By Elise Winland
Published November 21, 2025

              Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., opened a Nov. 20 congressional hearing with a stark assessment of Beijing’s campaign against faith: China’s escalating assault on religious believers is both a moral crisis and a direct threat to U.S. national security. 

              Smith began the hearing — titled “China’s War on Religion: The Threat to Religious Freedom and Why It Matters to the United States” — by underscoring the immediacy of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) repression. 

              “As we speak, the Chinese Communist Party, directed by General Secretary Xi Jinping, is engaged in one of the most extensive crackdowns on a Protestant Christian house church in 40 years,” he said, referencing the detention of dozens of Christian leaders of the underground Zion Church.

              In October, the U.S. State Department condemned Beijing after agents detained roughly 30 Zion Church leaders, including prominent Beijing pastor Mingri “Ezra” Jin. His family holds U.S. citizenship, and his daughter attended the congressional hearing.

              Smith pointed to several families in the room with “loved ones languishing in Chinese prisons,” adding that their suffering “is pressing, and we must act and pray with urgency.”

              One of those imprisoned is Catholic Chinese dissident Jimmy Lai, who has spent roughly five years in a Hong Kong prison and now awaits sentencing. 

              Smith, a Catholic, framed the conflict as a fundamental struggle over the “right of conscience — what George Washington called ‘that little spark of celestial fire’ — which is the inviolable domain in the heart of every human being.”

              Religious freedom is not a Western invention, he argued, but a universal right bestowed upon all men by God. He said it is “guaranteed by a sovereign God who created human beings in His own Image and Likeness and imbued them with inalienable dignity and worth, whether they were born in Washington or Wuhan.”

Why Beijing fears faith

              Smith argued that Xi — whom he labeled “the leader of the world’s largest atheistic state” — seeks to replace religion with loyalty to the Party.

              “[Xi] would have the Chinese people believe that religious freedom is not for them, that religion itself is not for them, because he, and the Party he leads, are terrified of religious faith,” Smith said. “They fear any moral or spiritual authority outside the control of the Party, and they punish worship of anyone but Xi Jinping.”

              The CCP aims for “total control over the heart, mind, and spirit of each citizen of China,” he said.

              Smith pointed to the CCP’s increasingly intrusive policing of private thought — including a recent “Clear and Bright” campaign that treated online “pessimism” and “negative emotions” as so-called “thought crimes.” 

              “This is totalitarianism, pure and simple,” Smith said, “and totalitarian governments cannot abide freedom of religion or belief. And yet — neither can they extinguish it.”

              Smith highlighted small but potent acts of defiance against the regime: Christians continuing services online after Zion Church was shut down, Tibetans sharing a banned song honoring the Dalai Lama, and Hui Muslims protesting mosque demolitions.

              Smith praised the quiet heroism of underground Bishop Guo Xijin, who recently marked his 40th priestly anniversary by offering the Holy Eucharist to local Catholics and pilgrims “through the bars of the chained gate outside his home.” Authorities have kept Bishop Guo confined to his residence, targeting him for refusing to place his flock under the Communist-controlled Patriotic Catholic Association (CCPA). As CatholicVote previously reported, the CCPA requires clergy to pledge “independence” from the Vatican. 

Why it matters to the U.S. 

              Smith argued that defending global religious freedom in China is not only a moral duty but a national-security imperative for the U.S. 

              “Robust religious freedom diplomacy is critical for U.S. national security,” he said, noting research that links religious freedom to economic growth, democratic stability, and trustworthy institutions. 

              China’s systematic repression of believers, he warned, would destabilize the region and distort fair markets for American businesses.

              He expanded on that point in a recent Washington Times op-ed, arguing that countries that suppress believers tend to become more brittle, corrupt, and prone to internal unrest. These dynamics, he said, spill across borders and give Beijing tools to pressure diaspora communities, police speech on U.S. universities, and coerce supply chains abroad. 

              “This unalienable freedom is fundamental to peace and prosperity — for China and for the United States,” Smith concluded, “and deserves our strong and unwavering support.”


This article was published on November 21, 2025 and can be found online at: https://catholicvote.org/catholic-congressman-why-chinas-war-on-religion-matters/