INTERVIEW with Rev. Pat Mahoney, Christian Activist Detained in China

Their story became international news after they were detained by police twice in two days in Tiananmen Square and deported. A Catholic Online Exclusive.

WASHINGTON (Catholic Online) - Randy Sly, Associate Editor and Washington Correspondent for Catholic Online spoke this weekend with Rev. Pat Mahoney of the Christian Defense Coalition upon his return to Washington after being deported by Chinese Authorities. Rev. Mahoney, along with two leaders from Generation Life, Brandi Swindell and Mike McMonagle, were in China to bring awareness to the world about issues involving human rights, life, and social justice. They were detained twice by police and finally deported.

RWS: Pat, when did you begin to plan for the demonstration in Beijing?

PM: When we heard a couple of years ago that Beijing would be hosting the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, we felt very strongly that there needed to be a public prophetic witness addressing the human rights abuses by the Chinese government and particularly speaking for those who were under the crushing hand of the government with regard to their Christian faith as well as to address the policy of forced abortion they were also enforcing. We felt there had to be this witness standing up for justice, being a voice for those who had no voice.

We didn't think we would even have an opportunity since the security is so strong for this event. My organization, the Christian Defense Coalition, has a reputation for speaking out against the human rights violations in China. We've been arrested in front of the Chinese Embassy, held prayer vigils for those who were seeking political asylum, and from forced abortion. I just said that there was no way we could get into China, to get a visa into the country.

A missionary friend suggested that we apply with the Chinese consulate in New York where you can process a visa in one day and to only go in as a small group. In June we went to New York City and, sure enough, we get our visas. We felt, really, God's hand upon us and that was the genesis of the event that we had been planning for almost two years.

RWS: What did you want to accomplish when you went to Beijing?

PM: There were really two things we wanted to do. First, we wanted to unfurl a banner in Tiananmen Square which said, "Jesus Christ is King." We wanted to proclaim the Lordship of Jesus Christ in front of the tomb of the man responsible for more deaths than even Adolph Hitler and who trampled the rights of the Chinese People.

With the banner, we also wanted to honor Cardinal Kung, who, in 1955, was called upon to renounce his Christian faith in front of a stadium filled with people. His answer was, "Jesus Christ is King!" We wanted to honor him and all the men and women who would not renounce their in Christ. For Cardinal Kung's heroic stand he was sentenced to life in prison, of which he served 30 years.

The second thing we wanted to do was lay Roses in Tiananmen Square for the students who led the pro-democracy demonstration in 1989 and were brutally killed on June 4th. We also wanted to kneel in prayer and pray for an end to the forced abortion policy in China.

We wanted to bring worldwide attention as the theme of the Olympics was "One World, One Dream." How could China celebrate that when they crushed the dreams of their own people?

RWS: You actually had the two demonstrations on two succeeding days, from what I read you were able to unfurl the banner the first day.

PM: On the first day, which was Wednesday, August 6, we went in front of Mao Tse-tung's tomb and unfurled the banner, we laid the roses and we knelt to pray.

Now, here's an interesting thing. China has massive security and all of the military and law enforcement were in plain clothes, they were not in uniform.

So we unfurled that banner... and it was kind of cute, Chinese children were all running over to have their picture taken in front of the banner. The security forces were all looking at us in disbelief as they've never seen anything like this there before.

After about 15 or 20 minutes we saw plain clothes police officers getting out of police cars. As I said the Chinese have massive security out but they're all in plain clothes as they don't want to world to see it. They came over and surrounded us with umbrellas to cover our banner.

We then decided that we would walk through Tiananmen Square. So carrying this banner that said "Jesus Christ is King" in both English and Chinese, we began to walk. As we came near a gate the security forces began to push us out of the square. We then knelt on the banner and began to pray. Eventually, they overwhelmed us and pushed us out.

We were then met by police in uniform who detained us. I said, "Are we arrested?" They said, "No." I said, "Can we leave?" They said, "No." We were kind of in this "limbo state" and, after about 45 minutes, they let us go.

We were then followed Chinese security forces who stayed in our hotel lobby. We told them that we had not finished our prayer vigil and the next day we wanted to have a news conference in the exact same spot to address the human rights abuses by the Chinese government.

RWS: So did you return the next day?

PM: We went back to the Square on Thursday, August 7, and it was literally packed with tens of thousands of people. As we approached Mao Tse-tung's tomb and the cameras came up on us, we were immediately surrounded by scores of security who were jabbing us with umbrellas.

They were trying to separate us - you may remember we had a young woman with us, Brandy Swindell,
Director of Generation Life, and they kept trying to separate her from Mike McMonagle (also of Generation Life) and myself. She would try to reach out to us and we would grab hold and hang on to her. My pants were completely shredded as we were taken out of the square.

We didn't want to resist completely so part of the time we were walking almost "duck style" and part of the time we were being dragged on our knees. We were dragged across a street and behind this wall. They kept trying to separate Brandi from us and put her in a different car, but we locked arms, determined that we would stay together. After about 45 minutes we were taken to a Beijing police station where we were questioned for several hours.

RWS: What did they ask you?

PM: It was a fascinating question time as we had a chance to share why we were doing what we were doing and it was a powerful witness.

They asked us, then, to sign some papers. We refused, saying that we were not going to sign any confessions since we hadn't done anything wrong. They told these were not confessions but a record of what we did and read the papers to us.

They also served us Kentucky Fried Chicken and brought the press in to film it, to show that we weren't being mistreated. It was histerical. I'm sitting there thinking that we here in China, wondering if I'm under arrest by the Beijing police department, and eating Kentucky Fried Chicken!

I'm guessing that it was now several hours later. We were taken in around 11:00 in the morning and it is now about 5 o'clock in the afternoon. Suddenly, the whole demeanor of the police department changed. They began to yell at us, "You have to leave the country now... today! You have to leave. You can't stay!"

They demanded that we pay to get plane tickets to leave the country that day, which would have been thousands of dollars. We told them that, first, we didn't have that kind of money and, second, even if we did we wouldn't pay because we didn't do anything wrong. "If you want to send us out of the country we can't stop you from doing that but we, of our own volition, cannot leave."

For quite awhile they kept yelling at us and finally said, "If you don't pay, then you've got to go to jail for an extended period of time."

We, then, said, "OK, then you'll have to take us to jail." They kept trying to get us to pay. Finally, they loaded us into a van to take us to jail. Then sort of the weight of all that was happening hit us. We got into the van not knowing if we were going to jail for a day, a week, a month... we have no idea. They drive us around Beijing for awhile, took us to actually get something to eat, and then we see that we are being driven to the airport. We have no idea what's going on. They get us tickets and we still don't know where we're going. They put us on an Air China plane to Los Angeles.

They disabled our phones; we didn't have any of our luggage with us and so we are just suddenly left in L.A.

RWS: What was the great thing you took away from all of this?

PM: Outside of being a voice for those who were in prison for their faith, or because they wanted a family, or jailed for their political views, we look to Christ, and followed the teaching of Matthew 25, when He said that when you do this unto the least of your brethren you have done this unto me. We had determined to be their voice.

But long-term... we didn't meet with any Chinese nationals because we didn't want to put them at risk... But we met with an American missionary who told us this heartbreaking story of this precious woman who was expecting her second child and tried to keep it from the government. They found out when she was eight months pregnant and forcibly aborted her child. It ruined her life, her marriage and so much.

We found out that if she could have paid a fine, she could have kept the baby. So we are now putting in place a way to get money into China to get to these women so that they can pay the fine and keep their children.

We believe God has put this whole mechanism in place that we can save lives in China.

RWS: I'm not sure if you are aware what the Beijing people have put on the official Olympic website for spectators about religion. They say, "China is a country with religious freedom and respects every religion. Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism and Christianity are religions found in Beijing. Religious activities are carried out in Buddhist temples, Taoist temples, mosques and churches in Beijing." What would you say about a statement like that?

PM: I would say that it is fascinating because that goes in line with what happened to us. The police said, "Go hold you sign up in front of a church," I'm quoting exact, "and you're disturbing the public order by holding this sign up in a public place."

I believe the government of China is willing to accept "religious expression" as long as it stays in the church and has no impact in the culture. So, in a way, China can say, "You can worship God in a Buddhist temple, a Catholic Church or a Protestant Church, but you cannot take that faith outside of that building."

I don't know if you know this or not, but young children are not allowed to go to Sunday School because they don't want them learning. I'm sure the Chinese are putting on a face, saying "We're not opposed to faith." But we found first-hand, only if you express it in a church building, you cannot take it outside."

And in all candor... tragically, I have heard that same kind of reasoning here in America. "Why do you need to do this in public? You just need to express this in church."

The whole theme is China is "do not disturb the public order." They have freedom of religion as long as you go to a state church and it stays there.

RWS: There are some who would say that the Olympics are to be a-political and we should keep issues aside and let the athletes of the world just come together. What would you say to those individuals?

PM: Here's what I would say to them and I would answer it two-fold. First, we recognized that concern and so we scheduled our events to take place before the Olympics even got started and planned on leaving August 8th before the opening ceremony began. We also kept all our events in Tiananmen Square on the opposite side of the city, away from the Olympic venues. We were aware of these concerns and wanted to do what we could to honor the Olympians, focusing on the political center of China rather than any Olympic venue.

The second thing I would say to that is that China has already politicized the Olympics; they are using this to try and improve their image in the world, that they have entered the 21st Century, that they are a modern nation right now... but you cannot separate the Olympic spirit from human rights and social justice. For example, South African athletes were not allowed to compete when there was apartheid. The Olympics certainly recognizes certain inconsistencies when it comes to human rights so our position on that was that we chose not to interfere with the Olympics. But I would say China has politicized the event so I would have no problem with some doing something during the games but that was not the route we chose to go.

RWS: And, truly, it was a time when the spotlight was on China.

PM: Absolutely. Here was our point. China had 100 thousand troops there to crack down on any dissent. We wanted to make it abundantly clear that 100 thousand or 200 thousand troops or a million troops cannot silence the voice of freedom and justice... that the voice of freedom and justice will be heard no matter what.

We could not allow this sanitized version of the Olympics to go on... the theme of the Olympics is One World, One Dream... How could that even be said by China, when they crushed the very dreams of their own citizens? There had to be a voice for those who had no voice.

We are so thankful that the President has followed up and even made some more very powerful statements on Sunday after attending church. He made some important statements about human rights, religious freedom, and social justice. So we were very thankful for how things turned out and how the message was put forth.

RWS: Pat, thank you for taking this time to speak with us at Catholic Online. I imagine your wife, Katie, was glad to see you!

PM: Yes, she was. She had no idea where I was for 24 hours. Our State Department was very helpful. They were informed that three Americans were being departed and they called her to let her know that. And it did turn out to be us.

RWS: Pat, thank you for the visit.

PM: Well, thank you and God bless.

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