Targeting the next generation; The Chinese government is cracking down on Christianity, enforcing laws in ways it hadn’t before. ( Image: Lintao Zhang / Getty Images)
China’s recent crackdown on Christianity has led to intensified enforcement of a law already on the books: children and youth cannot convert to the faith until they’re 18.
Churches across China are canceling Sunday School classes for children in light of the new clampdown, according to Mission Network News.
“One of the rules that have always been in their law is that you cannot proselytize or you cannot convert somebody under the age of 18,” Erik Burklin of China Partner told Mission Network News.
Previously, he said, parents “were having their children come to church and many churches started what we would call Sunday School classes.”
“They would use that time to teach children Bible verses and teach them Christian songs and so forth,” Burklin said.
Now, though, many churches “have been notified” by China’s “Religious Affairs Bureau” that “you can no longer conduct Sunday School classes in your churches,” he said.
“They even put signage up in the entrance of some churches to indicate that,” Burklin said.
This means China Partner’s YouthServe ministry – aimed at teaching church leaders how to conduct ministry for teens ages 13 to 18 – is “problematic,” Mission Network News reported.
During a recent trip, Burklin said, pastors approached him and said, “Please, we can no longer invite you to come and do these youth ministry trainings for us because we need to adhere to this new enforcement of this law.”
China Partner has discontinued the YouthServe initiative, according to Mission Network News.
Churches in China, Burklin said, must be creative if they are to reach children and teens with the gospel.
“One of the ways that we have learned also that we can reach that age group is through the parents,” Burklin said. “As we’ve started these marriage retreats and couples’ counseling sessions, [we’ve noticed that] many of these young couples have teenagers in their home.”
As earlier reported by Fox News, China’s ruling Communist Party, under President Xi Jinping, ordered that all faith-groups must “Sinicize” to ensure they are loyal to the official atheistic party or face the wrath of the Communist regime.
Churches are being raided, pastors detained, schools closed, and children are being asked about their parents’ reading habits, ministry partners report.
“The Bible says train up a child in the way they should go and when they are old, they will not depart from it,” Voice of the Martyrs USA Spokesperson Todd Nettleton told the Mission Network News. “The Chinese government, the Communist Party leaders, are very aware of that as well and they want to train up a child to be a good Communist.”
Burklin said persecuted believers are not disillusioned because they serve God, not the government, even though they respect the laws.
“God is in control, God loves the Chinese people, and in spite of all this, the church will grow,” he said, adding he’s encouraged by a Bible verse from the New Testament: Matthew 16:18: “Jesus said, ‘I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.'”
