Tu Da Sha Church Demolition in China. This is Tu Da Sha Church inXiaoshan District of Hangzhou City, in the province of Zhejiang in China. This rare and illegal footage of a church demolition was …More
Tu Da Sha Church Demolition in China.
This is Tu Da Sha Church inXiaoshan District of Hangzhou City, in the province of Zhejiang in China. This rare and illegal footage of a church demolition was smuggled out of China. Christians of all denominations who do not accept Communist party registration, including many roman catholics, are subjected to these kinds of state crackdowns.
[if you wish to skip the background info and go straight to the description of what's happening in the video scroll down to the asterisk]
Tu Da Sha Church was founded by an English protestant missionary in 1930 in pre-Communist China, and it had not registered itself with the Communist government. It had a membership of about 1500. The government declared its intention to destroy the church in 2003, at which point the members declared a three-day fast.On the evening of June 25, 200 brothers and sisters went to the church to pray. At midnight, approximately 100 additional brothers and sisters came from neighboring house churches to support their efforts.
Around 3:40 am, June 26, 100 people from the PSB, People Procurators, People's Court, Land Management Bureau and Religious Affairs Bureau arrived at the church with 27 trucks, several cars and two bulldozers. The government officials thought that, at such an early hour, no one would be at the church and they could destroy it unnoticed.
To their surprise they came upon 300 believers, from a very young to a very old age, all kneeling on the floor of the sanctuary praying.
Believers shut off the electricity to o keep the church from being destroyed . Yet government officials decided to call in reinforcements and told believers they would return around 8:00 am.
*[What you see in the video begins here:]
At 7:32 am a large group of government authorites arrived with over 200 military policemen accompanying them and more than 40 trucks, several cars, one bulldozer and one ambulance .
After realizing the government's intention to destroy the church, the driver (of the now missing bulldoze)r refused to earn money in this manner, as he did not return with them to demolish the building.
The destruction of the church was well organized by the government. First they used police cars to control traffic around the church. No one was allowed to enter from the outside. Then police dragged all the bicycles parked outside the sanctuary to a distant location.
Next they knocked down the doors to the sanctuary and asked the people inside to come out. No one moved inside the church as faithful continued to sing hymns.
The police were then ordered to drag them outside the building. However, some officers were reluctant to force them to leave. The Christians inside were praying as they normally do, kneeling on a small prayer pad.
Police units then knocked them down and dragged them across the floor on their prayer pads. Yet some military police did not want to drag away the innocent church members.
One policeman picked up a prayer pad, which was dirty from being dragged, and dusted it off and gave …
This is Tu Da Sha Church inXiaoshan District of Hangzhou City, in the province of Zhejiang in China. This rare and illegal footage of a church demolition was smuggled out of China. Christians of all denominations who do not accept Communist party registration, including many roman catholics, are subjected to these kinds of state crackdowns.
[if you wish to skip the background info and go straight to the description of what's happening in the video scroll down to the asterisk]
Tu Da Sha Church was founded by an English protestant missionary in 1930 in pre-Communist China, and it had not registered itself with the Communist government. It had a membership of about 1500. The government declared its intention to destroy the church in 2003, at which point the members declared a three-day fast.On the evening of June 25, 200 brothers and sisters went to the church to pray. At midnight, approximately 100 additional brothers and sisters came from neighboring house churches to support their efforts.
Around 3:40 am, June 26, 100 people from the PSB, People Procurators, People's Court, Land Management Bureau and Religious Affairs Bureau arrived at the church with 27 trucks, several cars and two bulldozers. The government officials thought that, at such an early hour, no one would be at the church and they could destroy it unnoticed.
To their surprise they came upon 300 believers, from a very young to a very old age, all kneeling on the floor of the sanctuary praying.
Believers shut off the electricity to o keep the church from being destroyed . Yet government officials decided to call in reinforcements and told believers they would return around 8:00 am.
*[What you see in the video begins here:]
At 7:32 am a large group of government authorites arrived with over 200 military policemen accompanying them and more than 40 trucks, several cars, one bulldozer and one ambulance .
After realizing the government's intention to destroy the church, the driver (of the now missing bulldoze)r refused to earn money in this manner, as he did not return with them to demolish the building.
The destruction of the church was well organized by the government. First they used police cars to control traffic around the church. No one was allowed to enter from the outside. Then police dragged all the bicycles parked outside the sanctuary to a distant location.
Next they knocked down the doors to the sanctuary and asked the people inside to come out. No one moved inside the church as faithful continued to sing hymns.
The police were then ordered to drag them outside the building. However, some officers were reluctant to force them to leave. The Christians inside were praying as they normally do, kneeling on a small prayer pad.
Police units then knocked them down and dragged them across the floor on their prayer pads. Yet some military police did not want to drag away the innocent church members.
One policeman picked up a prayer pad, which was dirty from being dragged, and dusted it off and gave …
