作者：孙浩亮

长期以来，中国官方在国际舞台上始终坚称“中国公民享有充分的宗教信仰自由”。然而，这一叙事在现实的铁幕下正不断被撕裂。2026年6月14日，成都秋雨圣约教会的三十多名神职人员与信徒在四川江油的一场主日聚会中，遭到大批警察、特警以及民宗局官员的暴力冲击，晏鸿、吴五清等多位长老被处以行政拘留。这场针对非官方家庭教会的精准打压，再次将中共精心包装的“伪宗教自由”推到了聚光灯下。

要理解这场持续数十年的信仰拉锯战，必须将其放在中共的核心宗教工具——“三自教会”政策的显微镜下进行审视。

“三自”的异化：从独立自主到行政附庸

“三自”原则（自治、自养、自传）在20世纪50年代提出时，表面上的政治口号是割断中国基督教会与西方帝国主义的行政隶属关系。但在数十年的演变中，“三自教会”已经从一个号称独立自主的宗教组织，完全异化为国家机器的一个行政分支。

在“三自”体制下，所谓的“自治”变成了“必须接受中国共产党的绝对领导”；“自传”则演变为“必须按照官方的政治意识形态来阐释圣经”。近年来，官方强力推行的“基督教中国化”运动，更是要求教堂升国旗、贴社会主义核心价值观。当政治纲领凌驾于神圣教义之上，当讲台上的宣讲必须经过意识形态的严格政审，“三自教会”在事实上已经变成了替官方统战、维稳的政治工具。

过滤器的逻辑：顺我者“合法”，逆我者“取缔”

秋雨圣约教会之所以成为官方持续打压的重点，恰恰是因为它拒绝加入“三自”体系。这揭示了中共“宗教自由”的本质：它不是保护公民信仰权利的普世原则，而是一种顺从性的分级管理体制机制。

愿意交出思想控制权的教会：被纳入“三自”系统，赐予“合法”外衣，成为官方用来对国际社会展示“宗教繁荣”的政治盆景与金丝雀。

坚守宗教独立、拒绝政治渗透的家庭教会：则被直接贴上“非法聚集”、“危害社会秩序”的标签，遭到 从日常监控、截访、逼迁，到如今直接动用警力包围冲击的严酷打压。

这种“非此即彼”的过滤器逻辑，充分暴露了其宗教自由政策的虚伪性。真正的宗教自由，核心在于公民能够按照其良知和信仰自由选择聚会场所、敬拜方式和神学立场，而不是必须在“成为体制的传声筒”与“成为国家的专政对象”之间做单选题。

2026年暴力冲击的深层警示

2026年6月14日秋雨教会信徒在异地酒店聚会仍遭六七十名警察包围，这一细节传递出了更为严峻的信号。它表明官方对独立信仰的容忍度已经降到了冰点，其监控和打压网络已经不再受地理位置的限制。即使信徒们退出了市中心的传统教堂，转而走向边缘的非正式场所，甚至异地秘密聚会，国家机器的触角依然无孔不入。

连数名年幼的孩子也被一同押上大巴车和警车的画面，更是将这种政治威慑的残酷性展露无遗。这种打压的最终目的，不是为了消除某种现实的安全威胁，而是为了在精神层面上制造恐惧，迫使所有独立于党体制之外的社会自组织——无论是宗教团体、民间NGO还是维权社群——彻底丧失生存空间。

结语

秋雨圣约教会的十字架并没有随着2018年的取缔而消失，反而随着2026年盛夏的这场冲击变得更加沉重。当一个政权需要动用特警、大巴车去围剿三十几个坐在酒店房间里唱诗、祷告的平民和儿童时，它所展现的绝非强大，而是一种深刻的意识形态不安全感。

通过“三自”政策将宗教豢养为权力的附庸，同时用警棍和拘留证去消灭真正的独立信仰——这就是秋雨教会事件背后的真相。中国离真正的宗教自由，依然有着一条由铁网、警灯和伪善谎言所筑成的漫长鸿沟。

编辑：Gloria Wang

翻译：戈冰

Official “Canaries” and Underground “Crosses”: A Look at the CCP’s Pseudo-Religious Freedom Through the Crackdown on Early Rain Covenant Church

Author:Sun Haoliang

Abstract: The Chinese official apparatus has long claimed to guarantee freedom of religious belief, but the recent renewed suppression of the Early Rain Covenant Church in Chengdu has drawn intense external attention. The incident once again highlights the long-standing contradiction between Chinese house churches and the official “Three-Self Church” system, as well as the ongoing tug-of-war between religious policy and autonomy of faith.

For a long time, the Chinese official apparatus has consistently maintained on the international stage that “Chinese citizens enjoy full freedom of religious belief.” However, this narrative is being continuously torn apart under the iron curtain of reality. On June 14, 2026, more than thirty clergy members and believers of the Chengdu Early Rain Covenant Church were violently raided by a large number of police officers, special police, and officials from the Bureau of Ethnic and Religious Affairs during a Sunday worship service in Jiangyou, Sichuan. Several elders, including Yan Hong and Wu Wuqing, were subjected to administrative detention. This targeted crackdown on an unofficial house church has once again pushed the CCP’s meticulously packaged “pseudo-religious freedom” into the spotlight.

To understand this decades-long tug-of-war over faith, it must be examined under the microscope of the CCP’s core religious tool—the “Three-Self Church” policy.

The Alienation of “Three-Self”: From Independence and Autonomy to Administrative Subsidiary

When the “Three-Self” principle (self-governance, self-support, and self-propagation) was proposed in the 1950s, the superficial political slogan was to sever the administrative subordination of the Chinese Christian church to Western imperialism. However, over decades of evolution, the “Three-Self Church” has completely alienated from an organization claiming independence and autonomy into an administrative branch of the state apparatus.

Under the “Three-Self” system, the so-called “self-governance” has turned into “must accept the absolute leadership of the Chinese Communist Party”; “self-propagation” has evolved into “must interpret the Bible according to the official political ideology.” In recent years, the “Sinicization of Christianity” campaign vigorously promoted by the authorities goes so far as to require churches to raise the national flag and post the Core Socialist Values. When political programs override sacred doctrines, and when the preaching on the pulpit must undergo strict ideological vetting, the “Three-Self Church” has, in fact, turned into a political tool for the authorities’ united front and stability maintenance operations.

The Logic of the Filter: “Legitimacy” for Those Who Comply, “Eradication” for Those Who Resist

The reason why Early Rain Covenant Church has become a primary target of continuous official suppression is precisely because it refuses to join the “Three-Self” system. This reveals the core essence of the CCP’s “religious freedom”: it is not a universal principle protecting citizens’ rights to faith, but rather a compliance-based, tiered management system and mechanism.

Churches willing to surrender intellectual control: Incorporated into the “Three-Self” system and granted the cloak of “legitimacy,” they become political bonsai trees and canaries used by the authorities to showcase “religious prosperity” to the international community.

House churches that steadfastly maintain religious independence and refuse political infiltration: Directly labeled as “illegal gatherings” and “endangering social order,” they face harsh suppression ranging from routine surveillance, interception, and forced eviction, to the current direct deployment of police forces to surround and raid them.

This “either-or” filter logic fully exposes the hypocrisy of its religious freedom policy. The core of genuine religious freedom lies in the ability of citizens to freely choose their meeting places, forms of worship, and theological stances according to their conscience and faith, rather than being forced to make a single-choice selection between “becoming a megaphone for the system” and “becoming an object of the state’s dictatorship.”

The Deep Warning of the 2026 Violent Raid

The detail that on June 14, 2026, Early Rain Church believers were still surrounded by sixty to seventy police officers while gathering at a hotel in a different locality sends an even more severe signal. It demonstrates that the authorities’ tolerance for independent faith has dropped to the freezing point, and their surveillance and suppression networks are no longer restricted by geographical location. Even if believers withdraw from traditional churches in city centers and move toward peripheral, informal venues, or even secret gatherings in different localities, the tentacles of the state apparatus remain omnipresent.

The footage of even several young children being escorted onto buses and police cars alongside adults fully exposes the brutality of this political deterrence. The ultimate goal of this suppression is not to eliminate some practical security threat, but to manufacture fear on a spiritual level, forcing all social self-organizations independent of the Party system—be they religious groups, civil NGOs, or rights-defense communities—to completely lose their space for survival.

Conclusion

The cross of Early Rain Covenant Church did not disappear with the 2018 ban; instead, it has grown heavier with this raid in the midsummer of 2026. When a regime needs to deploy special police and large buses to suppress over thirty civilians and children sitting in a hotel room singing hymns and praying, what it displays is by no means strength, but a profound sense of ideological insecurity.

Domesticating religion into a dependency of power through the “Three-Self” policy, while using batons and detention warrants to eliminate true, independent faith—this is the truth behind the Early Rain Church incident. Between China and true religious freedom, there remains a long chasm built of iron wire mesh, police lights, and hypocritical lies.

Editor:Gloria Wang

Translator:Ge Bing