Eric's Beijing Diary

This afternoon, I joined a bunch of parishioners from the church I go to, and boarded a bus for the trip across town to the ordination of new pastors for the new Chaoyang Three-Self Church, which is one of the two new Protestant churches being built by the Beijing government at a cost of 30 million RMB (3.6 million US). Religion in China is controlled by the government, and money is allocated based on demonstrated use. Since there has been a phenomenal growth in the number of Protestants, new churches are being built to meet the demand. But process is not instant. Three-Self churches are always quite crowded. Interest in the message of the Gospel is really growing in this country, and most of this interest is expressed in small private family gatherings. So the actual number of practicing believers is very hard to count. I would expect to see more and bigger churches.