Chinese leader suppressing church is beginning to manifest virility (8)
I believe the answer is:
machismo
'virility' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'chinese leader suppressing church is beginning to manifest' is the wordplay.
'chinese leader' becomes 'mao' (I've seen this before).
'suppressing' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'church' becomes 'ch' (common abbreviation).
'beginning to' says to take the initial letters.
The initial letter of 'manifest' is 'm'.
'ch'+'is'+'m'='chism'
'mao' placed around 'chism' is 'MACHISMO'.
(Other definitions for machismo that I've seen before include "show of masculinity" , "virile obsession" , "Aggressive virility" , "A show of virility or manliness" , "Hi, commas, strangely, might have exaggerated masculinity" .)