The Miracle of Conversions and Baptisms in China

AsiaNews ^ | 3/29/16 | Wang Zhicheng

[marshmallow]

An estimated 20,000 people were baptised on Easter night. Just outside Shanghai, 27 baptised people join a community of 100. Rampant materialism and individualism drive people to convert. Underground communities celebrated Easter without songs and in small groups.

Beijing (AsiaNews) - On Easter night, more than 100 adults were baptised in Beijing's Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception (pictured). Wrapped in a white robe, accompanied by godparents, they confessed their adherence to faith in Jesus Christ who died and rose again, baptised by Archbishop Joseph Li Shan.

The same ritual was repeated in all of China's Catholic churches during Easter eve vigil. In recent years, more than 20,000 new believers are baptised at this time of the year.

Some 27 baptisms took place in a parish just outside of Shanghai, in an area home to almost a million people. The local congregation includes only a hundred members; hence, with the newcomers who joined on Easter night, the community has grown by more than 25 per cent.

Christmas, Pentecost and the Assumption provide other occasions for baptisms. About 100,000 adult baptisms occur each year in the Catholic Church.

The number of annual baptisms in underground Protestant Churches (not subordinated to the government-controlled Three Autonomies Movement) is even higher.

For the government, in particular the Religious Affairs Ministry, the rising number of Christians in the country is a source of concern. Some estimates put the number of Christians at around 100 million, more than the number of members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), estimated to be around 85 million.

For some observers, the Communist Party itself is to blame for the growth of Christianity in the country. As theoretical and practical materialism drive people to seek wealth and consumption, people are left bereft of meaning.

[Cicero]

China was an ancient civilization. But Mao destroyed their basic traditions, the first to succeed in doing so after thousands of years. Confucianism is pretty well gone, and Taoism, and the Buddhist sects. And many of the traditional buildings, statues, pictures, and books were destroyed as well.

So, that pretty much left an empty space to be filled.

[loveliberty2]

Is it, perhaps, that we fail to understand that, as He (the Author of our faith) moved on this continent over 200 years ago in the hearts of those who received Him, He may be moving on another continent in the 21st Century?

"He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside, He came to those men who knew Him not. He speaks to us the same words: 'Follow thou me!' and sets us to the tasks which He has to fulfill for our time. He commands. And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship, and, as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He is." Albert Schweitzer, 'The Quest for the Historical Jesus'

[heartwood]

May millions and millions more know God in China.

[reviled downesdad]

From your fingers to God’s ears