In a move that has set off alarms among religious freedom advocates, the Chinese government is intensifying its efforts to incorporate underground Catholic communities into its state-sanctioned church. This action is accompanied by increased monitoring and restrictions on the estimated 12 million Catholics in the country, as detailed in a recent report by Human Rights Watch.

Human Rights Watch highlights that this heightened pressure is a continuation of a decade-long initiative aimed at ensuring religious groups conform to the Communist Party’s ideological framework. This campaign underscores China’s broader strategy of aligning all religious practices with state doctrines.

In response to the report, the Chinese government has dismissed these claims, arguing that Human Rights Watch has a “consistent bias against China,” as reported by the Associated Press.

The Catholic community in China has historically been divided between a state-regulated church and an underground faction that remains loyal to the Vatican. In a bid to mitigate these tensions, Pope Francis in 2018 struck an agreement allowing the Chinese government a say in the appointment of bishops.

In the backdrop of these developments, Chinese President Xi Jinping has been a central figure in enforcing the Sinicization campaign, which seeks to infuse Chinese cultural elements into religious practices. This is part of a broader push to bring all religious expressions under the state’s control, as echoed in a statement by Human Rights Watch researcher Yalkun Uluyol. Uluyol notes that nearly eight years after the Vatican-China agreement, Catholics in the region are encountering increasing repression that infringes upon their religious freedoms.

“A decade into Xi Jinping’s Sinicization campaign and nearly eight years since the 2018 Holy See-China agreement, Catholics in China face escalating repression that violates their religious freedoms,” Human Rights Watch researcher Yalkun Uluyol said in the report. 

“Pope Leo XIV should urgently review the agreement and press Beijing to end the persecution and intimidation of underground churches, clergy, and worshipers.”

The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson’s office told The Associated Press that Human Rights Watch “fabricates all manner of lies and rumors and lacks any credibility whatsoever.”

The office added that the government “oversees religious affairs in accordance with the law and protects citizens’ freedom of religious belief and normal religious activities.”

A man looks on at a Catholic church in Zhuozhou, China’s northern Hebei province April 22, 2025. (Adek Berry/AFP)

Human Rights Watch said its researchers are not allowed into China and that the report is based on interviews with people outside the country who had firsthand knowledge of Catholic life in China, along with experts on Catholicism and religious freedom.

The 2018 agreement stipulates that Beijing proposes candidates for bishop, which the pope can veto, though the full text has never been made public.

In June 2025, Pope Leo XIV, who had just become the pope, appointed a Chinese bishop under the 2018 agreement and said he would continue to honor the deal “in the short term.”

Pope Leo XIV waves as he arrives at Saint Joseph’s Cathedral in Bamenda on the fourth day of an 11-day apostolic journey to Africa April 16, 2026. (Alberto Pizzoli /AFP via Getty Images)

“I’m also in ongoing dialogue with a number of people, Chinese, on both sides of some of the issues that are there,” Leo said. “It’s a very difficult situation. In the long term, I don’t pretend to say this is what I will and will not do, but after two months, I’ve already begun having discussions at several levels on that topic.”

Since 2018, Human Rights Watch says Chinese authorities have pressured underground Catholics to join the state-run church through detentions, disappearances and house arrests, citing accounts from unnamed individuals who have left China.

The report also said China has tightened ideological control, surveillance and restrictions on religious activity and foreign ties, including requiring state approval for clergy travel, while officially recognizing and closely overseeing five religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism and Islam.

Xi Jinping said in 2016 he would “Sinicize” the country’s religions, a policy aimed at aligning religious practices with Communist Party ideology.

Human Rights Watch said authorities have taken sweeping steps to curb religious practice, including tearing down churches and crosses, blocking gatherings at unregistered churches and seizing religious materials not approved by the state.

The group said the broader “Sinicization” campaign has also led to intensified crackdowns on Tibetan Buddhists and Muslims.