Republican Sen. Marco Rubio warns Christians of the Chinese Communist Party's attempts to 'stamp out faith for good' by co-opting religious authorities in their campaign.
The CCPs war against believers of any faith aside from that approved by the communist state seemed to spread not only in their nation, but also to Hong Kong, The Stream reported.
Not only is political freedom crushed in Hong Kong with its National Security Law (NSL), a draconian law imposed by the CCP. The communist government is also using it to eliminate almost every right of the citizens including freedoms of speech, assembly, expression, conscience and most especially faith to name a few.
When it comes to religious liberty, Hong Kong's de facto constitution states that "residents shall have freedom of conscience... freedom of religious belief and freedom to preach and to conduct and participate in religious activities in public."
However, the CCP is now moving to overturn religious freedom by using the pretext of "collusion with foreign forces" as indicated in the NSL.
To those who are unaware, this same move mirrors the action of CCP in mainland China where people who freely express their faith are repressed and oppressed without mercy.
Until now, the CCP has continued their brutality against religious minorities like the Uyghurs and Tibetans. Apparently, the communist party fear Christianity not only because of its exponential growth but because "CCP rightly recognizes that the Gospel is irreconcilably at odds with totalitarianism."
For the CCP, contending with a higher authority than that of the government is something that they cannot tolerate.
Despite all the crackdowns currently happening in Beijing and now in Hong Kong, Christians still keep the faith that they can negotiate a deal with the CCP to protect them as a minority. However, the CCPs refusal to come to a compromise is proven when they continued to tear down crosses and detain priests even after a negotiation with the Vatican.
Last year, Chinese authorities detained Hong Kong nuns while visiting their relatives in the province of Hebei. There were no charges brought against the nuns, but they were detained for three weeks, released to a house arrest and were forbidden to return back to their city.
Since then, CCP has increased their surveillance of believers who openly practice their faith.
In December, churches were raided and two members of the Good Neighbor North District Church were arrested after the CCP froze the church's and the pastor's bank account.
With all that has happened, the Vatican has been quiet since the repression campaign of the communist party.
Cardinal Zen, bishop emeritus of Vatican in Hong Kong, already warned that seeing an improvement with the CCP's actions is next to none.
Cardinal Zen even asked, ""Is there any choice between helping the government to destroy the Church or resisting the government to keep our faith?"
Apparently, the CCP is doing everything they can to co-opt religious authorities to succumb to their campaign of stamping out people's faith for good by putting fear and terror in the people's hearts.
If left unchecked, CCP might one day persuade people not to believe in God anymore and that they are the highest authority to be feared of.
When this time comes, believers must stand in their faith and fight the battle not in the flesh but in spirit through prayer and continued intercession for religious freedom.
