Evangelical Christianity in the South

    

 

    The House Church Movement

 

Among the thorny problems facing the Church were the lack of scriptures. Restrictions on the distribution and the circulation of Bibles and religious literature intensified. The propagation of the faith was strictly forbidden while the Christian population ever increased, from 160,000 in 1975 to 1.2 million in 2000.  In 1994, only 25 percent of the faithful in Saigon owned a Bible. In the Central Highlands this figure could be as low as 10 percent. Until May 1994, the State-sponsored Christian Evangelical Church could receive approval from the Ministry of Sports and Culture  to  produce its own Bibles. Nevertheless, Bibles printed under government control must not be made available to unregistered groups. In September 1994, a training school was projected to open. Some 60 students were allowed to register for Bible studies, following the compromise between the authorities and the local Church in Da Nang. However, until 2002, after 27 years under communism, only one class for theology study with 15 students was authorized to operate.

 

As the house church movement expanded, the political regime sought to place the Christian Evangelical Churches of the South under strict control. Nevertheless, it always met strong opposition from most pastors who resiliently refused to come to terms with it. They particularly refused to accept the State authorities’ proposal for the creation of a  unified State-affiliated Evangelical Church. The house church movement came into being and spread throughout the country, regardless of raids and instances of suppression The number of followers of this unregistered house church  ever grew, and because of this, the Church endured serious difficulties and harsh persecution, particularly, members of the ethnic minorities in the Central highlands who constitute a large part of the Church population.

 

    Arrests and Imprisonment

 

The report submitted by Mr. Abdelfattah, U.N. Special Rapporteur, in accordance with the Commission on Human Rights Resolution 1993/25, noted cases of arrests and imprisonment concerning the Evangelical Christian clergy and believers as follows:

 

 In 1991, there were at least 11 pastors who were arrested on charges of conducting religious activities without a permit. They were such personalities as Tran Mai, Dinh Thien Tu, Tran Dinh Ai, R’Mah Luan, Phan Quang Thieu, Le Quang Trung, Vu Minh Xuan, Hoang Van Phung, Bui Thanh Se ,Vo Van Lac, and  Pham Phu Anh.  Of particular attention were the cases of unjust prosecution of prominent leaders of the Church:

 

1. Pastor Vo Van Lac, the leader of a Protestant Church in southern Vietnam, is said to have been taken to police custody in June 1991 and questioned with regard to his relations with foreign Christian organizations. He was released in July 1991 and believed to be under police surveillance afterwards.

 

2. The Reverend Bui Thanh Se, the leader of a Protestant church in southern Vietnam, was arrested in late June 1991, reportedly on suspicion of having links with foreign Christian organizations. He was released in July but was reported to be under close police surveillance.

 

3. Pastor R' Mah Loan, a pastor to the H'mong minority, was in charge of 14 congregations in the Dak Lak region. He was arrested in June 1991 for unknown reasons and \was believed to be held in administrative detention at a prison at Buon Me Thuot, Dak Lak Province, reportedly without formal trial or conviction. Ha Hak, a minister belonging to the Koho highlands minority, was reported to have been imprisoned in December 1991.

 

4. The Reverend Tran Dinh Ai, the leader of a Protestant movement in southern Vietnam, was arrested on February 27, 1991, allegedly because of his contacts with the overseas Pentecostal Church. Rev. Ai was reportedly sentenced to three years of administrative detention, without going on trial or being convicted. He is said to have been detained at Phan Dang Luu prison in Ho Chi Minh City and was not allowed to receive family visits for four months. In November 1991, he was moved to a labor camp in Song Be Province and was reported to be suffering from severe headaches, back pain, and a liver infection.

 

5. The Reverend Tran The Thien Phuoc, the leader of a Protestant Church in Ho Chi Minh City, was arrested in November 1989 while on his way to a meeting  with other Christians  and was allegedly charged with "disturbing the peace."  He had lived in Cay Truong II, Ben Cat, Song Be Province. Pastor Tran The Thien Phuoc was reportedly detained in a re-education  labor camp for the third time and was serving a three-year administrative detention sentence at a camp near Tong Le Chan, Song Be Province, although he had never been formally tried or convicted.

 

6. Pastor Ya Tiem, a minister belonging to the Koho minority from the highlands, was arrested in June 1991 for unknown reasons. He was believed to have been held in administrative detention in a prison in Dalat, Lam Dong Province, although he had reportedly not been formally tried or convicted.

   

7. The Reverend Dinh Thien Tu, the minister of the largest independent Protestant movement in Vietnam which reportedly comprised several thousand worshippers, was arrested on February 22, 1991 in Ho Chi Minh City, shortly after midday, allegedly for operating a social work program without the approval of the government and for alleged unauthorized contacts with foreign Christian groups. The arrest warrant presented to his wife in the afternoon, allegedly charged him with "using religion as a pretext for disturbing peace." His house was searched, and documents were confiscated. He was believed to be under a three-year administrative detention sentence, although he had not been formally tried or convicted. According to the information received, the Reverend Dinh Thien Tu was initially detained at the Phan Dang Luu prison, Gia Dinh, Ho Chi Minh City and was not allowed to receive family visits for four months. He was believed to have been moved at the end of November 1991 to a labor camp in the  Song Be Province. The Reverend Dinh Thien Tu, according to sources, had been accused of "teaching false theories and not observing the rules and regulations of the Church," and consequently was suspended from all pastoral duties and evicted from the Church parsonage.

    

8. The Tran Xuan Tu, a minister from Vo Dat, Duc Linh District of Thuan Hai Province, was reportedly forced to remove the cross from his church, which was subsequently occupied by the authorities. He was initially arrested in 1985 during a church meeting held in his home and reportedly served a three-year administrative detention sentence at the same camp in Vo Dat.

     

10. The dignitary Tran Mai, the leader of a Gospel Church in southern Vietnam, was arrested in Ho Chi Minh City on October 31, 1991 and alleged to have been charged with using religious activities to fight the government. He was reportedly serving a three-year administrative detention sentence in a labor camp at Tong Le Chan, Song Be Province. According to sources, he had not been formally tried or convicted. Ha Wan, a minister belonging to the Koho minority, had reportedly been detained in a prison in Lam Dong Province since December 1991.

 

10. The Reverend Nguyen Ngoc Anh had been detained since December 1989, allegedly without having been formally tried or convicted. He was reportedly to have been beaten on several occasions.

 

Sources also indicated cases of arrest in Saigon. The pastors Phan Quang Thieu, Le Quang Trung, Vu Minh Xuan, and Hoang Minh Phung were alleged to have been arrested in 1991 in Ho Chi Minh City and in the central highlands on charges of "pursuing religious activities without permission" and were reportedly detained on the basis of a People's Committee administrative order.

 

     Control

 

 Hanoi never loosened its r grip on independent religious groups. House Church leaders in Saigon said that the religious atmosphere throughout southern and central Vietnam fluctuated between periods of police harassment and seasons of relative religious freedom. The Christian communities in the city still resisted the unification of the Vietnamese Christians under the patronage of the Fatherland Front. The difficulties facing them were the formation of pastors, the slow development of the religion, and the closing of Christian worship places, and the arrest of pastors.   

 

   Tension between the police and unregistered Christian groups in southern Vietnam ever persisted as security forces carried out raids on rallies of the members of the House Church Movement in Saigon, beginning in February 1994. In early April 1994, the Ho Chi Minh City police in Binh Thanh Precinct launched a raid on an unregistered church associated with the Pastor Tran Dinh Ai' s House Church Movement. While there were no reports of arrests during the raid, the security officials were reported to have threatened the church members with further police action if they continued using their pretexts for "illegal assemblies."  The church group was fined 400,000 “dong” (US$ 38), and the authorities were reportedly to have placed the Church under police surveillance. The pastor was dismissed from his pastoral functions. Security forces, also raided a Ho Chi Minh printing house that was allegedly being used to  print clandestine religious literature for distribution among the house churches. Arrests made in connection with that raid were not known. The leader of another large House Church movement said that the police had detained eleven of the group's members throughout southern Vietnam during the Easter weekend and launched ten raids against the movement's meeting places. There were no further details available regarding these arrests and raids.     

 

  Discrimination    

 

In 1999,  a sociological research sponsored by a foreign embassy was conducted  within the Stieng ethnic minority in the commune Bu Gia Map, Phuoc Long District,  Binh Phuoc Province. Independent researchers noted that 41% of the population said they were the adherents to Evangelical Christianity. The researchers also mentioned that the mode of life of the Christians was spiritually improved owing to the abandonment of practices of traditional animism. According to the researchers, animist practices blocked the development of social life.  The Christians seemed to have a better spiritual life than other people. Nevertheless, they were targeted  with discrimination. A Koho missionary deplored the this suffering. The young Christians of his ethnic group were the object of jeers and derision in their schools simply because of their religious faith.. 

 

Converts to Evangelical Christianity grew in great numbers, regardless of interdiction and repression. The district of Back Lieu in the province of Minh Hai is  the southernmost region of Vietnam is a case in evidence. Many new settlers were the military personnel and civil servants of the government. They were given land and accorded other privileges from the government. Nevertheless, they experienced the least confidence in it and turned to other systems of faith, particularly, Christianity, instead. A movement of domestic Churches in the district saw a rapid progress, from 2 to 102 congregations, were formed only within a period of 10 years. Among the new converts to the faith  was Tran Ngoc An, a captain and hero of the People’s Army.  He benefited an invalid retirement pension for diverse wounds of war. During an operation  in the Soviet Union, a part of his cranial stature was replaced by a metallic plate. His suffering was such that it led him to seek consolation in alcohol and drug. However, intoxicated, ill-tempered, and neglected, An realized in despair he still had a way out. He had glimpse of a message of Christianity he had heard from certain new converts. He came to reason and believed in the message of redemption and  experienced himself a miraculous liberation from his intoxication. Excited by a new and hopeless for confidence in life, he studied with much assiduity his new faith and sooner became a missionary.

    

On December 22, 1999, Tran Van An and two other missionaries, Nguyen Khanh Tung and Tran Van Chinh accepted the invitation of a widowed lady of an officer killed  during the war and considered as a martyr of the “Revolution.” The lady had equally heard the Christian Good News and became a believer. which is for her an easy decision to abandon the cult of spirits of her spouse. To give testimony of the abandonment of her ancient beliefs, she invited the three missionaries to help her to put away the alter for the spirits. When they left the house, the three missionaries were arrested, kept in, and interrogated after that.  Brutal treatment of the security police worsened the wounds of Tran Van An, and he fainted.  Fearing that An would die, the police released him the  night before the Lunar New Year's Day. Having recovered his health, he related the story to the two other missionaries, who had also been maltreated during interrogation.   

 

     The Formation

 

A number of Christian denominations of Evangelical Christianity are members in the sanctioned Evangelical Churches of Vietnam. Pastor Huynh Thien Buu, the editor of the Yearbook of the Evangelical Churches in 1999, noted that 119 pastors practicing their ministry in the mountainous region were nor registered by the government. It is also the case of the majority of 1,500 preachers formed after 1975, and most of them are from the ethnic minorities. The yearbook cited as proof 282 regional communities are recognized by the authorities, but  283 others are non-official. These congregations are implanted in the regions inhabited by the ethnic minorities. In all, the Evangelical communities until the year 2000 totaled one million adepts. The State estimated the Christian population at 500,000 only.

 

Among serious difficulties facing the Churches of Evangelical Christianity is the shortage of ministers and pastors.. Until the 1990’s, 20 years after the reunification of the country, the Communist authorities in the South had authorized only 13 students to receive pastoral formation. No theological school could be opened, and no ordination was allowed. The replacement of pastors was very difficult. There existed only a clandestine formation of pastors thanks to which the needs for the religious life of the Christians were partly met.

 

     Other Obstacles

 

The Church has faced with numerous obstacles. Evangelical leaders are all concerned about the formation of leaders for a great member of ever-growing congregations in various areas of the country. It was not until September 1994 could the pastors Duong Tanh and Le Cao Quy of Da Nang receive permission to start a Bible training school for 60 students. Constraints placed on the training of new clergy ever remained. To this disadvantage,, there existed only one seminary in the country. The number of graduates, therefore, would never match the spiritual needs of the fast growing Evangelical congregations throughout the country.  In addition, as Bibles printed by government-run printing houses  were limited to State-sanctioned groups, the lack of Scriptures posed a serious problem to the preaching and religious education of the Church as a whole. Not much less deplorable was the lack of physical facilities for religious services. 

 

Until 1999, various denominations of the Evangelical Christian Church of Vietnam had called for a decision from the urban People’s Council to return to it its property in An Dong. Worse still, dispossession of worship houses prevailed in the provinces. In  July 1999, the local authorities of the district of Bu Dang in the province of Binh Phuoc voluntarily destroyed three modest churches of the H’nong ethnic minority and threatened to destroy seven more other churches. The information was quickly communicated to overseas Vietnamese Evangelical Christian congregations. The Vietnamese Foreign Ministry spokesman in the news conference belied the information, speculating that  such things could not occur in Vietnam. However, the investigators from  Hanoi who had come to the region and the destruction was stopped. It was the president of the People's Council of the district, Ba Chia, who had given the order to destroy the worship places. He was dismissed from his functions in December 1999. 

Evangelical Christianity in the Central Highlands

 

 

     Instances of Repression

 

Due to international pressure following the collapse of the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Union in the later years of the 1990”s, the Communist regime loosened its grip on religions. A number of pastors and ministers who had been arrested and sent to the reeducation camps or detained in the prisons were released. On the one hand, Hanoi sought to woo Western democracies, allowing church leaders to make contacts with international private agencies to get humanitarian aids. On the other hand, it maintained tight control on the Churches. A large number of pastors and ministers in the Central Highland remained imprisoned or placed under administrative detention. A series of new laws were promulgated restricting religious services and practices, and thus disallowing  those pastors and ministers released from reeducation  or imprisonment to perform religious duties.

   

Twenty-five years (1999) after the reunification of the country, the Christians in Vietnam still remained a marginal minority. They  had been stripped off  the rights to religious freedom as prescribed in the Constitution of Vietnam. Ever since 1975, no organization of the Evangelical  Churches had obtained legal status while conversions to the faith grew at a remarkable rate. In the Central Highlands, the Christians of ethnic minorities represented three-fourths of some 800,000 Christians of Vietnam. Nonetheless, these innocent believers were severely persecuted due to religious practices. They were targeted with threats, jeers, beatings, and fines. They were even dispossessed of their properties and forced to do hard work, or imprisoned for having refused to renounce their faith.

 

The ill-treatment inflicted on the Christians in the bosom of the ethnic minorities spread so widely and systematically that it is impossible to believe in the excuses given by the government according to which it would only a matter of isolated cases attributed to some civil servants without conscience (Commission of Religious Freedom of the World Evangelical Union in Singapore, Feb. 2000 (EDA, May 2000).

 

     Trials and Arrests

 

Persecution against the clergy and laity continued to take place throughout the South. The persecution of tribal members of Evangelical Christianity deepened in the first years of “Renovation” as the house church movement was growing at a steady rate. Pastors formed by American missionaries throughout  the Vietnam War particularly suffered from harsh repression.  

 

Recognized among the Evangelicals persecuted were members of the Jeh, Jerai, Koho. and other tribes:

 

1. Pastor Ka Philip, house-church leader, arrested in 1990 and released on July 2, 1993;

 

2. The Reverend Nguyen Chu, Evangelical pastor serving faith in the Jeh community of Gia Lai - Kontum Province, arrested on May 13, 1990, while preaching in Kontum township on charge of “committing crimes against collective security;”

 

3. Pastor A Out, member of the Jerai tribe, arrested in June 1990, sentenced to three years in prison,  on charge of” pursuing religious practice without permission,” and detained at Camp T5, Pleibomg, Gia Lai- Kontum Province;

 

4. Pastor Tran Dinh Ai, house-church movement leader, was arrested on February 25, 1991 on charges of “having connections with foreign religious groups, organizing illegal assembly, and preaching without permission,” and sentenced to three years in prison. He was detained in Chi Hoa Prison, Saigon, and, later moved to Camp Tong Le Chan, Binh Long District, Song Be Province;

 

5. Pastor Dinh Thien Tu, house-church movement leader, arrested on February 22, 1991, on charges of  “having connections with foreign religious groups and abusing religion under the guise of social work,” sentenced to three years of hard labor,  and detained at Phan Dang Luu, Saigon, and, later  moved to Camp Tong Le Chan, Binh Long District, Song Be Province; 

 

6. Hoang Van Phung, house-church leader serving faith in the southern rural area, arrested in 1991 on charges of “practicing illegal preaching and pursuing religious practices without permission, and opposition to the State policy,” detained without trial, and released in April 1991;  

 

7. Vu Minh Xuan, arrested in 1991, on charges of “practicing illegally preaching pursuing religious practice without permission, and opposition to the State police,” detained without trial, and released in December 1993; 

 

8. Pastor Vo Xuan, house-church leader, arrested and released in 1991; 10. Le Quang Trung, house-church leader in the southern rural area, arrested on charges of “practicing illegal preaching, pursuing religious practices without permission, and opposing to the State policy,” detained without trial, and released in the same year;

 

9. The Reverend Phan Quang Thieu, house-church leader,  arrested on charges of “practicing illegal preaching, pursuing religious practice without permission, and opposing to the State policy,” and detained without trial; 

 

10. Pastor R’mah Loan, pastor with the H’mong tribe, arrested in June 1991, for unknown reasons and was placed under house arrest without trial;

 

11. Pastor Vo Van Lac, taken into custody in June 1991 for “having relationship with foreign church organizations” and released in the same month;

 

12. Pastor Lhu Anh, house-church pastor, arrested in August 1991, and released on November 20, 1991; 14. Pastor Phu Anh, house-church pastor, arrested in August 1991 and released in November in 1991;

 

13. Pastor Tran Mai, house-church leader, arrested in Saigon on October 31, 1991, on charges of “having connections with foreign religious groups, pursuing illegal religious  activities, and opposing to the State policy,” detained at Phan Dang Luu Prison,  moved to Chi Hoa Prison, then moved to Camp Tong Le Chan, Song Be Province; and

 

14. Nguyen Bai Tai, house-church leader, arrested on April 26, 1992,  on charge of “holding religious assembly without permission,” detained at Thu Duc, and released in December 1993.

 

The report by the Special Rapporteur of the United Nations on religious tolerance during his visit in Vietnam shed light on the contradictions in the laws and law practices of the Government of Vietnam in matter of religion. None of the recommendations of this report has been realized by Vietnam. For a long time, the Evangelical Churches  of Vietnam and their brothers and friends in the world are aware of the two distinct religious policies: the official policy and the “internal” policy. The official policy embodies the laws and interpretations of the laws by various government agencies. The “internal” policy is largely instituted by measures and methods dealt with the religions according to situations and circumstances. The Commissions for Religious Liberty of the World Evangelical Alliance and Evangelical Alliance of Canada noted the brutal manifestations of the "internal treatment policy." This treatment is manifest in any objective report on violations religious of religious freedom in modern Vietnam. Members of the Jeh and Jerai, as a case in evidence, were the most miserable victims of “internal policy” during the first years of the 1990’s. Recognized among them were:

 

1.Y Thang, member of the Jerai tribe, arrested and detained for religious reasons;

 

2. Y De, member of the Jerai tribe, arrested in 1990 for religious reasons; 3. B. Yui, member of the Jerai tribe, arrested in August 1990, on charge of having contacts with “illegal” religious groups, sentenced to three years of hard labor, and detained at Camp T20, Pleiku, Gia Lai - Kontum Province;

 

3. Ama Phuc, member of the Jerai tribe, arrested in August 1990, for having contacts with “illegal” religious groups, sentenced to three years of hard labor, detained at Camp T20, Pleiku, Gia Lai-Kontum Province;

 

4. Ro Cam Sieng’ member of the Jerai tribe. arrested in August 1990, for having contacts with “illegal”  religious groups, sentenced to three years of hard labor, and detained at Camp T20, Pleiku, Gia Lai-Kontum Province;

 

5. A. Dia, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990 for having contacts with “illegal” religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Kontum Province;

 

6. A. Tho, member of the Jei tribe arrester in Summer 1990, for having contacts with “illegal” religious groups , sentenced to three years in prison, detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Pleiku Province;

 

7. A. Blan, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with illegal religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Pleiku Province;

 

8. Siu Trung, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with “illegal” religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Kontum Province;

 

9. Siu Phan, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with “illegal”  religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, and detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia-Lai-Kontum Province;

 

10. A. Phiel, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with illegal  religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, and detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Kontum Province;

 

11. A. Neo, member of the Jeh tribe, for having contacts with “illegal”  religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, and detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Pleiku Province;

 

12. A. Chuoc, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with “illegal”  religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, and detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai- Kontum Province;

 

13. A Trip, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with “illegal” religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, and detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai-Pleiku Province;

 

14. A. Yel, member of the Jeh tribe, arrested in Summer 1990, for having contacts with “illegal” religious groups, sentenced to three years in prison, and detained at Camp T5, Pleibong, Gia Lai - Kontum Province;

 

15. Pastor Nguyen Ai has reportedly also been arrested for preaching without a permit and is said to have been sentenced to nine years of imprisonment in a labor camp. Mr. Minh and Mr. Son, Christian elders held meetings for the members of the closed Thanh My church.  According to the information received, they were arrested in April 1990 at Don Duong, near Dalat;

 

16 Y De and Mr. Y Thang, have been detained since 1989, reportedly for their religious activities. Twenty-four Christians from the Jeh tribe have reportedly been imprisoned since the beginning of 1990 in Dak Lak, Gia Lai Province;

 

17. Pastor R' Mah Boi, a young Christian leader in the highland district of Chu Pa, Gia Lai and Kontum, belongs to the Jerai minority. He was arrested in August 1989 reportedly for organizing a working party of about 200 tribesmen of Christian faith to help 2 tribal elders who had been ordered by officials to harvest a large rice-field when they were caught holding church meetings. Pastor Boi is said to have been detained and imprisoned on the basis of Administration Law No. 135. He has reportedly not been formally tried or convicted and is believed to be in arbitrary detention at prison camp A-20 in Dong Xuan, Phu Yen Province;

 

18. Pastor Vu Minh Hung, a minister from Pleiku, is said to have been arrested for the third time in December 1989 during a church meeting in his home. He was reportedly detained for the first time for 1 week and the second time for three months (first 7 days for interrogation and reeducation). Pastor Hung, who has not been formally tried or convicted, is believed to be held in administrative detention at the reeducation labor camp A-20 in Dong Xuan, in Phu Yen Province; 

    

19. Pastor Nguyen Chu and Pastor A Uot were reportedly arrested between 1989 and 1990 and are reportedly detained without trial. The Reverend Vo Xuan, a Protestant church leader in southern Vietnam, was allegedly taken into custody on December 1989 for meeting with other Christians and was charged with "disturbing the peace." Shortly before his detention, he reportedly baptized several persons; and

 

20. In Kontum, the Reverend Nguyen Chu and his son, Nguyen Hao, who serve the Christian faith in the Jeh minority territory, were arrested on the afternoon of the Palm Sunday, 1990. They were accused of supporting the movement of resistance of the FULRO (United Front for the Liberation of the Oppressed Races).  Before that, the local authorities had arrested a great number of Christians of this ethnic minority. Approximately 24 among them were imprisoned in Dak Lak, the city of Gia Lai-Kontum

 

  Situation of the H’mong Refugees

 

All through the 1990’s, the H'mong Christians in the North  suffered  from severe persecution. More than 8,000 among them had to leave their ancestral homes in Ha Giang and Lao Kay and took refuge in Dak Lak. a thousand of kilometers away.  Yet, they were not free from repression in the new land. The local authorities regarded them as the reactionary elements that opposed the States. Many H’nong refugees were  chased out of the piece of land they had just broken for farming. Others were ordered to leave the poor shelter they had scarcely raised. Still others were even forced return to their province of origin, empty-handed, unless  they pledged  that they would not receive any aid from the government and renounce their Christian faith.

 

Petitions to the central authorities to complain about the abuses of the local authorities came to the deaf ears. The thirty-page petition dated 1999 presented various instances of oppression. The local authorities  had used armed policemen or military units to intimidate the H'mong. and forced them to sign prepared documents in which the signatory pledges to renounce their Christian faith, promises, to abandon Christian religious practices, and to report to the authorities about the Church’s or Church members’ activities.

   

Christians who refused to comply with the orders were beaten .and fined  with big sums of money, up to a million “dong.” Without money, they had to pay in kind, to reimburse debts in food  of primary necessity or animals for pulling, or days of work. In January 2000, the H'mong Christians on the frontier provinces of China lived  under threat, The frontier police frequently visited their houses and forced them to renounce the faith and reestablish the alters for spirits  In some regions, the local authorities forced the Christians to prove their return to the animist cults by drinking blood of sacrificed animals.

   

By  the middle of the 1990's, the Vietnamese Communist Party put into practice a new tactic to put an end to the growth of Christianity in the H'mong tribe. The traditional animist religion, until then considered as primary superstition, was exalted as good and sane. A campaign of propaganda was initiated to motivate the H'mong Christians to return to their ancient beliefs. Along with it, meetings were organized during which the H'mong were constrained to sign the documents of abjuration and to drink a liquor composed of animal fresh blood with rice wine according to traditional  beliefs. Several years later, the methods were also applied to the Montagnards of the   Central Highlands.

  

This coming back to secular ethnic customs was accompanied with a campaign of denigration of Christianity. Based on the false interpretation of the term that means “God.” The anti-religious propaganda of the government blamed the Christianity for pursuing a political objective, creating  a H'mong kingdom. Under this pretext the authorities would easily erase the new faith.

 

From 1997 to 2000, some 15,000 H'mong Christians of the provinces of the North who were chased from their ancestral houses and communes still suffered much more hardship and discrimination in the new land. Being the refugees against their will, they underwent miserable trials. As a consequence of these physical and spiritual damages caused  indifference and  religious intolerance caused by the State unavoidable social uprisings happened the following years. As they did not know where to go, to go, the H'mong were forced to clear secondary forests and to clear waste land for farming for survival. Repression nevertheless persisted. Hundreds of Christian chiefs languished for years as a result of unspecified arrests and atrocious imprisonment. There were, at least, a dozen of them were the victims. Some died of malnutrition or lack of medical care.  In August 2002, a H'mong by the name Bua Senh suffered unjust death following the coups inflicted on him by the civil servants simply because he refused to abjure his faith.

 

According to the logic of the regime, all these interdictions have nothing to do with religious freedom: These activities are illegal. As such, they deserved to be administered by "internal treatment," the measures with  which  the Party and State will not have to rely on the “laws.”  In an answer to a petition of the H'mong, the local public officials simply stated that “ ... freedom of religion is not made for the H'mong.”  In other words, the "official policy" was not made for them.

 

At  the beginning of 2002, a group of 120 immigrant families of H’mong built shelters, cleared forest land, and to planted crops in the south of Dak Lak Province. The Vietnamese troops arrested and chased them from their settlements right at the beginning of their first harvest. They were moved toward a distant zone under the control of military units stationed in the west of the province. They were  forced to do the clearance of forest and never received salaries; they were only given enough food to survive. When the work was done, they were abandoned to themselves. Being the newcomers in the distant highland region, H'mong Christians were exposed to the ravages of malaria without medical assistance. This “internal treatment” measure had chased them from their homeland in the Noith, then made them the illegal refugees and vulnerable immigrants with all risks of abuses. The government still had the pretext under which to accuse them of promoting the “illegal internal immigration,” and creating social disorder and  sabotage to national unity.

Evangelical Christianity in the Center

 

 

    Instances of Persecution

 

     Hue

 

Phu Anh, aged 40, was arrested in early August 1991 in Hue, allegedly on charges of distributing contraband Bibles and other religious literature. He is said to have been held in administrative detention in Da Nang and was reportedly released on November 20. He is still thought to be under police investigation.

 

     Da Nang

 

The lack of scriptures constituted a serious problem to the preaching of the faith. Tied to restrictions. Pastors Le Tanh and Cao Van Quy  and a number Evangelical members of the congregations under their leadership had to compromise with the authorities in exchange for permission to start a Bible training class.  Persecution nevertheless intensified. In February 1994, the security forces of Da Nang, broke up an unregistered Church meeting and arrested 30 church members. Following the raid, at least five church leaders were arrested and detained in a police lockup for four days and given a fine of an equivalent $ US 25 each before they were released.

 

     Quang Ngai

 

On November 20, 1994, the authorities at Ba To, Quang Ngai Province arrested Pastor Nguyen Duc Loi and Pastor Nguyen Van Vui, the leaders of the House Church movement. They were accused of having pursued political schemes and exploited religious activities. They were detained for seven months. In March 1995, two militant Christians of the Same-affiliated Church organization in the district of Son Ha were arrested for unspecified reasons. They were only released after several weeks of detention.

 

These arrests of Church members apparently resulted from the rapid growth of Christianity in the local ethic minority Hre. The Reverend Loi, who speaks proficiently the Hre language, played a role in the Bible propagation in the area, was among the arrested. After his arrest, the  House Church movement of the Hre cane to a standstill. However, the Christians continued to participate in religious celebrations at private houses, regardless of all interdictions. They only performed religious services in accordance with the law as prescribed by Article 7 of the Decree 69/HDBT of March 21, 1991. According to this article, "the faithful have the right to practice the rites of offerings and the right to recite prayers in the interior of the family." They would only participate "in religious activities which are performed in the interior of a worship place."

 

An inquest of 6 pages edited in Central Vietnam and signed by 17 members of a domestic Church belonging to the Assembly of God reported in detail the barbarous treatment that the police inflicted on them on September 19, 1999. The incident occurred in the commune of Binh Linh, district of Que Chau, province of Quang Ngai.  The Church members were taken with hands tied  to the to the commune headquarters for interrogation subsequent to a peaceful meeting for prayers at the house of Sac and Day. Along the road they were mocked at with rude things. They were brutally beaten during the interrogations. In an instance, the security police behaved  just like the crazy crooks of the Red Guards of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. While dragging the poor Christians along the road, they held high the Bible and shouted: "The same things will occur to whoever believes in this sordid book." Among the victims was Huynh Van Bay, who suffered torture during intermittent interrogations by the agents of the police Nguyen Nghia and Tran Phuoc Thiep. To force the Christian from renouncing his faith, the two agents beat, boxed, and kicked him until he fainted. When released, Bay succumbed to serious  illness.

    

The petition to the central administration stressed that the Christians concerned are poor peasants who aspire to take care of their families, serve their faith, and build the country. These Christians ask themselves whether the kind of ill-treatment they suffered is part of the policy of the State, and, if that is true, such an act is executed in contradiction to he declaration of the Secretary-general of the Party, Le Kha Phieu when he affirmed that religious freedom is guaranteed to every citizen. The Christians, in reality, could only  receive ill-treatment that are  brutal from the agents of the public security of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. The most deplorable case in evidence is that of the Hre missionary, Dinh Van Hoang and his pregnant spouse. Both of them were beaten in July 1999. Following the ill-treatment, the spouse of the missionary lost her child. The husband and wife even continued to perform their mission of propagation of the faith, Because of this, their house was mysteriously burnt. Everyone knew who the arsonist was but dared not say.

 

     Testimony

 

There existed in the beginning of 1999 hundreds of domestic Churches in the Hre population in Quang Ngai. It was then an impetus to a powerful movement of faith in the region. Notwithstanding, because of this expansion of house church, many Christians were targeted with ill-treatment of the security police. In August 1999, a member of group of domestic Church, called "Friendly Christians" demanded in a petition to the administration of Quang Ngai Province respect for religious freedom and decent conduct towards the Christians, as follows:

 

 “ My name is Nguyen Huu Cau. I belong to the group of  the ethnic Hre. I am 43 years old, and I am from the hamlet of Ca Dao, commune of Son Dang, district of Son Ha in the province of Quang Ngai. I desire to testify the accomplished work by the Lord in the commune of Son Lang in the entire district of Son Ha where there is not any Christian church while the Christians are numerous. In the commune of Son Lang only, the are 150. Christians. On June 28, 1999, our congregation at Son Long organized a Summer class of Bible for the children in my house. The first day, the children received with joy the Word of God and practiced holy chants, and sang holy songs. Nevertheless, the next day, at 14:30, the agents of local security police interrupted our activities. They dismissed the class and ordered me to go to the district security police office for  an interrogation. t 

      

Politely and confidently, I talked to them about the religious policy of the State and freedom of religion, but to all intents they oppressed me. I was indignant at their behavior and manner as they penetrated my house without a written order from their superior. I asked them  to set me free because of this. I reasoned that had resisted the order of Captain Lien, who wore the uniform of patrol police, for illegal intrusion into my house. I said: "Nobody in my family has violated the traffic or transportation regulations. Your order of arrest is not a warrant." They admitted that all the facts I said was reasonable. They had searched the garden where the children had been attending a session of Bible reading. They had been singing with joy. Having offered no counter-argument, the policemen were very angry. They communicated by radio with other policemen working outside, asking them to come the place office to intimidate me and executed barbarous acts against me. They said that I was under arrest and intended to tie my hands. I expressed my reprobation of all of that. I held a glass in my hand and held it firm. They dared not come near. But, in a moment, they threw a grenade of gas on me, bound my hands, and took me away.

      

They also arrested my friends Dao and Trung, my brothers in the service for the Lord who came to help me with Bible readings to children. They threw us into a cell in a police station of the district of Son Ha, a cell in which we can only eat and relieve ourselves. They refused to give us a mosquito net or anything to keep off the mosquito. They gave us a bowl of rice with coarse salt, twice a day. The first day, we did not have water. Then, they furnished us with a small bottle of water daily. In spite of this ill-treatment, all three of us continued to pray the Lord in a loud voice to encourage ourselves. We recited  Biblical texts that we knew by heart in this manner. We did this  any time we were not interrogated.

     

The night of July 5, 1999, at about 1 or 2 o'clock in the morning, three of us woke up and prayed in such a loud voice that the guards could not sleep. I recited the psalms and concluded my prayer by these words: "In the name of Jesus Christ, evil disappears!" They came to strike violently on the door and injured me. They said to me: "You recited your prayers day and night. Do you want to make the prison a place of cult?" On this point, they were right. From my cell, through canalization, I talked to a prisoner of the next cell, Nguyen Ngoc Thang, aged 23. I made a testimony and awakened him to faith. I taught him to sing Christian songs and he learned by heart a passage of Gospel: Jean 3,16. Thang was in prison because of a crime and waited to be brought before the tribunal.   

       

On July 7, 1999, I only imagined that I was going to be liberated because 9 days had already passed by since my arrest, which term of temporary detention  set forth by the local authorities, and I thought that I could write a verse from the Bible on the wall to leave a testimony. I was immediately punished, a terrible punishment. They put me in a  terrible foul cell, I did not  imagine that  I could bear such a pain. When I came back home, I thought that they had thrown me into the inferno. I thank God that that excruciating pain only lasted five hours, and that was a nightmare that would ever haunt me all my life.

     

After these nine days, they set three of us free. We came back home. exhausted. As for me, during the following week, I was to report myself at the police headquarters for interrogations for the agents there to complete an on-file document on my personal history. They condemned me in a meeting of denunciation of crimes before a group of retired policemen and other people who took side with the ‘Revolution.’ These people shouted at me and threatened me. Some said to me: ‘We must use the law of the jungle against you and reprove you severely so that you will stop behaving stupidly like a dog.’ The chairman of the People’s Council  of the commune of Son Lang concluded with warnings against ‘whoever would come to talk to me.’

Then, they imposed on me a fine on three amends:

       

1- 200,000 to one million ‘dong for having abused democratic privileges of the citizen by violating national security,

       

2- 200,000 to one million ‘dong’ for having counteracted an agent of the law while in the exercise of his functions. and

      

3- 200,000 to one million ‘dong’ for having degraded a building belonging to the nation."

      

My photo camera “Pratica” and my flash “Sun Pak” were confiscated and would only be returned to me until I  completely acquitted myself of the amends.

 

I asked my Christian friends to pray the Lord in my favor to intervene in this instance. My family is really in very great misery: my religious life was in jeopardy.  The faith that just flourishes in me  and the photos I have taken kept with me until now are all resources with which I can invest in the service of God.

  

As regards my health condition, I suffer chronic loss of memory.  From the start of my incarceration, I have contracted a certain number of illnesses. I have salt in blood because due to ill nourishment. As my family is aware of my illness, they have tried to support me, giving me what I need.  The camp authorities  did not facilitate things.  From time to time, my children take risk to enter the courtyard of the prison to bring me a little supply of food. But, the guards confiscate it all. 

 

The testimony by a Christian in Quy Nhon  showed how deplorable the Christians suffered under persecution:   

 

“I hereby respectfully addressed to the congregation of servants of the Lord. In June 1999, my Church at Qui Nhon (we belong to the Vietnamese  congregation of the district of Qui Nhon, province of Gia Lai) convened  an assembly destined to impart methods of religious instruction to new preachers. The police of the Security interrupted the assembly, seized the Bibles, religious books, copies of songs, .... dressed a report, and insisted that we all be brought to trial  before the People's Council.  After many days under interrogation, we were imposed on a fine for amends of 400,000 “dong’”

    

In the commune of Suoi Bac, district of Son Hoa in the province of Tuy Hoa, the police addressed to the Christians of the Hroi ethnic: "You are not authorized to pray together in your family. If you want to practice a cult, you must go to a church." Ethnic Christians in Phu Yen suffered the same fate.  Persecution  intensified.  The Hroi and Ede ethnic minorities in the two districts of Son Hoa and Son Hinh in the province of Phu Yen. suffered harassment and intimidation. The missionaries were beaten, humiliated, calumniated, and offended. The civil servants of the government of these two districts got the masses together at regular intervals to propagandize, speaking ill of the movement and growth of the Evangelical Christian Churches. By propaganda, they vilified the Church: "Protestantism is an American religion, the religion of the counterrevolutionary, the religion that seeks all means to overthrow the government. Whoever sows  this religion will be arrested, and thrown into prison and will have to suffer the rigor of the law."

 

     Thuan Hai

 

The Reverend Xuan reportedly refused to sign a false confession and was held 347 in administrative detention in a security prison in Thuan Hai Province, without being allowed to receive family visits for four months, until April 1990. He is reported not to have been formally tried or convicted and was released in December 1991. According to the sources, Rev. Xuan had previously spent 13 years in a reeducation camp until April 1987 because he used to be a military chaplain in the South Vietnamese army.

 

     Phan Rang

 

In the Vietnamese Christian communities in the provinces of Thuan Hai and Song Be, arrests took place, usually after assembly celebrations at domicile. The two Christian leaders, Son and Minh, of the Christendom of Thanh My, which is near Phan Rang Province, were arrested in April 1990 for having organized an assembly for prayers at a private house. During December, 1990, three pastors were arrested for the same reason: The Reverend Vo Xuan in the region of Binh Thuy where three temples were temporarily closed.