China: How churches are adapting to the ‘Post-COVID-19 Era’

China Christian Daily (CCD) published a report on 6 June 2022 in which a wide spectrum of pastors commented on the current situation and trends in Chinese church life since the 2020 pandemic. The current trends can be summed up with the keywords ‘group-based’, ‘family-based’ and ‘digitalization’, and are not limited to house churches: 

“Group-based” refers to small group gatherings. “Family-based” means that meetings and worship services take place in a believer’s home. “Digitalization” refers to worship, meetings, and training programs held online. Actually, the three changes have begun years ago, but the 2020 pandemic has speeded them up. 

World Watch Research analyst Thomas Muller comments: “The trends mentioned above confirm what other observers have been reporting over the last years and would appear to reflect sensible adaptions for church life in general. Although many pastors seemed to sense the danger of cults influencing and possibly taking over small group gatherings, it is particularly ‘digitalization’ which is proving most difficult. Use of the Internet has been facing increasing restrictions, also affecting Three-Self churches, since the implementation of the ‘Administrative Measures for Internet Religious Information Services’ began on 1 March 2022. The CCD report states that pastors can only share 60-second voice mails on social media such as WeChat, for example, to avoid having to submit sermon details to the authorities. This shows that in-person meetings remain irreplaceable, wherever possible.”