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Post-Tiananmen Chinese Communist Party Religious Policy
Lambert, Anthony P.B.
Lambert, Anthony P.B.
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n20-3_4_391.pdf
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Abstract
"The Beijing massacre of June 1989 has had a profound effect on the religious policy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as it has had in every field of Chinese society. Prior to the sudden swing back to a hard-line political position, there had been many signs of a thaw in the offing in Chinese religious policy.' In 1988 daring voices in both the Protestant and Catholic Churches in China had spoken out in strong terms condemning the government's 'patriotic' religious associations as puppets of the party and as having lost all credibility among ordinary religious believers. They had called for the radical liberalisation, even abolition, of both the Protestant Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) and the Catholic Patriotic Association (CPA).2 During the high tide of the democracy movement in May-June 1989 many theological students from both the Protestant and Catholic 'patriotic' seminaries had taken part in demonstrations supporting the student movement. Bishop Ding, head of the TSPM and of Nanjing Seminary, had himself come out in support of the students' demands. Ironically, the very theological students who had to undergo regular political indoctrination to ensure their loyalty to the communist system were calling for greater religious freedom and for democratisation of China."
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1992
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With permission of the license/copyright holder