The detained priests, nuns and seminarians belong to the diocese of Baoding City, which has at least fifty thousand underground Catholics, according to the U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern.

The raid took place on Monday morning, when Fr. Lu Genjun, former vicar general of Baoding, was also detained, ICC said, quoting Asia News. The city authorities released two seminarians a few hours later, but no one knows where the others are being kept. The intention of the officials could be to force the clergy to join the state-sanctioned Catholic open church, ICC remarked.

In August, Chinese Communist Party officials ordered dozens of churches to replace crosses with the five-pointed star, the symbol featured on the country’s flag to represent the CCP and its role in the nation, according to the religious liberty magazine Bitter Winter.

The Chinese government continued its campaign against Christianity during the country’s coronavirus outbreak by destroying crosses and demolishing a church while people were on lockdown.

Source: christianpost.com