Empirical Study of Religious, Social and Political Values of Urban Chinese Christians

Abstract

This chapter taps into the religious, social and political values of Chinese urban Christians. After the disastrous years of the Cultural Revolution, religions have been coming back to China in a significant way. Christianity is one of the fastest-growing religions in China. Given the rapid increase in the Chinese Christian population, it is surprising that contemporary Chinese Christians have not been the subject of sufficient study, as they are still shrouded in mystery and their religious beliefs and sociopolitical values are little known to non-Christian Chinese and the outside world. The rapid increase of Christians in China could obviously have far-reaching implications for China’s future social and political development. This chapter will examine the religiosity (i.e., the believing and behaving aspects) of Chinese urban Christians as well as their social and political values, which will be compared with those of Chinese urban non-Christians and American Christians. Another question to be answered in the chapter is whether religiosity of Chinese urban Christians attending official churches is different from that of unofficial “house church” members. A third question to be answered is how Chinese Christians’ religiosity affects their social values and support for democratic values.