1989 - The Youtong Bloodbath

April 18, 1989

Luancheng, Hebei

An underground Catholic prayer meeting in China.

The tension and sharp division between Catholics belonging to state-sanctioned Catholic Patriotic Association (CPA) churches and those Catholics who choose to remain part of the unregistered, or ‘underground’ churches has occasionally spilled over into violence. One of the worst examples of this occurred in 1989 at Youtong village in Luanchang County, Hebei Province, where the majority of Catholics belonged to the Trappist tradition.

Youtong village at the time had a population of 3,400, of whom 1,700 were Catholics. Of these, just 200 belonged to the CPA and the remaining 1,500 were underground believers, who had for some time pleaded with the government to let them build a church to worship in, but their pleas were denied. Subsequently, they errected a large tent in the village and used it for their services. In the month before the bloodbath, Public Security officers came to Youtong and ordered the people to stop praying, and for the tent to be dismantled. The believers respectfully declined, citing the ‘freedom of religion’ guaranteed in the Chinese constitution.

At about eight o’clock in the morning of April 18th,[1] the government launched a massive, unexpected attack on the Catholics of Youtong. For some time details of what unfolded were sketchy, until eyewitnesses smuggled a letter out of China in which they appealed to Christians around the world. In the believers’ own words:

“About 8 a.m. about 5,000 police and armed militia mobilized several hundred trucks to surround the entire village. Then they rushed into the priest’s house and the temporary tent-church, hoping to arrest the priest. They demolished the church and used batons to injure many believers. They forcibly dragged out of the church several dozen women who were praying. Six elderly women were knocked unconscious and did not get up….

About 3 p.m. a great crowd of armed police wearing steel helmets and bullet-proof vests and wielding electric stun-batons, clubs and bricks, arrived and attacked the believers…. Then the armed police attacked the priest’s house from all sides, beating anyone in sight. The Christians fled inside, but they threw bricks at the house and broke all the windows and dragged everyone out one by one, beating them unmercifully. They would not release even old people over 80 or children in their early teens. They were beaten until their whole bodies were covered with wounds. Several hundred believers were beaten up and lay down, filling the entire courtyard. There were rivers of blood….

In this cruel incident more than 100 people were injured, 60 of them severely, including 20 who were beaten unconscious and did not revive. More than 30 were arrested. Among them were four children under 15. It is not clear whether they are dead or alive…. The whole body of believers in Youtong Village appeal to the Pope and believers throughout the world to pray for us and to pray for the Chinese church. Pray that our faith and courage will be strengthened, that we will overcome evil, and that through international public opinion justice will be served!”[2]

The government originally tried to whitewash the incident, claiming nobody had been injured and that the police had operated lawfully against the “illegal occupation” of a school campus. After the believers’ appeal was published around the world and the incident could no longer be concealed, the CPA admitted the incident had taken place, but put the blame squarely on the shoulders of Pei Ronggui, the underground priest, for “deceiving the local Catholics.”[3]

Later information revealed that three Christians had been killed in the Youtong bloodbath, and more than 300 injured includiug a nun who “had her eyes knocked out”[4] after being beaten in the face. The victims allegedly “included teenagers, people over 80 years old and a disabled beggar.”[5] One report said, “Catholics filled the rectory and blocked the entrance. Police clambered onto the roof, tore away the tiles, and threw them down at the crowd inside. Two young women accosted along the road insulted their attackers and were trampled to death.”[6]

Two martyrs from the Youtong Bloodbath were Pei Guoxin and Dong Zhouxiao, who were both reportedly beaten to death in detention some time after June 1989.[7] Immediately after the incident the police went to all the hospitals and medical clinics in the area and ordered them not to treat anyone from Youtong village.

The local believers helped the underground Catholic priest of Youtong, Pei Ronggui, flee the village during the incident, and for some time he went into hiding, with the authorities attempting to hunt him down. The 53-year-old priest was finally captured in late 1990 and sentenced to five years in prison. He was released early in March 1993, apparently in a bid by China to create a good impression in the run up to its bid for the 2000 Olympics.[8] On January 7, 1994—after Beijing’s first bid for the Olympics failed[9]—Pei was rearrested and sent back to prison to serve the remainder of his sentence.

1. Some reports give the date of this incident as April 17th, but the appeal letter the Christians from the village sent around the world gave the date as the 18th.
2. Si Shiba Canan Zhenxiang [The Truth About the April 18th Cruel Incident], handwritten appeal from “All the Members in Youtong Village,” translated by and cited in Lambert, The Resurrection of the Chinese Church, 195-196.
3. Lambert, The Resurrection of the Chinese Church, 197.
4. China News and Church Report (No. 303, May 3, 1989).
5. China News and Church Report (No. 303, May 3, 1989).
6. Edmond Tang & John-Paul Wiest (eds.), The Catholic Church in Modern China: Perspectives (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1993), 63.
7. See Puebla Institute, The Martyrs of Maoism, 31.
8. South China Morning Post (April 3, 1993).
9. Ironically, most experts believe the first Beijing bid (for the 2000 Olympics) lost out by just two votes to Sydney because of China’s poor human rights record.