| Summary/Abstract |
This paper concerns religious charity, a phenomenon that has reemerged
as Chinese religious life has revived and expanded. Such charity
off ers a number of potential benefi ts to the party-state, but it also challenges
regime eff orts to limit the spread and public profi le of religion.
Religious charity is regarded as relatively compatible with the regime’s
secularizing ambitions in that it focuses adherents’ attention on the
problems of this world rather than on salvation in the next. Yet many
faith-based philanthropic endeavors are forms of religious practice and
expression in their own right, such as the two examples examined in
this paper—the Gansu Province Association for Minority Nationality
Cultural and Educational Promotion and the Gospel Rehab in Yunnan.
By melding religiosity and public service, adherents sacralize the locations
and activities of charity, bringing religion into spaces from which
the party-state tries to exclude it. Charity thus enables religion to spill
over its designated boundaries, enter the public square, and infuse even
some institutions and organizations of the party-state itself.
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