Apple has removed a popular Christian Bible app in China after the Chinese government deemed that the app violated Communist laws.
Bible App by Olive Tree and Quran Majeed have been taken down due to alleged “compliance issues,” the tech giant told the BBC.
Apple refused to give details about what the compliance issues were, but directed the BBC to its Human Rights Policy: “We’re required to comply with local laws, and at times there are complex issues about which we may disagree with governments.”
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Christianpost.com reports: Apple also told the BBC that the apps had been removed because Chinese officials had stated they violated laws on hosting illegal religious texts.
“Apple chief executive Tim Cook has been accused of hypocrisy from politicians in the U.S. for speaking out about American politics, but staying quiet about China,” the BBC noted.
Chinese authorities are also removing Bible apps and Christian WeChat public accounts as new highly restrictive administrative measures on religious staff went into effect earlier this year.
Open Doors estimates that China has more than 97 million Christians, many of whom worship in unregistered or so-called “illegal” underground churches.
The U.S.-based persecution watchdog International Christian Concern documented more than 100 incidents of Christian persecution in China between July 2020 and June 2021 as the country’s communist regime seeks to forcefully convert independent religious groups into mechanisms of the Chinese Communist Party.
ICC tracked 23 incidents of authorities demolishing religious structures and symbols during its reporting period, the group said in its report.
“The CCP has torn down, destroyed, and removed numerous churches in China, especially those that refused to submit to its control,” the report said.
The persecution watchdog added in the report that it recorded 14 cases of “Sinicization,” which is a state campaign to forcefully assimilate religious groups into CCP-defined Chinese culture.
As an example, ICC highlighted the plight of a church bookstore that was forced to display Mao Zedong’s Little Red Book instead of the Bible. The Administration for Religious Affairs also ordered Christians to study President Xi’s book and memorize his speeches.
Under the direction of President Xi Jinping, officials from the CCP have been enforcing strict controls on religion, according to another report released in March by China Aid.
Open Doors USA, which monitors persecution in over 60 countries, estimates that there are about 97 million Christians in China, a large percentage of whom worship in what China considers to be “illegal” and unregistered underground house churches.
Christians are not the only religious minority to face persecution at the hands of the CCP, however.
Estimates suggest that as many as 1 million to 3 million Uyghur and other ethnic Muslims have been subject to internment camps in the western Xinjiang province, where they are taught to be secular citizens who fall in line with the CCP. In January, the U.S. State Department recognized China’s treatment of Uyghurs as a “genocide.”
You can bet it was a manipulative disingenuous piece of seditious treaso stirring propaganda from apple. What else could it be from that company that hates every government on earth.? And the idea of sharing would be their worst nightmare, they who refuse to pay any taxes to give back anything to any community anywhere
Exactly why their head office is in Ireland.
And thanks for using my identity BTW and thanks DISQUS for allowing it Their usual policie
And congratulations on mimicking my style You’ve obviously been told to study it in order to deceive the world. .
Apple? The same Apple that named itself after the bitten Apple in the Bible? The same Apple company that charged $666 for their first CONsumer product? The Apple that is currently censoring against my wishes? Shocking.
You cannot believe anything apple say. China has had issues, with the Vatican over who has the right to appoint bishops with the Vatican demanding they do ot and China naturally being concerned about subversion insisting they select them. And I KNOW 100%that political extremists and radicals use church as their covet story for subversion globally, just as they use it for drug trafficking and money laundering In fact “Nothing is what it seems” and people who refuse to learn that will forever be like babies lost in the woods.