“Now early in the morning He came again into the temple, and all the people came to Him; and He sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to Him a woman caught in adultery. And when they had set her in the midst, they said to Him, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses, in the law, commanded us that such should be stoned. But what do You say?’ This they said, testing Him, that they might have something of which to accuse Him. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger, as though He did not hear.

"So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, ‘He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.’ And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. Then those who heard it, being convicted by their conscience, went out one by one, beginning with the oldest even to the last. And Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, ‘Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, Lord.’ And Jesus said to her, ‘Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.’

"When the crowd disappeared, Jesus stoned the sinner to death saying, ‘I too am a sinner. But if the law could only be executed by men without blemish, the law would be dead.’”

Many Christians would undoubtedly recognize the first two of the above paragraphs as part of the Gospel according to John. The third paragraph? After the Wuhan virus, the third paragraph might be the most despicable thing emanating from a nation run by unapologetic Chinese communist thugs.

Thugs who intend to rewrite Holy Scripture so it aligns with the Politburo’s sensibilities.

“China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency said late last year that Politburo Standing Committee member Wang Yang had presided over a meeting of so-called scholars and ‘religious people from the grassroots level’ to discuss ‘making accurate and authoritative interpretations of classical doctrines to keep pace with the times,’” reveals columnist Matthew Taylor King.

The full version of the Beijing Bible has yet to be released, but the above passage was made public last week — as part of a textbook for Chinese high school students. According to the Roman Catholic news agency UCA, the textbook will be used to teach those students “professional ethics and law,” and the above passage is a “moral” example, explaining that obedience to the law at all costs is an absolute necessity.

Totalitarian government demands nothing less. And while many Americans should be rightly infuriated by this wholesale bastardization of Christian beliefs and values, they ought to be just as enraged by a progressive-controlled American education system that force-feeds our own students an equally contemptible bastardization of American values and history in the form of Common Core, Critical Race Theory, the 1619 Project, and the LGBTQ agenda.

Just like China’s Communist Party, progressives are dedicated to teaching children what to think, not how to think.

Xi Lian, a professor at Duke University Divinity School, illuminated the big picture, noting that the Chinese fear Christianity for three reasons. First, the religion is international, and thus links people in bonds of solidarity and affection that transcend national controls. Second, it is congregational, giving it the “ability to mobilize a stable, reliable community” — capable of toppling dictatorships. Third, Christianity’s “transcendent vision [and] transcendent values” present the Communist Party with an insuperable “moral and ideological rivalry,” in comparison to the CCP’s Marxist-Leninist foundation, that many Chinese view as a “spent force.”

By contrast, Christianity is thriving: According to the book A Star in the East: The Rise of Christianity in China, co-authored by sociologist Rodney Stark and Xiuhua Wang, the number of Christians in China is increasing by 7% per year. Thus, between 1980 and 2007, the number of Chinese Christians increased from 10 million to 61 million. If that trend continues, there will be 295 million Christians in China by 2030.

Again, while that reality is anathema to Chinese totalitarians, Americans shouldn’t be too smug. “As Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, noted [recently], there is a strong parallel between China’s efforts to ‘create a new version of Christianity’ and those pioneered by Protestant liberalism in Europe and America,” explains columnist Tyler O’ Neil.

They aren’t alone. Last Sunday, in his latest encyclical letter, “Fratelli Tutti” (Brothers All), Pope Francis asserted that the pandemic proved the “magic theories” of market capitalism have failed and should be replaced by a new type of politics promoting dialogue and solidarity. Pope Francis also revealed that he views the nation-state as an impediment to that agenda, adding, “The limits and borders of individual states cannot stand in the way of this.”

In short, the pope embraces the globalist agenda, couched in Christian terms. In doing so, he willfully ignores the reality that it wasn’t the capitalists who unleashed a global pandemic and lied about it, exponentially increasing its devastation. It was the same Chinese communists intent on making a mockery of the Bible itself — in pursuit of unassailable power.

Tragically, the pope’s current stand should surprise no one. In 2018, the Vatican’s foreign minister stated that “sinicization” and “inculturation” — defined as aligning Christianity with the Chinese communist worldview — are the keys to Christianity’s future in China.

In other words, communist sensibilities should trump Christian doctrine. How will that work? Perhaps the pope and other equally feckless Christian leaders should examine the realities of life as a Muslim minority in China, where government officials have turned that nation’s Uyghur Muslim population into de facto slave labor. Slave labor that produces goods for American multinational corporations, whose CEOs worship the god of market share — which has reached a new high during the pandemic.

“There is much more that could be said about this project, but the most important point for Americans to grasp is that the CCP has learned from the mistakes of the Soviet Union where religion is concerned,” warns columnist Cameron Hilditch. “Beijing’s co-opting, repackaging, and careful control of Christianity within China’s borders is in stark contrast with the Soviets’ outright, implacable hostility to organized religion.”

In America, under the banner of “incrementalism,” secular progressives have embraced similar efforts to undermine Christianity. And just as in China, their biggest obstacle is people of faith, who are routinely dismissed as bigots for rejecting that secularism in favor of religion.

Yet something revealing and quite timely just occurred. After Trump contracted COVID-19, the outpouring of hate from far too many progressives (with notable exceptions) revealed a stunning callousness impossible to obscure. That it happened so close to the election provides the electorate with perhaps the starkest choice among many regarding the nation’s future.

A constitutional republic can survive many things. Government-endorsed soullessness isn’t one of them.