China has the world's largestirreligious population.[3] TheChinese government and the rulingChinese Communist Party (CCP) have conductedantireligious campaigns throughout their rule.[4] Religious freedom is protected under theChinese constitution. Among the general Chinese population, there are a wide variety of religious practices.[5] The Chinese government's attitude to religion is one of skepticism and non-promotion.[5][6][7][8]
According to a 2012Gallup poll, 47% of Chinese people were convinced atheists, and a further 30% were not religious. In comparison, only 14% considered themselves to be religious.[9] More recently, a 2015 Gallup poll found the number of convinced atheists in China to be 61%, with a further 29% saying that they are not religious compared to just 7% who are religious.[10]
Since 1978, theconstitution provides for religious freedom: "No state organ, public organization or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion; nor may they discriminate against citizens because they do, or do not believe in religion" (article 36). The Chinese state officially recognizes five religions - Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism, and Protestantism - managed by theState Administration for Religious Affairs of theUnited Front Work Department.[11][12]
While in modern history, theTaiping Rebellion,Boxer Rebellion,Communist Revolution, and theCultural Revolution contributed significantly to the rise of irreligion and distrust of organized religion among the general populace, irreligion in its various forms, especiallyrationalism,secularism, andantitheism, has had a long history in China dating back millennia. TheZhou dynastyClassic of Poetry contains several catechistic poems in theDecade of Dang questioning the authority or existence ofShangdi. Later philosophers such asXun Zi,Fan Zhen,Han Fei,Zhang Zai, andWang Fuzhi also criticized the religious practices prevalent during their times. Buddhism flourished in China during theSouthern and Northern dynasties period. It was during this period thatFan Zhen wroteShen Mie Lun (Simplified Chinese 神灭论,Traditional Chinese 神滅論, "On the Annihilation of theShen") in reaction to Buddhist concepts ofbody-soul dualism,samsara andkarma. He wrote that the soul is merely an effect or function of the body, and that there is no soul without the body (i.e., after the destruction and death of the body).[13] Further, he considered that cause-and-effect relationships that were claimed to be evidence ofkarma were merely the result of coincidence and bias.
Confucianism as a state-instituted philosophy has flourished in China since theHan dynasty, and the opportunities it offered were another fundamental origin of atheism in China. While there were periods in which Taoism and Buddhism may have been officially promoted, the status of Confucianism in Chinese society had rarely been challenged during imperial times. Extensive study of theConfucian Classics was required to pass theImperial Civil Service Examinations, and this was the major (and often sole) means by which one could achieve prominence in society. Confucianism places particular emphasis onhumanistic and this-worldly social relations, rather than on an otherworldly soteriology.[14][15] This produced a cultural tendency that facilitated acceptance of modern forms of irreligion such as humanism, secularism, and atheism.[citation needed]
Zhu Xi, one of the most important Confucian philosophers, encouraged anagnostic tendency within Confucianism, because he believed that the Supreme Ultimate was a rational principle, and he discussed it as an intelligent and ordering will behind the universe (while stating that "Heaven and Earth have no mind of their own" and promoting their only function was to produce things. Whether this can be considered a conscious or intelligent will is clearly up to debate).[16]
China is considered to be a nation with a long history ofhumanism,secularism, and this-worldly thought since the time ofConfucius,[17][19] who stressedshisu (世俗 "being in the world").Hu Shih stated in the 1920s that "China is a country without religion and the Chinese are a people who are not bound by religious superstitions."[20]
In the 19th century, after China's defeat in theFirst Opium War and in successive wars, the country succumbed to increasing domination by foreign imperialist powers. TheBoxers (or theYihetuan) considered Christian missionaries as promoting foreign influence in China and held deep anti-Christian views. Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant missionaries and church members were massacred.[citation needed]
In the 1920s, theAnti-Christian Movement (非基督教运动) was an intellectual and political movement inRepublican China.[21] TheMay Fourth Movement for a New Culture attacked religion of all sorts, includingConfucianism andBuddhism as well as Christianity, rejecting all as superstition. The various movements were also inspired by modernizing attitudes deriving from bothnationalist andsocialist ideologies, as well as feeding on older anti-Christian sentiment that was in large part due to repeated invasions of China byWestern countries.[21][22][23]
During the Cultural Revolution, a radical policy of anti-religion and anti-tradition was instituted. In the ensuing decade, the five major religions in China were severely suppressed. Many religious organizations were disbanded, property was confiscated or damaged, monks and nuns were sent home (or killed in violentstruggle sessions).[24]
Since thereforms of 1979, the government has liberalized religious policies to a degree, and the religious population has experienced some growth. Nevertheless, the irreligious remain the majority among all age groups in China. The CCP may even support certain local religious institutions and festivals in a bid to promoteChinese unification such asMazu.[25][26][27] However, atheism, characterization of religion as superstition, and promotion ofscientific materialism remain core tenets of the ruling CCP.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) p. 13, reporting the results of the CGSS 2006, 2008, 2010 and 2011, and their average (fifth column of the first table)....humanist philosophies such as Confucianism, which do not share a belief in divine law and do not exalt faithfulness to a higher law as a manifestation of divine will
{{cite journal}}:Cite journal requires|journal= (help){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)Officials in Beijing hope Mazu will help them in a different way. The United Front Work Department, the Communist Party branch with the job of boosting China's influence abroad, views the goddess as a tool to win Taiwanese hearts and minds. Mazu—or Lin Moniang, as she was known before becoming a goddess—hailed from a small fishing village on the island of Meizhou in the province of Fujian. Today worshippers make pilgrimages to her ancestral temple there. That is useful to China, which has been supporting Mazu-related cultural exchanges with Taiwan since the late 1990s. Local offices of the United Front talk openly of using Mazu to "strengthen Taiwan's patriotic unification force". If they can turn Taiwan's love of Mazu into love of the motherland, that would make it easier to peacefully bring Taiwan back under the mainland's rule.
In 2011 Mr Xi urged officials to "make full use" of Mazu to woo Taiwanese, most of whom have ancestral ties with the mainland.
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