Ten weeks after the coordinated raids on the Zion Church network, 18 pastors and church members remain in detention and their families are struggling to cope in the absence of their loved ones, with some worried about health issues, some leaving the country and some suffering ongoing grief.
Zion Church, led by senior pastor and church founder Jin Mingri (pictured), is one of the largest networks of unregistered churches in China, with five thousand members meeting in over forty cities and an estimated ten thousand attending online.
Around thirty church leaders and members across nine provinces were arrested in coordinated raids beginning on 9 October, in what Dr Bob Fu of China Aid described as “the most extensive campaign against urban house-church networks in more than forty years”. Eighteen leaders and members have been formally charged and remain in detention, while the others have been released, five of them on bail pending trial.
The 18 church members are being held in two detention centres in Beihai, Guangxi: nine women are in Beihai No. 1 Detention Centre (Wang Cong, Wu Qiuyu, Li Shengjuan, Hu Yanzi, An Mei, Zhan Ge, Wei Yunfei and two others identified only as Sister Z and Sister M for safety reasons; and nine men in Beihai No. 2 Detention Centre: Jin (Ezra) Mingri, Yin Huibin, Gao Yingjia, Wang Lin, Liu Jiang, Sun Cong, Liu Zhenbin, Lin Shucheng, and Wang Zhong. Several detainees continue to undergo frequent interrogations.
Last week, families of the detained Christians briefly met on a video call during which some shared updates and others prayed. China Aid commented, “These moments of mutual comfort allowed them to feel a strength that has not yet been taken away.”
Pastor Jin has been permitted to meet with his lawyer and a legal assistant, but meetings are difficult as the pastor is handcuffed and has to communicate through iron bars while seated in a fixed, enclosed chair.
His family reports that all post sent to the detention centre has been rejected and that he was denied a Bible for almost two months, despite repeated requests. He has now received one, with defence lawyer Zhang Kai stating on 9 December that “through multi-party coordination and communication [the pastor] has been able to read the Bible in the detention centre“. However, other detained church members have not been permitted to have Bibles or any other books.
Zion Church reports that members in many parts of the country continue to receive phone calls from police, are summoned for questioning and are required to sign interrogation records. Law enforcement agencies persist in attempting to frame members’ offerings as “fraud”.
The church network continues to function, despite the pressure its members face, and recently circulated a communication quoting the verse “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” (Romans 8 v 35). On Sunday 14 December the online worship service was held as scheduled, with more than 1,500 Zoom accounts connected. One church member commented that in the midst of fear they have not stopped worshipping, nor have they abandoned their spiritual life and Zion Church
Health concerns
Some families are concerned about the health of their detained loved ones, including the family of elder Wang Zhong, who has a heart condition. He previously underwent stent surgery and currently has blockages in two major arteries near his heart, requiring urgent medical intervention. His wife Tong Hong has repeatedly applied for medical bail pending trial, but all requests have been denied.
Senior pastor Jin Mingri suffers from severe diabetes and while he is reportedly receiving medication, his wife Chunli Liu (known as Anna) said she is “deeply concerned about his health”.
Families flee
Some pastors’ wives have taken their children and travelled to Thailand, fearing for their safety. China Aid reports that most entered on tourist visas, leaving them anxious about their future legal status and the length of stay. Some families have been intercepted while attempting to leave China, with some eventually allowed to pass, while others were stopped at border control and prevented from leaving.
Pastor Wang Lin’s wife Su Ziming is one of those who have been able to leave the country; she and their two young children are now trying to build a stable life abroad. Pastor Wang (pictured) reportedly had a long-held hope that his children would grow up in an environment free from repeated expulsion and deprivation of schooling.
Pastor Wang was the first to be detained in the crackdown when police took him at Shenzhen Bao’an Airport on 9 October, where he had travelled from his home in Shanghai, and Su Ziming was also detained for a time. They have faced repeated harassment since June 2025, including frequent forced relocation, disrupting their children’s education. After the pastor’s arrest, his wife and children were reportedly under “significant emotional distress”.
Geng Pengpeng, the wife of detained pastor Gao Yingjia, also left China out of concern for her safety and her six-year-old son’s schooling and is in Thailand. She told Radio Taiwan International (RTI) in an interview that since the arrest operation in October her life has been “plunged into uncertainty and fear”. She discovered that she too been placed on the arrest list and on the advice of lawyers and friends she decided to leave the country with her son, travelling first to South Korea.
“I did not know how to plan the next step… just for my child and me to not fall ill from the exhaustion of traveling around,” she said. They moved on to Thailand, but she said the decision was made “under extreme urgency and without any preparation”. Geng Pengpeng said that 9 to 11 October were the most frightening three days of her life. Along with the arrests, power was cut to church members’ homes, and door locks were prised open. Friends urged her and her husband to hide and they turned off their phones and removed SIM cards to evade tracking, but Beihai police still located them at 2 am on 11 October. Her husband was taken away and she believed she would be taken too. Her son has frequent nightmares, worrying that his mother will be arrested.
Geng Pengpeng travelled with her son to Guangxi to organise legal and personal affairs, but when she returned to Beijing a week later she discovered that the lock on her door had been forced open, some belongings were missing and she sensed that she was being monitored. Admitting to RTI that she often weeps at night, Geng Pengpeng said, “I am constantly drifting, worried about my husband and also worried about what I should do next.”
Despite her anxiety however, she said that prayer allows her to find moments of comfort amid the chaos and that she believes her husband and the other detainees can bring light to those around them, despite being in darkness.
Pastor Sun Cong’s wife Gu Xiaoyu, who was forced to leave home with her three children, wrote on social media, “Telling myself that the old days are gone forever… A profound sense of rootlessness rises from my chest, as if I have lost the home my husband gave me. This is the first time I have so deeply understood: this is what it means to be like duckweed, floating without roots.”
Prolonged grief
China Aid reports that “For families who remain in China, the reality is even more heartbreaking.” Many children of detainees have suffered significant emotional distress, especially those who witnessed their parents being taken away in police raids.
The young daughter and mother-in-law of pastor Wang Cong (pictured) have reportedly remained in “prolonged grief” since she was taken away and family members say the elderly woman often weeps over the loss of her daughter-in-law.
Wang Cong’s husband Ren Zhong wrote a prayer letter that has circulated within the church community describing the pressure the family is under, writing that after his wife was detained the health of older family members deteriorated rapidly. His mother suffered a relapse of her severe depression, experiencing symptoms such as palpitations and difficulty breathing, and expressing negative thoughts such as “life has no meaning” to her family, causing deep concern. The letter said their three-year-old daughter was traumatised by the late-night raid on their home by law enforcement officers and continues to show signs of fear. Ren Zhong stated that, given the family’s special circumstances, his wife’s lawyer had made an application for bail but it was rejected.
Thanksgiving dinner party raided
In late November more than twenty police officers burst into a guesthouse in Beijing’s Fengtai district where around ten Christians connected with Zion Church were preparing for a private Thanksgiving dinner in a rented space.
Participants said the event was simply a “family-style Thanksgiving sharing,” with no religious ceremonies, and was not open to the public. They said police cited “illegal gathering” and checked each person’s ID before taking everyone to the police station to make statements. All except a young woman named Chang Rou were released after questioning. “This was just an ordinary dinner in a private space,” one participant said. “There was nothing of a dangerous nature and no acts that were illegal.”
(China Aid, Radio Taiwan International)
Photo credits:
Zion Church (Jin Mingri)
China Aid (Wang Lin and Wang Cong)