Beijing, China – A leader in China's state-backed church defended government limits on religious freedom in China Tuesday, saying Christians are free to worship and spread their faith as long as they do so privately.
The Rev. Cao Shengjie, president of the China Christian Council, said that government regulations allow worship in authorized venues but not in public places in order to protect the rights of others.
"So we don't have religious activities in public places because we don't want to cause religious disharmony," Cao said at a news conference.
Government controls on religion have attracted sharp criticism from Christians overseas and Chinese who refuse to submit to state authority. At issue, is what many feel is a duty for Christians: the right to propagate the faith.
Unauthorized Protestant churches, often called house churches because believers gather in private homes, are growing more rapidly than state-approved churches in part because of zealous proselytizing, according to Chinese and foreign religious scholars. The government has fought back by arresting some of China's best organized and entrepreneurial evangelical preachers.
These divisive religious controls are now set to follow Beijing's leadership to the United States. President George W. Bush is expected to raise religious freedom in summit Thursday with Chinese President Hu Jintao in Washington.
Cao's Christian Council, which oversees administration of state-approved churches, hopes to dispel American misgivings by bringing an exhibit on the Bible in China to three American cities starting in late April. Former President Jimmy Carter and the Rev. Billy Graham are lending their names to the tour, giving China's state-backed church a chance for greater legitimacy.
"We enjoy policies of religious freedom," Cao said. "Many people don't know the situation in China, especially Americans."
Sometimes, she said, American Christians pray for Bibles for Chinese Christians, not realizing that council-backed Amity Printing Press publishes 2.5 million Bibles a year. With a network of 70 distribution centers nationwide, Bibles are reaching Christians in remote areas, she said.
Even as she defended government restrictions, Cao also offered a nuanced depiction of the controls, Christianity's continued spread despite the limits and the state-backed churches' role.
"We believe that every Christian has the responsibility to spread the Gospel," said Cao. In authorized congregations, she said, believers were attracting converts by talking privately about their faith to friends and colleagues.
At Cao's Huai'en Church in Shanghai, "every year we have 200 to 300 baptisms. These are people who are brought in by friends and relatives," she said.
Cao stuck to the official estimate that China has 16 million Christians, rejecting higher estimates as "far-fetched." Foreign scholars have estimated that there are 35 million Protestants and another 12 million Catholics.
Nevertheless, Cao rejected the notion that Chinese Christians were divided between approved and unofficial or underground churches. "I pray to the Lord that the number of believers in China will be great," she said.