The first point which I want to emphasize is that American Christians should be extremely wary in accepting some of the news which comes to them from Communist-inspired sources, telling of the tolerance of Christian churches in Red China. Unfortunately, there are some people in America who, from admiration of the Chinese Communists, or from other motives, have allowed themselves to be used as disseminators of this information. Some well-meaning Americans have been misled into thinking that Christianity, at least Protestant Christianity, has found a modus vivendi with the Chinese Communists. Nothing could be further from the truth. We will get nowhere in our study of this subject unless we realistically face the fact that true Christian churches have virtually been abolished in Communist-ruled China.
It is true that organizations still exist in Red China which call themselves Christian churches. They are occupying the old church buildings where real congregations used to worship. But the tragedy is that they are not Christian, except in name. They are police agencies of the Communist state. Former church members are allowed to attend these so-called “churches”, and former Christian ministers are allowed to preach, provided they accept the discipline and supervision of the atheist masters of the state. The texts of the sermons are handed to the preachers by the Communist functionaries. Needless to say, these sermons are full of propaganda for Communism, and servile support of the Communist dictatorship. No sermons of any other kind are permitted.
May I illustrate what I mean? During the Korean War, the Chinese Communists - you will recall - gave wide circulation to the rumor that the United States was using germ warfare against them. In order to provide apparent Christian confirmation of this lie, the Communist commissars required one of the religious magazines which was under their control to publish a cartoon. The cartoon, which shouted at the reader from the cover of the magazine, pictured President Truman kneeling before a swarm of rats, beseeching them to do their part in the Korean War.
So great was the pressure upon the Christian population of China that any pastor who refused to sing anti-American statements was usually sent to his death. A tragic instance was Dr. Lu Chih-wei, former President of Yenching University where he had succeeded Dr. Leighton Stuart, a former American Ambassador to China. Dr. Lu, who refused to sign the anti-American statement, was condemned to death and was executed.
I have in my files a letter which was written by a Christian in Shanghai, under the date of October 10, 1956. The letter closes with these terrible words:
“The Gospel is still being preached but is being mixed up with other things. The churches are attended by only about one half of their former number of worshippers. Some are afraid; some don’t come because they don’t want politics in sermons. And so the hungry sheep look up and are not fed.”
Even from its restrained words, we get a picture of the terror-haunted life of Christians in present-day China:
A year or so ago, a delegation of Australian Anglican clergymen was allowed to visit Red China and contact the Communist controlled churches. Francis James, one of the members of the delegation, writing in the Episcopal Church News, repeats the question which he addressed, while in Red China, to a Chinese Communist, who was the Director of the Bureau of Religious Affairs which supervises the churches.
“You say there is no religious persecution”, he said. “If all is as you say, then why are there so many Christian leaders in prison? To my knowledge, four Roman Catholic Bishops and three Protestant Bishops are behind bars. Moreover, I have learned that Wang Ming-tao and our own Bishop Kimber Den have only just been released from jail. If that is not religious persecution, what is it?”
In another passage of his article, Mr. James wrote:
“All Chinese Christians speak of the (Communist) government in almost identical terms, which have been supplied to them through the Three Self Movement in its weekly or bi-weekly lectures for church workers and pastors. The Three Self Movement, in turn, has worked out these terms in consultation with the Bureau of Religious Affairs.”
Only a few months ago, 19 Chinese church leaders, including Y. T. Wu, Wu Yi-fang, Bishop Robin Chen and Y. C. Tu exhibited their anti-Americanism by writing to Mr. and Mrs. John W. Powell and Julius Schuman, former editors of the China Monthly Review, who are awaiting trial for anti-American statements, strongly expressing their sympathy over the “unjust indictment” which the Federal Grand Jury has brought against them. The 19 say, “We feel it our duty as Christians to register our strong protest against such a flagrant infringement of human rights and civil liberties.” The Powells and Schuman had published lying articles, under the supervision of the Communist masters of Shanghai, charging the American Government with the use of germ warfare in the Korean War.
Despite the plain evidence which is before our eyes, a minority of the Protestant clergymen in this country have joined in the agitation for the establishment of cooperative relations with the Communist-controlled Christian churches in Red China. They are urging that American Christians should hold out the right hand of friendship to the godless agents of Communism who are posing as spokesmen for the Christian body in Communist China today. It is tragic, but it is true.
In the December 3, 1957, issue of the Daily Worker, Communist official organ in the United States, I read these surprising words:
“Dr. Eugene Carson Blake predicted today that the National Council of Churches would arrange an exchange of visits with Protestant leaders of (Red) China ‘whenever it appears that the Chinese churches themselves wish and are prepared for such a project.’ Dr. Blake, retiring Council President, addressed 2,000 church leaders from 30 major Protestant and orthodox denominations at one of the opening day’s sessions of the General Assembly of the Council. He recalled that a 2-day visit of American churchmen sponsored by the National Council of Churches last year ‘worked out more fruitfully than any of us dared hope.’”
Such an extraordinary statement from a Christian leader of Dr. Blake’s eminence indicates just one thing. It indicates that Dr. Blake, and others who think as he does, simply do not understand the realities of the position of Christian churches in Red China today. I have no doubt that their intentions are good, but they have allowed themselves to become the victims of Chinese Communist propaganda, which has spread like an evil slime over the world of free men. Unwittingly, they are playing the anti-Christ Communist game. Their wishful thinking has betrayed them into believing what is not true.
Such a proposal as that of Dr. Blake falls like a black cloud upon the genuine Chinese Christians who have been endeavoring, in this fearful hour, to keep Christianity alive in the Far East. All over Red China, genuine Christians are being hunted down, spied upon (by the very Communists in the various churches whom Dr. Blake wants to meet in friendship), thrown into prison, and even tortured and murdered. Like the early Christians in the days of the Roman persecutions, they are endeavoring, at the risk of liberty and life, to continue their Christian services in secret and in hiding. And now word comes to them that the president of the largest church body in the United States wants to send American clergymen to Red China to clasp hands with their Communist persecutors, and to recognize the Communist-dominated churches as true Christian churches!
Communist China, in its diabolical endeavor to uproot true Christianity, has wiped out in less than a decade the missionary work done by Western Christians during the last one hundred years. It has hounded and driven from China the dedicated American men and women who have devoted their lives to foreign missions. It has imprisoned, tortured and killed some of the finest foreign missionaries in China. It has confiscated and turned to political use the churches and institutions of the foreign missions in China, most of them paid for by the contributions of the American churches, including nickels and dimes given by American children. It has corrupted and broken the spirit of thousands of weak-kneed native Christians and have turned them into evil servitors of the godless Communist state. And now it is proposed that American churchmen recognize these persecutors of God’s church as fellow Christians! Could folly be more complete?
I am glad to note that not all American Christians have been deceived on this issue. One American clergyman, who heads a large church body declared on December 4, 1957:
“True Christianity cannot do business with the stooges of the Communists, or be a party to the Communist use of the church for propaganda purposes... The line against Red China must be held. We must work and pray for the liberation of Red China and the opening of the doors again for missionaries.”
My theme tonight is “What Can Christians in America Do For China?” I have tried to make clear what Christians should not do. We Chinese who are working desperately to save Christianity in the Far East should not be stabbed in the back by American clergymen who propose to recognize and establish friendly relations with Christianity’s persecutors. If American Christians cannot help us, at least they should refrain from hurting us as Dr. Blake, Dr. John A. Mackie and other prominent church leaders propose to do.
But there are some things which American Christians can do. Because I believe without qualification in the efficacy of prayer, I ask that American Christians, in all their churches, should raise their voices in prayer to Almighty God for the early deliverance of their brother Chinese Christians from Communist chains. I hope that they would join me in asking for divine forgiveness for those among the Chinese Christians who have allowed themselves to be tempted away from their religion by the rewards or threats imposed by the Communists. I ask that they pray for the former native Christian pastors who have entered the service of Communism and who are now conducting so-called Chinese Christian churches which have nothing to do with God. I ask that they pray for the souls of the Christian martyrs, who did not bow their necks to Baal, and who have languished and died in Red China’s prisons.
Fortunately, while the Christian church stands in ruins in mainland China, it is surviving strong and confident in the province of Taiwan, which is now the seat of the Government of the Republic of China. The years of separation from the mainland have seen the Christian church in Taiwan advancing by leaps and bounds.
In 1945, when Taiwan was returned to China after a half century of Japanese rule, there were less than 30,000 Christians on the island. Only a few denominations were allowed to operate, the most active being the Canadian Presbyterian Mission. Today, over 100 Christian denominations are operating in Taiwan. Within the space of 12 years, Christian membership has increased from 30,000 to nearly ten times that number.
At Taipei, the capital city of the Republic of China. visitors and tourists are greeted by the sight of churches and chapels in almost every street. Increasing numbers of Chinese in Taiwan are flocking to Christianity. I recall a few summers ago I attended an open air revival meeting in a public park in Taipei. At the end of the meeting, more than 600 of the 800 persons present stood up and manifested the wish to become Christians. Taiwan in its crisis is gripped by a deep, revivalist spirit. To care for the physical and spiritual needs of this great surge toward Christianity, we need more clergymen. Let me recommend support of this Taiwan surge to Christianity to Dr. Blake and his associates, as a much more appropriate object of his zeal than his present preoccupation with the Chinese Communists.
The church which I attend in Taipei, the Shih Ling Church, and of which I am the layman head, is located in an orchard. On an average Sunday, you will see in the pews such prominent persons as President and Madame Chiang Kai-shek, Prime Minister and Mrs. O. K. Yui, Chief Justice Wang Chung-hui and his wife, Secretary General to the President and Mrs. Chang Chun, Chief of the Combined Service Forces and Mrs. J. L. Huang, and others high in the political life of the Republic. There is no country in Asia today where more outstanding government leaders are active Christians than in the Republic of China.
To fulfill the needs of increasing numbers of Christians in Taiwan, we have built new seminaries to train Christian pastors and workers. For all this work, we need more support from American Christians. In Taiwan, we have 200,000 aborigines who live in the mountains. Many of them have embraced the Christian faith. Their response to the Christian message has been phenomenal. Lacking money, they have built churches for themselves with their own hands. They observe the Sabbath Day faithfully. But they are handicapped in many ways. An extremely worthwhile task for American Christians is to correspond directly with the church elders of these mountain congregations. The interest which you show in their work for Christ will be a great incentive for their labors. They want to know that the outside world is interested in the fight for Christianity which they are carrying on among their people.
Here is a cause truly worthy of your support.
It is also important that the Christian missionaries and preachers who visit Taiwan should have a true understanding of the political realities under which the 10,000,000 people in our country live. Free China lives under the constant threat of Communist aggression. Only a narrow strip of water separates Taiwan from the jet bombers and the concentrated armed might of the ruthless Chinese Communist dictators on the opposite mainland. To retain our liberty, to keep alive our determination some day to return to the mainland and reclaim all China from its present black night, our people must be continuously awake to the Communist menace and be militarily and spiritually prepared to repel it. The rulers of Red China have, again and again, emphasized that they will never cease their efforts until they have taken this one province which is still resisting Communism. We cannot afford to relax our vigilance for even a moment.
For this reason, it is regrettable that careless-talking Christian visitors sometimes make ill-considered statements to the people which tend to discourage them from resistance to Communism. When I was in Taiwan a few years ago, I heard some foreign Christian visitors telling wounded soldiers in a hospital in Taipei that mighty as the Ceneralissimo was, he could not cure them of their wounds. The Generalissimo never claimed that he had such powers, but for foreign visitors to emphasize the point could have no other effect than to undermine his authority. Such tactlessness on the part of our would-be friends simply makes our work harder in Taiwan.
On another occasion, a foreign preacher told a group of Chinese that Christ was sure to come tomorrow, and hence they should not think and work for the future. All they needed to do was to trust Jesus, and believe in His second coming, and everything would be well. Of course, this is sheer fatalism. It can have no other effect than to dampen the determination of the people of the Republic of China to keep themselves strong and alert to repel the ever-present danger of invasion. Before I left Taiwan to serve as Ambassador to Japan, I had planned to assemble the missionaries and the Chinese church leaders in a meeting and discuss with them the duty of a Christian people in the face of an unresolved war with godless Communism. I have often regretted that I did not have time to carry out this plan.
We need tolerance and understanding from our friends in this critical hour. Our fellow Christians from America must understand the overriding necessity of defense against Communist aggression and refrain from words and action which would serve to weaken the will to resist Communism. We in the Republic of China have an historic mission to perform in Asia - a mission which will increase the security of the whole free world. Our Christian friends must understand the great imperatives which move us in this emergency.
I wish to quote what was said by President Chiang Kai-shek in one of his recent interviews with an American missionary:
“My country was the first to suffer from Communism. It was also the first to resist Communism. Today, the whole free world is confronted with a false ideology which denies the existence of the living God and invents its own gods. The only way to destroy this false ideology is to follow the spirit of Christ. We do not have the sign of the Cross on our uniforms, but we will bear it on our hearts... I feel closer to the people of the United States than to the people of any other nation besides my own. I hope they will join us in our Christian crusade of liberation ... ”
What can Christians in America do for China? They can either discourage us, or they can inspire us to go on with our hard tasks. I am sure that no responsible American Christian would wittingly place stones in the way of the true Chinese Christians, to make their perilous way even harder. If I have spoken too frankly tonight, it is because I do not believe that those who would hold out the olive branch to the Chinese Communists, and to the renegade Christians who serve them have actually thought out the historic consequences of what they propose. We live in an age of terror, and of threatened terror. We must weigh every step we take in the light of the world-wide crusade against the Communist anti-Christ. I have every conviction that God will lead us to victory in this contest. But Christians can best serve God in this crisis by avoiding mistakes and blunders which will make the task of anti-Communism harder. We want Christian Asia. Let us face the stern truth that we cannot achieve it by making dishonorable gestures of friendship to those whose work is not to build the church, but to destroy it.