Ⅰ. Executive Summary
In 2025, China’s economy deteriorated across the board. Foreign-funded enterprises withdrew in large numbers, factories and businesses closed throughout the provinces, unemployment surged, and countless ordinary citizens struggled to meet even their most basic living needs. As a result, public resentment intensified, social unrest increased, and widespread fear permeated society. Instead of addressing the suffering of the population, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) further escalated its repression and persecution of religious beliefs, forcefully advancing its “Party-ization of religion”1 policy in an attempt to eradicate all religious faiths. Across China’s provinces and cities, authorities continued large-scale arrest campaigns and severe crackdowns against house churches. Among them, The Church of Almighty God2 (CAG), the Zion’s Light Church in Xi’an3, Shaanxi, the Golden Lampstand Church in Linfen4, Shanxi, and the Yayang Church in Wenzhou5, Zhejiang, were subjected to particularly harsh repression. Places of worship were raided and shut down, church and personal assets were forcibly plundered, and large numbers of church leaders, co-workers, and lay believers were arrested, detained, sentenced, or imprisoned for extended periods. Among these house churches, The Church of Almighty God6 has endured the most severe persecution. Since the Church’s establishment in 1991, the CCP has sustained a campaign of repression and mass arrests targeting CAG members. Since Xi Jinping came to power, the CCP has significantly escalated its crackdown against the CAG, with officials publicly vowing to “not stand down until the Church was completely eradicated.” Despite launching numerous large-scale arrest operations, the CCP has never succeeded in destroying The Church of Almighty God. From September 2020 to August 2023, the CCP planned and implemented a campaign known as the “Three-Year General Battle,”7 which caused severe disruption to The Church of Almighty God across China but failed to halt the Church’s growth overseas. With the Church’s expansion to more than 100 countries worldwide, the CCP has grown increasingly hostile and desperate, mobilizing the full apparatus of the state to further intensify its persecution. In August 2023, the CCP launched a new nationwide campaign—the “Three-Year Tough Battle”8 (January 2024–December 2026)—elevating the suppression, mass arrests, and ultimate eradication of The Church of Almighty God to the level of “national security” and implementing a systematic, nationwide encirclement and repression. Large-scale arrest operations were carried out across the country with high frequency, long duration, and wide geographic scope. Large numbers of CAG Christians were arrested and tortured, with some persecuted to death. The number of CAG members who have been forcibly disappeared or remain missing is difficult to determine.
2025 marked the second year of the CCP pressing ahead with its “Three-Year Tough Battle” to repress and persecute The Church of Almighty God, with nationwide “zero-out” campaigns continuing to escalate. The CCP directed governments and public security authorities at all levels to conduct dragnet-style investigations targeting CAG Christians, with explicit instructions to “err on the side of over-reporting rather than missing anyone.” Search and arrest quotas were forcibly and directly tied to the performance-based pay and evaluations of grassroots officials, while ordinary citizens were offered substantial cash rewards for reporting CAG believers. Subsequently, Domestic Security Protection units, in coordination with criminal police, special police, and armed police forces, were mobilized en masse on a massive scale to launch a nationwide “people’s war” of searches, denunciations, and arrests against CAG members. At the same time, the CCP established a vast network of brainwashing bases and facilities9 nationwide, subjecting detained CAG Christians to repeated rounds of ideological indoctrination. Through the forced inculcation of “Party culture,” combined with violent methods such as sleep deprivation, prolonged exposure to propaganda videos, and corporal punishment, authorities sought to compel CAG believers to sign the “Three Statements” (Statement of Guarantee, Statement of Repentance, and Statement of Severance) or the “Five Statements” (adding the Statement of Confession and Statement of Denunciation to the existing “Three Statements”). These measures were intended to achieve an ideological “zero-out” of Christians and compel them to renounce their faith. During searches and arrests, the CCP made extensive use of high-tech surveillance systems, including the “Skynet” and “Sharp Eyes” networks, facial recognition technology, big data analysis, electric bike tracking devices, and drones. Plainclothes officers and military personnel transitioning to civilian careers were also recruited or employed to carry out long-term tailing, precise positioning, covert filming, and round-the-clock surveillance of CAG Christians. Throughout 2025, arrest operations swept the country in wave after wave, subjecting The Church of Almighty God to yet another round of severe repression and persecution.
According to incomplete statistics, from 1991 to 2025, at least 520,191 CAG Christians were arrested and at least 318 were persecuted to death. Between 2011 and 2025 alone, at least 84,077 CAG Christians were subjected to torture or forced brainwashing. Between 2017 and 2025 alone, at least 13,034 CAG Christians were sentenced to prison. Due to the CCP’s strict information blockade, the enforced disappearance or loss of contact of many CAG Christians, and the fact that certain regions—such as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region—have become a no-go area under CCP’s intensive surveillance, detailed accounts of the persecution remain inaccessible. As a result, additional data and related information cannot be fully documented.
More details at: Annual Report Exposing the CCP’s Persecution of The Church of Almighty God (2025)
