BEIJING, CHINA — Sept. 21, 2026 — Chinese authorities have reportedly detained multiple pastors and church coworkers from Beijing Jiaquan Church, an influential urban house-church network with more than two decades of ministry in the Chinese capital and congregations elsewhere in China.
ChinaAid has received first-hand reports of the detentions but is working to confirm details such as the approximate number of people taken into custody, arrest locations, or specific charges. The raid comes days before Chinese President Xi Jinping’s planned visit to Washington.
The developing reports raise concern that authorities could be extending pressure on prominent independent urban churches following the nationwide crackdown on Beijing Zion Church that began in October 2025 and repeated police actions against Chengdu’s Early Rain Covenant Church this year.
If confirmed, a coordinated operation across multiple locations to arrest Jiaquan church members would mark another significant action against church networks operating outside China’s state-controlled religious system. ChinaAid is working to determine whether congregations outside Beijing were also targeted.
Church has more than two decades of ministry
Sources familiar with the church told ChinaAid that Jiaquan Church has ministered in Beijing for more than 20 years and developed churches and gathering points spanning several parts of China, serving more than 1,000 believers.
Influential among younger urban Christians, the church has incorporated contemporary Christian music, interactive fellowship and discipleship into its ministry. For more than a decade, church leaders have operated the Noah Music School in Beijing, training musicians and worship leaders serving house churches across China.
Rev. Bob Fu, founder and president of ChinaAid, said the reported detentions fit a troubling pattern involving some of China’s best-known independent churches. He classifies it as an expanding campaign against some of China’s most influential urban house-church networks.
House churches operate outside the government-approved Three-Self Patriotic Movement and other state-controlled Protestant structures. Chinese authorities have tightened restrictions on unregistered religious groups in recent years, with verified reports of surveillance, raids and criminal prosecutions.
Fu said the churches have different histories and ministries but share a determination to conduct church life independently of government political control.
“We are urgently concerned for the safety, health and legal rights of every Jiaquan pastor and church coworker who has been taken away,” Fu said. He called on authorities to disclose detainees’ identities and whereabouts, explain the legal basis for any detention and allow access to independent legal counsel.
Pattern of pressure on prominent house churches
The reports come less than a year after authorities launched coordinated raids against Beijing Zion Church, one of China’s largest house-church networks.
Beginning in October 2025, authorities detained members of the church across multiple provinces, with 18 formally arrested. ChinaAid News reported Sept. 10 that eight pastors and co-workers remained held at detention centers in Beihai, Guangxi, an autonomous region in southern China, facing “fraud” and “illegal business operations” charges.
Authorities have also repeatedly targeted Early Rain Covenant Church in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province in southwestern China. Including a police raid on June 14 in Jiangyou, a city northeast of Chengdu, detaining more than 30 members after intercepting a church gathering at a hotel. And another on Sept. 10, detaining 11 Christians, most over age 60, during a small reading gathering at a teahouse.
Early Rain is among China’s best-known Protestant house churches. Authorities banned the church following mass arrests in December 2018, and founding Pastor Wang Yi later received a nine-year sentence. Members have continued meeting privately despite recurring police pressure.
Detentions reported days before Xi visit
The Jiaquan reports also emerge days before Chinese leader Xi’s scheduled Sept. 24 summit with President Donald Trump.
ChinaAid said it has no evidence linking the reported Jiaquan arrests directly to the summit. Fu nevertheless said the timing is notable and the treatment of peaceful Christians should be raised during high-level U.S.-China discussions.
The timing also follows a Sept. 16 religious-freedom forum in Washington, where advocates highlighted cases involving Christians and other religious groups in China ahead of Xi’s planned visit.
ChinaAid will continue working with sources inside China to verify the developing reports and plans to publish additional information as it becomes available.
Founded in 2002, ChinaAid is an international Christian human rights organization committed to promoting religious freedom and the rule of law in China through advocacy, legal support, and international awareness campaigns.