(COMMENTARY) In January 2018, a massive explosion shook the Chinese city of Linfen. As pillars of smoke billowed above the eerily silent streets, onlookers realized that one of the largest churches in China had been leveled. Elsewhere in the world, one might have logically assumed that the huge church’s destruction was an act of anti-Christian terrorism.

And it certainly was an act of anti-Christian violence. But the bombing didn’t happen in the Middle East and the perpetrators were not Islamist terrorists. Instead, China’s paramilitary “People’s Armed Police” had raided the Golden Lampstand Church – home to more than 50,000 “unregistered” Christian worshipers – in Shanxi Province. They had packed its worship hall with explosives and clicked a detonator.

The Media Project - China's relentless assault on religious freedom