Volume 7 Issue 24

China Installs Surveillance Cameras in Churches to Monitor Christians

China’s Orwellian-like network of surveillance cameras now includes churches.

Most churches within the Protestant Three-Self Patriotic Movement in one major Chinese city, Huai’an, have government-mandated surveillance cameras that allow the communist government to monitor the congregation’s every move, Bitter Winter reported.

For example, Bitter Winter visited a Three-Self congregation that had 28 high-definition surveillance cameras, including six above the podium and four at the entrance. 

Within the Huaiyin district of Huai’an city, 155 of the 170 Three-Self churches have government-mandated cameras that are connected to a network allowing the government to watch Christians, Bitter Winter reported. Huai’an’s population is 4.7 million

“The Religious Affairs Bureau pressured us into installing them,” a member of the church told Bitter Winter. “Each surveillance camera is connected to the public security organs, as required by the Religious Affairs Bureau. They can see every move in the church. If we didn’t follow their demands, the church would have to be shut down.”

The cameras are part of a massive network of cameras across China that allow the government to monitor citizens. There are an estimated 176 million surveillance cameras across China, The Atlantic reported. That number could reach 450 million by 2020.

China’s persecution of illegal house churches is well-documented. But its surveillance of Three-Self churches – which are legal but face severe restrictions – has not received as much attention.

In Dingji Town Three-Self Church in Huai’an, the government installed surveillance cameras in the prayer room, in the lobby, and in the courtyard.

“House church gatherings are being persecuted. I never thought that there would be no freedom at Three-Self churches, either,” a Three-Self church member said.

The footage is being closely monitored. 

“Every time we hold a gathering, the local United Front Work Department, the Public Security Bureau, and the town government send specially-assigned personnel to come and supervise the church,” said the Christian that attends the church with 28 cameras. “These people take turns on duty, sitting in front of the computer and observing each move of every person in the church. Now, when believers come to attend gatherings, they don’t dare to speak casually.”

'The Word of God Began to Change Me': Gay Man Finds Jesus, Marries a Woman

A man who was formerly involved in a homosexual lifestyle has spoken openly of his miraculous conversion. Incredibly, after he found Christ, Brian Wheelock was taken on a miraculous journey of renewal and, eventually, ended up marrying a woman.

Speaking to a crowd at the Freedom March in Washington D.C., Wheelock talked candidly about his former life, declaring that Christ set him free from sexual sin in a profound and powerful way.

“I lived that life for at least ten years, and it was a crazy time in my life,” he said of his former life embroiled in homosexual relationships. “Those feelings were real. I spent a lot of time in relationships and you know what, that’s who I was, it was my identity.”

Speaking with great courage, Wheelock said that he “thought he was free” at the time. Soon, however, he realized that was becoming increasingly depressed and was overcome with a dreadful sense of emptiness.

“The more immersed, and the more I lived that life, to me it was empty, and just began to be a place of depression for me – where I just wasn’t fulfilled,” he said, according to the Christian Institute.

It was only when Brian traveled to the United Kingdom that he was confronted with his need to change. Sinking into a pit of depression and despair, he sought God. “I felt God was telling me ‘Brian, this is not my best for you. Brian, I have better for you,’” Wheelock explained.

Then, Wheelock, who was at the time still involved in homosexual relationships, began to experience vivid dreams about meeting a woman who would at some stage become his wife. Brian recorded the experience in a powerful journal entry:

“Last night I had a dream- a vision from God. I dreamt that I got married (to a girl!) who has a medium build with long brown hair.  She was beautiful.  Together we had 3 or 4 kids…it was hard to tell.  But I could clearly see the oldest. A girl- a beautiful girl- with long brown hair.  She was twirling and spinning with flowers in her hair and the biggest smile on her face,” he wrote, according to LifeSite News.

He felt like it was God speaking to him about his sexual orientation.

So, upon returning to the United States and still wildly conflicted, Brian decided to set foot in a church. “I just literally went to a church and just started hearing the word of God, and something about the word of God began to change me from the inside out,” he said.

However, with the self-awareness to know that he was not beyond the perils of temptation, Wheelock then did something absolutely extraordinary – he wrote up a covenant between him and God, promising not to dwell on sinful thoughts. He would sign it twice daily as a reminder that he could win the battle over sin.

While many would criticize this as legalism, Brian was simply following the crucial scripture found in 2 Corinthians 10:5 that instructs us to “take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”

Gradually, as he practiced obedience to Jesus, and with the help of the Holy Spirit, something began to shift in his life.

“I didn’t pray in the name of Jesus that he would make me straight,” Wheelock explained. “I prayed I would die to myself and I would become a follower of Jesus Christ. And God is faithful to that.”

After a period of continued healing, Brian went to meet his future wife, Pam. Incredibly, the couple now has three children together and a blessed family life.

“I look at my girls and sometimes cry,” Wheelock said. “If I didn’t yield myself to the Lord and follow His lead, these little munchkins wouldn’t even exist! It overwhelms me to think that an entire generation—my kids, their kids and onward—wouldn’t have even been possible if I didn’t embrace the plan that Jesus was showing me.”

Food Price Shock Coming - African swine fever To Devastate Pig Population

We have never seen an animal disease outbreak like this before, and it is rapidly getting worse.  African swine fever, also referred to as "pig Ebola", has already wiped out millions upon millions of pigs and it continues to spread to even more countries. There is no vaccine and there is no cure, and so essentially we don't have any way to stop this disease.

At this point, the only solution is to kill all the pigs wherever the virus is found and desperately hope that it doesn't spread anywhere else.  But that approach clearly hasn't been working, and according to a recent Fox News report this epidemic has now become the "biggest animal disease outbreak we've ever had on the planet"...

"This is the biggest animal disease outbreak we've ever had on the planet," Dirk Pfeiffer, a veterinary epidemiologist at City University of Hong Kong and swine fever expert, said. "It makes the foot and mouth disease and [mad cow disease] outbreaks pale in comparison to the damage that is being done. And we have no way to stop it from spreading."

China is the epicenter for this outbreak, and it is also home to half of all the pigs in the world. Actually, to be more accurate, I should say that it used to be home to half of all the pigs in the world.

In a normal year, China slaughters approximately 700 million pigs.  But according to Rabobank, that number will be down 30 percent this year due to this outbreak...

Researchers at Rabobank are estimating that this year China will suffer a 30% loss in pork production as a result of ASF. To put that into perspective, that 30% loss in production is equivalent to Europe's entire annual pork supply, and almost 30% larger than U.S. annual pork production.

So let's do some quick math.

30 percent of 700 million is 210 million.

Let that sink in for a moment.  210 million pigs will be lost in China alone in 2019, and when you throw in the rest of the world we are talking about cataclysmic losses already and the outbreak is still getting worse. One of the primary reasons why this virus is so fearsome is because it survives just about anywhere and it is incredibly hard to kill...

The germ is hardy, capable of remaining active in water for a month, in meat and blood at room temperature for several months and for six years in cold, dark conditions. It's resistant to temperature extremes, and can survive a day in vinegar-strength acids.

Even if we had an effective treatment, attempting to eradicate this disease would be a complete and utter nightmare. But as I stated earlier, there is no vaccine and there is no cure. All we can do is keep killing pigs. But of course global demand for pork just continues to grow as the global population increases. So with increasing demand and rapidly falling supply, it was inevitable that pork prices would begin to rise substantially...

The implications of the outbreak are already being felt beyond Asia. Global pork prices have risen by almost 40%, and long term it is likely to lead to more pork imports from Europe and America to meet demand, which will also push up global meat prices.

And what we have seen so far is just the beginning.  In fact, China's Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs is now telling us that the price of pork is likely to rise 70 percent by the end of 2019.

Of course if this disease continues to spread, we could be talking about an epidemic that could literally end the global pork industry as we know it today.

Already, there is a tremendous amount of paranoia about the spread of this virus, and for good reason.  In fact, the virus has been found "in Chinese pork products that were confiscated by customs officials in Japan, South Korea and Australia"...

But the virus has been in Chinese pork products that were confiscated by customs officials in Japan, South Korea and Australia, suggesting that the virus has permeated the food chain in China.

And could it be possible that pork products tainted with the disease were able to slip through the inspection process in various countries? We don't know.  But what we do know is that African swine fever has been spreading all over Asia.

It has now spread to Mongolia, Cambodia, Hong Kong, North Korea and Vietnam.  In fact, it is now being projected that Vietnam will lose 10% of its pork production this year...

Rabobank is projecting that Vietnam, which in May mobilized its military in the fight against the disease, will lose 10% of its pork production. Today, pork accounts for three-quarters of all meat consumption in the nation of Vietnam.  This disease is already a major national crisis in that country, and we are still in the very early stages of this outbreak. Meanwhile, this virus is starting to pop up in Europe as well.  According to one report, the disease was just identified at a major pig farm in Poland...

A farm with more than 8,000 pigs in Poland has broke with African swine fever. According to the World Organization for Animal Health, the farm is located in Bielsk Podlaskie near the border with Belarus. And in Denmark, they have actually constructed a 43-mile border fence in order to keep out wild boar. It is a good thing that they are taking this threat so seriously, because African Swine Fever is incredibly deadly.  Up to 90 percent of the pigs that catch the virus end up dead, and once it starts spreading on a pig farm it is inevitable that all of the survivors will have to be killed as well in order to help prevent the spread of the disease. Unfortunately, most people in the western world still don't seem to understand the seriousness of what we are facing.  Essentially, what we are dealing with is an existential threat to the entire global pork industry. And considering the fact that we really struggle to produce enough food for the entire planet in a good year, this should be a major wake up call for all of us.

Last week I spent about 200 dollars on groceries, and my shopping cart wasn't even full.  The price of food is already ridiculously high, but it looks like things are going to get much worse in the months ahead.