‘Three-Self’ Pastor taken by Chinese Police
By Joseph DeCaro, Worthy News Correspondent
BEIJING, CHINA (Worthy News)– Last month, Chinese police abruptly abducted a “Three-Self” pastor from his own state sanctioned church in Henan Province, according to International Christian Concern.
About a dozen officers walked into the Nanle County Christian Church where they bound Pastor Zhang Shaojie and then took him away; almost one month later, his congregation still doesn’t know where he is, or even what condition he’s in.
The Sunday after Shaojie’s abduction, police surrounded the church and arrested more than 20 members who tried to go inside.
According to ICC, Pastor Shaojie’s arrest comes just one day after the Communist Central Committee promised to end its Re-education through Labor program that permitted police to arrest and sentence any citizen for up to four years of “re-education” without a trial; for decades the program had imprisoned thousands of Chinese Christians who attended unregistered house churches.
Shaojie’s arrest, however, was unprecedented not only because he was the pastor of an official Three-Self Church, but he was also chairman of the local Three-Self Committee!
Further, the arrest of dozens of Shaojie’s own officially sanctioned congregation is yet another challenge by the communist state to millions of Chinese Christians who thought they were safe and secure while worshipping in a Three-Self Church.