ICC Note: The underground church is strong in China, but state-sponsored churches are essentially guaranteed to suffer Communist infiltration of core Christian doctrines. The president of this seminary must be a Communist plant himself. He argues that Christianity cannot conflict with the Communist Party’s ideals and even celebrates the widespread removal of church crosses within his own province. His support of the CCP’s persecution of Christians speaks to the fact that the CCP’s anti-Christian agenda is not even thinly veiled; it is outrageous and forcefully shoved down the throats of Chinese citizens through its leadership in all sectors of society, even including religion.
7/26/2016 Hangzhou, China (China Aid) – As seen in a video that was recently distributed domestically, students singing the national anthem was a significant part of the graduation ceremony at Zhejiang Theological Seminary. This is an inevitable product of the authorities forcibly destroying crosses in the Zhejiang area since 2014, spreading the Sinicization of Chrisitanity, and vigorously pushing [churches] to fly the national flag.
The president of the seminary, Pan Xingwang, is a pastor and leader who supports the authorities in their cross demolition campaign and has repeatedly spoken out in support of the authorities’ Sinicized Christianity and “Five Entries and Five Transformations” Movement [Editor’s note: the movement is a systematic procedure being used in Zhejiang to force Christianity to be more in line with state values]. Pan played an unfortunate role in the persecution of Christians by authorities. Under his leadership, Zhejiang Theological Seminary has become a base which creates only Red pastors.
The 2016 Undergraduate Admissions Guide of the Theological Seminary states: “The seminary’s training objectives are: to cultivate preachers who consciously accept the leadership of the Party and the government, safeguard national unification and ethnic unity, adhere to the principle of an independent [from foreign influence] and self-managing Church that is politically reliable, knowledgeably accomplished, of a moral character that will convince the public, useful in critical moments and will keep closely in touch with believers and adapt to the trend of the times.”
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