Abstract: Many young Protestants in the Chinese city of Xiamen marry a non-Christian spouse. How ... more Abstract: Many young Protestants in the Chinese city of Xiamen marry a non-Christian spouse. How does religious heterogamy illuminate the social and ritual boundaries created by Protestants in Xiamen? Considering the function and permeability of these metaphoric boundaries, how should we visualize them? This article draws on data collected between August 2014 and February 2016. Intermarriage with non-Christians is condemned by most ministers in Xiamen, but it is an essential option for young women who far outnumber marriageable men in most church communities. The resulting weddings are marked by a search for compromises among the bride and groom, their parents, and the social communities for whom their parents host the wedding. It is argued that in terms of function and permeability, the social and ritual boundaries of Protestantism in Xiamen are less like barbed-wire fences than like the gates of a subway system, or the emergency exit of a shopping mall. Since a central aim of Chinese Protestants is to recruit more people to the faith, there is room for women to briefly exit the community and to re-enter with a converted husband. This focus on boundaries as metaphors may contribute to the field of interreligious studies, where boundaries are a key concept.
Following its designation as a Special Economic Zone in 1980, the Chinese island city of Xiamen h... more Following its designation as a Special Economic Zone in 1980, the Chinese island city of Xiamen has once again become an affluent urban center. This paper explores recent changes in discourse and practice in Xiamen’s historic Protestant community, focusing on funerals and how they could become major platforms for proselytizing. Based on data derived from interviews, participant observation, and documents issued by secular or religious authorities, four key processes are identified. First, urban modernization policies of the local state have outlawed—but not quite eradicated—cherished funeral rites like lighting firecrackers and holding funeral marches accompanied by brass bands. Second, modernization efforts by Xiamen’s church leadership have reduced the prevalence of sackcloth and led to changes in services in funeral parlors. Third, large-scale immigration established Mandarin as the dominant language and gave rise to so-called Protestant funeral groups, whose charity work is focused on proselytizing among bereaved families. Fourth, the increasing human and financial resources of Protestants in Xiamen facilitate the mobility of large funeral groups and their use of items such as decorative crosses, musical instruments, and songbooks. The paper concludes that change, resistance to change, and proselytizing at funerals can provide insights for the study of Protestant Christians and their ritual events in China’s burgeoning urban societies.
Modern Chinese history offers scholars plenty of reasons to abandon the state-imposed neologism o... more Modern Chinese history offers scholars plenty of reasons to abandon the state-imposed neologism of 'religion'. For its popularization in the late 19th century marked the start of multiple cycles of violence against 'superstition' , its ideological twin. To the contrary, this article explores how 'religion' (zongjiao) is deployed by ordinary people in contemporary Southern Fujian. Through three case studies I demonstrate that 're-ligion' has become part of the ways ordinary people in contemporary Southern Fujian harmonize their conflicting ritual practices and ideas about the world. A more narrow and exclusive deployment of 'religion' by scholars, followed by policy makers, may augment the realms of 'culture' and 'superstition' , the latter of which has in particular been subject to coercive action in China. Being aware of the nefarious consequences of deploying 'religion' outside the Western world since the 19th century, scholars today have a responsibility to premeditate the outcome of narrowing down the range of practices, architecture, clergy, communities, and objects currently associated with 'religion'. Keywords religion – superstition – China – religious freedom – ritual – household * Bram Colijn is a PhD student at the Faculty of Theology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. He studies religious diversity in contemporary China from an anthropological perspective. His recent fieldwork focuses on the communal rituals of households shared by practitioners of folk Buddhism and Protestant Christianity. He is a cum laude graduate of Contemporary Asian Studies at the University of Amsterdam and an associate fellow at the research cluster 'Religion in Modern China' at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen.
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Papers by Bram Colijn
religious authorities, four key processes are identified. First, urban modernization policies of the local state have outlawed—but not quite eradicated—cherished funeral rites like lighting firecrackers and holding funeral marches accompanied by brass bands. Second, modernization efforts by Xiamen’s church leadership have reduced the prevalence
of sackcloth and led to changes in services in funeral parlors. Third, large-scale immigration established Mandarin as the dominant language and gave rise to so-called Protestant funeral groups, whose charity work is focused on proselytizing among bereaved families. Fourth, the increasing human and financial resources of Protestants in Xiamen facilitate the mobility of large funeral groups and their use of items such as decorative
crosses, musical instruments, and songbooks. The paper concludes that change, resistance to change, and proselytizing at funerals can provide insights for the study of Protestant Christians and their ritual events in China’s burgeoning urban societies.