Posted on 06/26/2018 1:10:35 PM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege
Burning fake money and other paper effigies on certain days of the Chinese lunar calendar is a tradition many Chinese families, including Wang’s, keep in the hope that their ancestors will receive and enjoy gifts in the other world and be protected in this one. Wang had followed this practice since he was a child. But two months before leaving London after two years of study, Wang had been baptized against his parents’ wishes.
Since the early 2010s, increasing numbers of Chinese students have studied abroad, mostly in English-speaking countries. Among them, as many as tens of thousands who converted to the Christian faith overseas return to China every year.
Yet large numbers of converts give up after coming back to China. Volunteers and missionary staff who have worked for years with Chinese students in the United States estimate that 80 percent of believers eventually stop going to church after returning home. It generally takes time for returnees to find their places again in a country still searching for rules and norms to match its rapid economic and social changes.
For the returnees who have known church only in a liberal Western campus setting, both registered and house churches represent a drastic change.
“When Christian converts first return to China after graduation, they often feel confused and frustrated. They are inclined to blame these on their unfulfilling religious life,” said Sylvia Lu (a pseudonym), who runs a small underground organization that helps returning Christian converts plug into local churches in the Shanghai area.
For security reasons, her organization accepts participants mostly through recommendations by American campus ministries. To dodge censorship, they avoid using keywords such as “church” or “prayer” on social media.
Chinese culture itself can also cause converts to waver...
(Excerpt) Read more at foreignpolicy.com ...
However, Christian groups on college campuses may not be doing enough to bolster the kind of beefy, meaty "spiritual warfare" Christianity that can sustain individuals in the real world, whether in China or otherwise.
How much of that is out of fear of persecution, or losing jobs?
It’s not that oppressive now. You may take a social credit hit, depending on how well the church adhere’s to Xi’s Principles. There is a lack of seasoned leaders. America has lots of them.
The church I attend has a large number of Chinese members and the church is very conservative.
The Chinese dislike wobbly theology.
” . . . the kind of beefy, meaty “spiritual warfare” Christianity that can sustain individuals in the real world. . . “
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Mark 16:17-18 King James Version (KJV)
17 And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;
18 They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
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Perhaps they should be encouraged to specialize in the Deliverance ministry, the casting out of devils, or evil spirits, from Christians. Front-line spiritual warfare.
It doesn't work here, either.
That depends on whether the church is registered, an international or whether it's a 'house church', doesn't it?
Here's an article that pretty much agrees with what our missionaries say about Christianity in China.
Could be that many of the religious groups abroad were more of a social club.
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