NPR’s Lisa LIm notes that many Chinese are looking for an alternative to “rampant materialism,” and that a religious rush seems to be bubbling up.
In the country’s first major survey on religious beliefs, conducted in 2006, 31.4 percent of about 4,500 people questioned described themselves as religious. That amounts to more than 300 million religious believers, an astonishing number in an officially atheist country, and three times higher than the last official estimate, which had largely remained unchanged for years.
“Chinese people don’t know what to believe in anymore,” says Liu Zhongyu, a professor at East China Normal University in Shanghai, who conducted the survey. “And since the political atmosphere has relaxed, they turn to religion for comfort.”
….
Across China, religious belief has blossomed and flourished — far outpacing the government’s framework to control it — with a profusion of charismatic movements and a revival in traditional Chinese religions. Two-thirds of those who described themselves as religious in the 2006 survey said they were Buddhists, Taoists or worshippers of folk gods such as the Dragon King or the God of Fortune.
Since Lim brings up the point, we’ll rephrase it as a question: To what extent is this flourishing state-controlled? In a related story about the worship of the sea deity Mazu on China’s Meizhou Island, Lim speaks of the government’s (at least tacit) approval as
… a sign of how far the Communist Party has moved. This atheist party is encouraging the worship of this ancient goddess toward its greater aims of building a harmonious society; and of moving closer to Taiwan — the island it thinks of as a renegade province.
That party members can openly worship could serve as a test-case for local deities in other places in China.
The Communist Party once regarded worshiping folk goddesses like Mazu as rank superstition. But now, she is a money-maker, co-opted and harnessed by local officials. Far from being banned, Mazu is being used by China’s communist leaders for their own political and economic ends.
Way back in 1997, China spoke out on what it considers sanctioned faiths, pointing at the time to
over 100 million followers of various religious faiths, more than 85,000 sites for religious activities, some 300,000 clergy and over 3,000 religious organizations.
Make of that, and the rest, what you will. If we know anything about China, it’s that it’s usually far more complicated and intentionally convoluted than it seems – or at least however the numbers make it look.