The torch of faith is blazing in China
Aid to the Church in Need's John Pontifex reports from China on how the Church is confounding oppression with a record number of conversions
21 March 2008

'I am not going to pull down the church - if you insist on it being done, you'll have to do it yourselves and face the consequences from an angry people." These words of a priest in southern China speak volumes about how the Church is pushing the boundaries of the Chinese system to the limit.

Elsewhere, the Church's growing boldness is even more striking. In eastern China's Hebei province, Fr Han (all names and places have been changed) described a climactic stand-off over the construction of his new church. He explained: "The authorities kept trying to stop me from building my church but in the end I just went ahead with it anyway."

For the church's opening ceremony Fr Han wanted to hold an outdoor procession and again he was refused permission - but with just hours to go, he got the go-ahead.

To get a picture of just how plucky this attitude is it is necessary to go back into China's past. Before travelling to China on a two-week, fact-finding and project-assessment trip with Aid to the Church in Need, I began to look into the history of the Church in modern-day China and was horrified by what I read.

From the start, Mao Zedong struck serious blows against the Church after the Revolution of 1949 but it was only 15 years later that the full force of the persecution began to be felt.

The Cultural Revolution launched in 1966 ushered in an era of unmitigated misery for millions regardless of their background, but the Church fared especially badly.

All churches were closed, many of them destroyed by the Red Guards, and all official religious activity ceased. Even people caught muttering a prayer to themselves risked punishment.

Since Mao's death in 1976, which brought an end to the Cultural Revolution, the road to recovery has been long and arduous for the Church, with many obstacles, some of them seemingly insurmountable.

But the situation of the Church today is now so changed it is virtually unrecognisable from the misery of 30 years ago. This massive growth was to be a recurring theme of my trip.

The statistics alone make remarkable reading. Having been apparently wiped out, Christianity now boasts at least 40 million members, a third of them Catholics. Some reports suggest that within 30 years, nearly a third of China's 1.3 billion people could be Christian.

Fr Han's church in Hebei demonstrates the reality of this at grass-roots level. He explained how, within just a few years in the parish, he had increased the number of youth groups from six to 24 - each with 15 young people learning the Faith and praying together.

His parish boasts 500 baptisms every year and weekday Mass attendance is 1,000.

Nor is he alone. Elsewhere in Hebei young university students described their initiatives going out into the college campuses, encouraging people to attend "study days" and prayer groups, all aimed at encouraging people to turn to Christ.

Elsewhere in China, a bishop told us that every year up to 100,000 people convert to Catholicism, many of them adults - a figure later verified by independent sources.

It would be facile to claim that such growth was simply and solely the product of a Church that had rediscovered the meaning of evangelisation.

Impressive though the Church's outreach to the community undoubtedly is, what these home-grown missionaries - both lay and clergy - are tapping into is a society increasingly intrigued by religion, especially Christianity.

Deprived of religious expression for so long, the novelty factor of a belief system is perhaps one key factor. But the people we spoke to pointed to something deeper - namely the search for the meaning of existence and interior spiritual development, yearnings inherent to humanity and unsuccessfully stamped out by Communism.

A glimpse into this came from a number of sources, not least a catechist, who on a long minibus journey through Hebei province told me how she came to Christianity. She described her uneventful years as a food factory manager in northern China, close to the border with Russia, and how on one dreary afternoon she happened to step into a church.

"When I saw the cross in the church, I somehow felt very touched," she said. "Looking back, I feel as if at that moment, I heard a voice saying: 'Come, follow me.' I got baptised soon after. It is like a miracle. I had never wanted to be involved in religion."

Elsewhere, clergy explaining the growing numbers coming to Mass described how they were preaching a vision of humanity quite unlike the peculiarly Chinese hybrid of nationalism and socialism that is all people have even known. Now the classic Communist mantra is being replaced by a dramatic shift towards materialism.

China's phenomenal economic growth has obsessed the media for years: an economy in tatters 30 years ago is now firmly on course to become the world's second largest, perhaps within a decade.

But less visible to the media is the human cost of such a transformation and how many Chinese are uncomfortable about the shift to mindless materialism.

One priest said: "There is a concern that people have about the emergence of a capitalist environment, a selfish, superficial society and an uncaring one. In the Church we give them a feeling that we are all part of one family - we are all brothers and sisters. This means that when people come to the Church, they feel like staying."

The shift towards embracing religion is beginning to break down other barriers, too. One night we were taken to a newly constructed church where crowds gathered to welcome us. For the first time, the church brought together Catholics from the state-recognised "official" Church and the "underground" Church, which rejects government interference.

The comments of the faithful were very revealing. One parishioner said: "The Church is wonderful. In our search for reconciliation, Our Lord takes the first place. Without him, we will never be able to have true unity."

The initiative may be a one-off but it shows how the hopes spelled out in Pope Benedict XVI's letter to China of May 27, 2007 are already beginning to bear fruit.

The Church's growth and increased unity may at times cause the authorities to modify their tactics of control but the regime has made it clear that there is still plenty of sting in the Chinese dragon's tail.

The Catholics we visited in Hebei were still reeling from the death of underground Bishop John Han Dingxiang. This was a man who died in prison without anyone from his Church being allowed to visit him on his death bed, who was cremated in secret and taken by night to a public cemetery, denied a proper funeral.

In total, there are about a dozen such bishops - and a similar number of priests - in prison, under house arrest or on the run from the regime.

But as the Beijing Olympics draw nearer the signs are increasingly clear that the government has no option but to give the Church the recognition in society that it deserves.

Last year alone Aid to the Church in Need, the charity for suffering Christians, granted about 100 requests for help from bishops and religious superiors in China.

The support provided is huge in a country with 1,500 seminarians and 500 novice Sisters. Help for formation is a priority for ACN aid to China. The charity accepted more than 70 such applications for help last year. Construction, too, is a priority. Churches, presbyteries, parish halls and convents are waiting to be built.

And yet, with so many conversions, such progress is only the beginning. One bishop, whose diocese has trebled to 150,000 faithful in barely 25 years, told us: "What has happened here is amazing - but there is still so much more to do." The growth of the Church in China is the hope of the Church universal.

When the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics gets under-way later this year, think also of another torch that is being lit in China: the torch of faith.

Aid to the Church in Need (UK) has launched a campaign to support the Church in China entitled China - The Torch of Faith. For further information visit ACN