government’s motives unclear. The incident adds to a broader pattern of arrests among underground churches, which operate outside state‑sanctioned religious bodies.
“[Sunday’s] raid is another stark reminder that the Chinese Communist Party continues to treat peaceful Christian worship as a threat to state control,” said Bob Fu, founder of the non‑profit ChinaAid.
In a related case last October, 30 leaders of Zion Church were singled out across seven cities. Its founder, Ezra Jin, remains in custody.
For more on the ongoing crackdown of underground churches, visit this BBC article.
