Official attitudes toward religion have gradually loosened in China in recent years, enabling the resurgence of popular belief. Places of worship for the five officially recognized faiths — Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism and Islam — have been restored or built anew, and public worship allowed again amid signs that the government sees limited religiosity as a useful component of its drive to build what it calls a “harmonious society.”La religión como un elemento de moderación social:
Chinese experts say the growing popularity of religious belief has been driven by social crises involving corruption and the expanding gap between rich and poor.
Asked about the government’s evolving attitudes toward the growing popularity of religion, He Guanghu, a professor of philosophy at People’s University in Beijing, said, “I hope the government will look at the zeal in religion positively, and see that it can help restore social order and harmony, that it helps governance and is not a threat.”
A recent poll by East China Normal University estimated that 31.4 percent of Chinese 16 or older are religious, putting the number of believers at roughly 400 million.
In recent years, official estimates have placed the number of believers at around 100 million, but the fact that the new survey’s results were not only made public but were also reported by the government-controlled Chinese news media suggests that the survey has been given at least some official credence.