China: new restrictions on foreign Christians

New regulations make religious activities much harder for foreign Christians in China.

Foreign Christians will no longer be able to preach or evangelise in China, following newly enacted restrictions from 1 May in the name of ‘national security’.

The rules specifically target foreigners in China. While Christian foreigners are not officially banned, any events involving foreign nationals – from preaching to religious ceremonies, down to visits from missionaries – must be approved by the relevant authorities to be considered legal. In practice, these permissions are very unlikely to be given by the authorities. While Christianity is officially permitted under the Three-Self Church movement, these churches are heavily controlled and monitored by the government.

A wide range of restrictions

Any foreigner coming into China must not have any religious books or audio-visual materials that ‘exceed personal use quantities’ – otherwise they must obtain approval from relevant authorities and declare them at customs. This effectively prohibits the public importation of religious books, including Bibles.

A further wide range of religious activities are now classified as illegal – including:

• ‘interfering with or controlling Chinese religious groups’
• establishing religious organisations
• promoting ‘religious extremism’
• inviting Chinese citizens to join a religion
• producing or selling religious books
• organising religious education and training
• accepting donations from Chinese organisations or citizens for religious purposes.

The rules also prohibit using religion to undermine China’s national unity, ethnic solidarity, religious harmony and social stability – terms which are broad enough to obstruct anything that might threaten the Chinese Communist Party’s control of its citizens.

It is worth noting that history has shown that laws controlling religious expression tend to be executed to differing extents across the country. In some regions, these regulations are likely to be strictly imposed, while other regions will be much looser in their application.

Updating existing restrictions

These restrictions result from the newly revised ‘Implementation Rules for the Administration of Religious Activities of Foreigners in the People’s Republic of China’. The laws are not new themselves – rather, the Chinese government has issued regulations relating to existing laws, dating from 1994, that are much more detailed than previously.

China never granted visas to foreigners on the basis of them being missionaries; this work has always been covert. Foreign nationals who have visas on other bases have, of course, shared the good news of Jesus. These regulations make that much harder. There are also concerns that the restrictions will mean increased pressure on domestic religious organisations.

Local believers and foreign missionaries join in asking for the worldwide church to pray with them, following the enactment of these regulations.