Growth of Christianity Has Re-shaped Religious Landscape in China

The growth of Christianity among intellectuals has fundamentally "reshaped the religious landscape in China", says a leading Chinese academic and editor of what's described as the country's "most authoritative" journal on religion.

Edmond Tang, from the University of Birmingham, is editor of the new-look China Study Journal which will be launched by Churches Together in Britain & Ireland (CTBI) on Monday 26 March. "Today it is an open secret that Christian fellowships - a new kind of 'house church', run by Chinese professors and students, are active in most Chinese universities. More than 30 academic faculties and research centres are devoted to the study of a once maligned religion. The question is why."

However, Tang added: "It is not enough today just to document what is happening on the ground. It is equally important, if not more so, to know what people are thinking religiously, and how that relates to the moral and spiritual questions that are debated by the educated Chinese. This is where the real heartbeat of a new China can be found."

The publication will be launched by Canon Janice Price, Executive Secretary of Global Mission Network, CTBI and Rt Rev David Urquhart, the Archbishop of Canterbury's Episcopal Link to China.

Bishop Urquhart said: "It can be very hard to find and source accurate information about life and the Church in China. This journal provides an invaluable and authoritative link and will be of immense value to a wide cross-section of people."

The China Study Journal is an initiative of the China Desk, an office of Churches Together in Britain and Ireland in cooperation with the Department of Theology, University of Birmingham.

The publication has its roots in a research project begun in the 1970s at the height of the Cultural Revolution, a period when China was cut off from the outside world, when churches and other religious organisations in China were forbidden, and when religious persecution was rife.