Communist Domesticity

Christians in Communist China have suffered under an attack as clever as any Iron Curtain persecution and far more systematic than most of the others. Speaking for the Protestants, the Rev. Wallace C. Merwin, onetime Presbyterian missionary in China and now working for the National Council of Churches' Division of Foreign Missions, last week appraised the Communist attack and Christianity's chances for survival.

"The Chinese Communists," he wrote in The Christian Century, "recognize that persecution is not the most effective way to deal with the church." Their method: domestication. "The church, in other words, is permitted to exist only as it is useful and submissive to the Communist government."

A Love-America Complex. "Virtually every [Chinese] Christian leader of importance has at one time or another made public confession of his errors in thinking ... Such sins as the 'religion-above-politics' mentality and the 'love-America, fear-America, worship-America complex' are confessed as well as 'misconceptions' concerning Communism and Russia . . . Many have been required to accuse their missionary associates of such crimes as the murder of orphans, hospital patients or refugees, and of embezzlement and espionage . . .

"Churches and mass meetings of Christians publicly supported the charges of germ warfare in Korea against the U.S., and appealed to Christians of the West to condemn this nation. In one of the clever Communist schemes for involving and committing them on the side of the regime, church leaders have been forced to serve on investigation teams and on land reform and even public tribunals . . ."

Church attendance, although not forbidden outright, has been cleverly discouraged. "Even when church services are permitted," says Merwin, "the church buildings are used for political meetings or for barracks or granaries . . ."

Conformed or Liquidated? With the handful of foreign missionaries left in China either imprisoned or under house arrest, what hope is there that Chinese Christians will stand up under their ordeal? "Most Christian leaders," Merwin admits, "have either conformed or been liquidated--not necessarily by execution or imprisonment, although some have met that fate. Undoubtedly a number of Christian leaders have become convinced supporters of the Communist cause . . .

"There is evidence, however, that the subjugation of the church is not so complete as it seems on the surface. A careful reading of certain confessions has convinced those acquainted with the signers that they carry a double meaning--a defense of the conduct or thought now disowned as well as an ostensible statement of conformity . . . Some ministers openly and determinedly preach the Christian Evangel, refusing to adulterate it with politics and even condemning those who preach a political gospel . . . Chinese Christians have assured many of us that they will be true to Christ, that they will die rather than renounce their faith."

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