To better control the growth and influence of Christianity, the Chinese government plans to incorporate Buddhist scripture and Confucian teachings into the Bible and edit worship songs to include Chinese characteristics, the head of a persecution watchdog has revealed.
The Rev. Bob Fu, founder of the persecution watchdog organization China Aid, told Congress that the Three Self Patriotic Movement and the Chinese Christian Council (China’s state-sanctioned Protestant bodies) have developed a five-year plan on “promoting the Sinicization of Christianity,” The Christian Post reports .
The plan, finalized at a meeting this March, proposes “cultivating and implementing the socialist core values” and will be supervised by the national religious affairs bureau. “Every province, autonomous region and municipality’s TSPM and CCC seminaries and churches will cooperate with it,” according to Fu.
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To “sinicize” (bring under Chinese control) Christianity, the government plans to “retranslate” the Old Testament and provide new commentary to the New Testament, Fu revealed.
“The plan made it clear that ‘Sinicization of Christianity’ means to change ‘Christianity in China’ into ‘Chinese Christianity,'” he explained. [The plan] emphasized that ‘the heart and soul of Christianity’s Sinicization is to Sincize the Christian theology,’ and even proposing to ‘re-translate the Bible or re-write biblical commentaries.’
Source : Gospel Herald
