The Christian Network

Abstract

This chapter discusses the development of a widespread Christian network. House churches, both rural and especially urban, have emerged as the most active in the dissemination and spread of Christianity, largely in reaction to government insistence on its own state-sponsored Christianity, which many worshippers reject. House churches are linked through a growing Christian network with local-level branches or segments (tuanqi 团契) as well as a transregional and international dimension (xitong系统). The relatively hidden and informal nature of the network enables Christianity and its house churches to expand more fully than has been the case with the formal, government-backed Three-Self Church in Linyi. The role of rapid urbanization in prompting intensive linkage between rural and urban churches, and their subsequent spread, is examined in detail through an analysis of nodes in an extensive network of communications and transactions. Missionary teaching on the theme of the universality of Christianity provides the spiritual and intellectual basis and justification for the transregional expansion.