August 12, 2020 (Morning Star News) – An 84-year-old Christian in Shanxi Province, China was among people in at least five provinces ordered to remove Christian imagery from their homes and replace them with pictures of President Xi Jinping, religious rights magazine Bitter Winter reported.
“The township [Chinese Communist] Party [CCP] secretary asked me to take down and throw away the cross and told me to pray to Xi Jinping from then on,” the unidentified Christian told Bitter Winter. “Xi Jinping is a man, not God. I feel saddened for the cross being taken down, but there is nothing I can do.”
That was in June. Since May, CCP officials in Shanxi, Henan, Jiangxi, Shandong and other provinces have threatened to withdraw the social welfare benefits poor people rely on for food, especially during the COVID-19 epidemic, if they refuse to replace Christian imagery with that of Xi, the magazine reported.
“In June, a village official in Lin County, administered by the prefecture-level city of Lüliang in the northern province of Shanxi, repeatedly notified villagers through social media to remove all religious symbols from their homes,” Bitter Winter reported. “He stated that the cross symbolized heterodox teachings, which should be purged as per orders from higher authorities. If not, they will be held criminally accountable. The official stressed that impoverished…
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