Religious Revival and Exit from Religion in Contemporary China

China Perspectives 2009/4 | 2009 Religious Reconfigurations in the People’s Republic of China Religious Revival and Exit from Religion in Contemporary China Benoît Vermander Édition électronique URL : http://journals.openedition.org/chinaperspectives/4917 DOI : 10.4000/chinaperspectives.4917 ISSN : 1996-4617 Éditeur Centre d'étude français sur la Chine contemporaine Édition imprimée Date de publication : 31 décembre 2009 ISSN : 2070-3449 Référence électronique Benoît Vermander, « Religious Revival and Exit from Religion in Contemporary China », China Perspectives [En ligne], 2009/4 | 2009, mis en ligne le 01 décembre 2012, consulté le 28 octobre 2019. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/chinaperspectives/4917 ; DOI : 10.4000/chinaperspectives.4917 © All rights reserved Special Feature s e v Religious Revival and Exit i a t c n i e from Religion in h p s c r Contemporary China e p BENOÎT VERMANDER This paper examines both the revival of religious organisations and practices in China and what could be coined the “exit from religion” exemplified by the loss of religious basis for social togetherness and the instrumentalisation of religious organisations and discourse. It argues that “revival” and “exit” taken as a twofold phenomenon facilitate an understanding of the evolving and often disputed nature of China’s religious sphere throughout history as well as the socio-political stage that the country is entering. he study of religion in the Chinese context confronts between civil society and the party-state whose policies and some basic problems: how relevant is the term “reli - instructions it transmits. (4) Further, the State Administration T gion,” borrowed from Western languages via Japan - of Religious Affairs (5) at the central, provincial, and local lev - ese, in referring to the social forms examined? (1) Even if one els functions as a sort of “ministry of religion” with extensive chooses to speak of a “religious sphere,” can Western con - powers. Right from the start of the Communist regime, “het - cepts turn up anything but largely misleading analogies in de - erodox cults” and “superstitions,” as distinct from “religions,” scribing mental and social structurations, (2) even when the were officially banned, the former often subject to systematic concepts are specifically tailored to take Chinese realities repression, as illustrated right from 1951 by the violent crack - into account? (3) But then, which terms and what categories down on Yiguandao. This preliminary observation already should be used to consider phenomena usually classed under points to a framework of understanding. The system in oper - Western “religious studies”? Conversely, would too narrow ation introduces a double rupture, while retaining the possi - a focus on lexicographical matters not lose sight of universal bility of safeguarding a “continuum” for the religious sphere: elements in Chinese religious experience and manifesta - tions, thus blocking the way to a comparative work? Further, 1. Joël Thoraval, “Pourquoi les ‘religions chinoises’ ne peuvent-elles apparaître dans les statistiques occidentales?” (Why “Chinese religions” elude Western statistics), to what extent do official designations of authentic and “ac - Perspectives chinoises , no.1, March 1992, pp. 37-44; Vincent Goossaert, “1898: The ceptable” religious forms inform or distort our perception of Beginning of the End for Chinese Religion?”, Journal of Asian Studies , 65(2), 2006, pp. 307-336. Chinese religious activities in the spontaneity of social man - 2. Liu Xiaogan, cited by Fan Lizhu, describes as “inverse analogical interpretation” ifestations? Such questions can be expanded and pursued, Chinese researchers’ practice of applying a Western concept to understand their own belief systems, thus going against the grain of Chinese philosophies right from the first illustrating the basic difficulties faced in any study of “reli - century AD, which used familiar concepts such as those of Dao to take into account gion in China.” imported Buddhist notions. See Fan Lizhu, “The Dilemma of Pursuing Chinese Religious Studies in the Framework of Western Religious Theories,” Fudan Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences , 2(2), June 2009, pp. 29-48, especially p. 30. Religion in China: 3. Fan Lizhu notes that C.K. Yang’s famous concept of diffused religion to explain the speci - Demography and ethnography ficity of social forms among China’s religious orders has been translated into Chinese often with the connotation of “dispersed” ( sankaide ), “enlarged” ( kuosanxing ), “spread” (misanxing ), or “distributed” ( fensanxing ) (Fan, art.cit ., p. 38). Regulating and controlling religious 4. The “Three-Self Patriotic Movement of the Protestant Churches” was founded in 1954, practice the Chinese Buddhist Association in 1955, and Islamic, Daoist, and Catholic associations in 1957. The structures may be more complex than this quick summary would suggest. Strictly speaking, the Protestant church is formed by the “China Christian Council ” It must be noted that from 1949 until now, only five religious (founded in 1980) and the aforementioned “Patriotic Committee.” The relationship between the “official” Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association and the Chinese Catholic forms have enjoyed legal recognition, and that each of them Bishops Conference is of the same nature. is “structured” by an association that acts as a conveyor belt 5. Previously known as the Bureau of Religious Affairs. 4 N o 2009/4 Religious Revival and Exit from Religion in Contemporary China s e v i a a rupture between recognised and unrecognised religious The very nature of the institutional framework provided by the t c n i forms (regardless of the latter’s degree of institutionalisation); relay-associations harks back to a century-old practice, with e h and within recognised religions, a rupture between groups the gradual constitution of “national” and “modern” religions: p s c and personalities participating in structures established by the national religious associations took shape in 1912 and were co- r e (8) party-state and those shunning them. However, in actuality opted by the state in the 1930s, albeit reformatted to suit the p there is less of a rupture than a “continuum” governed by a needs of the post 1949-regime. Thus the 1949 rupture did not variety of strategies adopted by different actors as regards the dilute the constitution of a “modern” religious sphere that degree of their inclusion in the official apparatus (from total began in the late nineteenth century – but it is worth examin - integration to dissidence, with all the stages in between). ing whether even the institutional rupture could be traced to a Article 36 of the PRC Constitution (6) stipulates that: time far earlier than 1949 (to 1898 (9) ) in accounting for the dynamic of the Chinese religious phenomenon. Citizens of the People’s Republic of China enjoy free - dom of religious belief. No state organ, public organi - Counting believers … sation or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion; nor may they discrim - State control of religious expression does not accord with inate against citizens who believe in, or do not believe data collection. Thus, censuses preclude questions on reli - in, any religion. The state protects normal religious ac - gious affiliation. The Chinese opinion polling organisation tivities. No one may make use of religion to engage in Horizon Group ( Lingdian jituan ) conducted two surveys in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of collaboration with the Pew Global Attitudes Project in citizens or interfere with the educational system of the 2005 and 2006, and another in 2007 with C100, a non-par - state. Religious bodies and religious affairs are not tisan organisation of Chinese Americans. (10) However, as subject to any foreign domination. city-dwellers are over-represented, (11) the results reflect the Public control, individual freedom of belief, designation by 6. Published in March 1982, the Central Committee “Document 19” had already formulat - the state of beliefs and their manifestations deemed “nor - ed the principles on which Article 36 is based. 7. See David A. Palmer, “Heretical Doctrines, Reactionary Secret Societies, Evil Cults: mal,” a strict national framework assigned to religious organ - Labeling Heterodoxy in Twentieth-Century China,” in Mayfair Mei-hui Yang (ed.), Chinese isations – such are the principles set out. Religiosities: Afflictions of Modernity and State Formation , Berkeley, University of Barring the 1966-1979 period, the continuity of the regime’s California Press, 2008, especially pp. 129-134. 8. This involved creating two competing Buddhist associations by 1912, one more secular legal and ideological framework for dealing with religion pre - and the other monastic; a somewhat similar situation in Daoism’s national structuring; vailed over the changes introduced. The legal framework was creation of a national Islamic association; the flowering of a tentative national organisa - tion for Confucianism; later national structuring of Christian churches, thanks to confes - set out in 1982, but the principles therein had been adopted sional divisions, foreign influences, and the strength of already existing specialised right from the early 1950s (a notable exception was the affir - associations. See Vincent Goossaert, “Republican Church Engineering: The National Religious Associations in 1912 China,” in Mayfair Mei-hui Yang (ed.),

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