HONG KONG (UCAN): The Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission launched a campaign across China to crack down on what it deemed “the illegal activities” of commercial websites and media outlets, however, websites and social media accounts managed by Church people have also been affected by the move.
Father Paul, who is responsible for the WeChat public account of a diocese in northern China, said officials asked him to delete certain content claiming it violated the provisions of the Regulations on the Administration of Religious Information Services on the Internet that came to effect in March (Sunday Examiner, March 15).
The officials also asked him not to publish religious content and delete what had been already published. They also urged him to pay “attention to public opinion on the Internet” and “not to give the foreign media an excuse to attack the government.”
Father Paul said the officials’ demands show that they “are neither confident about legitimacy of their own regulation nor of their own system.”
Father Zhao, also from northern China, said authorities started monitoring the Church’s social network when churches were closed earlier this year because of the Covid-19 coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic. He was asked to stop livestreaming Masses for his parishioners.
Officials said the regulations did not allow people “to disseminate religious beliefs via the Internet, especially on livestreaming platforms,” the priest said.
He said authorities were worried that priests might criticise the government online. Besides, they also thought online Masses could attract many people to the Church, weakening the Communist Party, he said.
“They do not have the confidence and the courage to face reality. They can only suppress others and rely on violence to solve problems. This is a tyranny of dictatorship,” he said.
Father Peter, a priest in China’s northeast, said he was also asked to stop livestreaming Masses during the pandemic. Officials said they would block the church if they did not impose the rule banning the broadcasting of religious content.
Father Peter said the regulations themselves are “illegal because they suppress the Church and violate the freedom of faith and speech.”
The surveillance includes even laypeople. For example, one woman said she was on a WeChat group in the morning but was accused of violating the rules and blocked in the afternoon. She said her violation sharing Bible verses with fellow Christians.
“The government has repeatedly denied it monitored people’s Internet access, but it blocks Internet accounts based on what they communicate. How is this even possible?” she asked.
An operator of the heavily subscribed WeChat public account said the government aims to choke any voice other than the official one. Requesting anonymity, she said she was concerned about the government campaign.
She said the government claims the crackdown on content is to help the unity of China. However, the move comes when China faces international criticism on several fronts and it wants to hide facts from Chinese people.
“So it has to use official media to spread misinformation to the public and get them to hate the world. At the same time, it is cracking down on online platforms to prevent people from sending out messages,” she said.
China has always considered Christianity as a medium promoting the western world, so it wants to crack down on the religion, she added.
