Christianity

We further discuss the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. How Christian was it really? Or did it rather belong in the Chinese tradition of armed religious movements such as the Yellow Turban Rebellion that nearly destroyed the Han Dynasty? We look at Christianity in China more broadly, from the introduction of Nestorian Christianity in the 7th century to the Jesuit missionaries of the 16th and 17th centuries. How do traditional Chinese religious views differ from Christian assumptions?

And what are Christian assumptions and attitudes, anyway? Many apparently secular ideas trace their origins to Christianity. Marxism may be deemed an offshoot of it. And Catholic canon lawyers coined the term "human rights." Western society's urge to cast down the mighty and raise up the humble and meek is clearly Christian-derived. To what extent are difficulties between the West and contemporary China the result of the latter not being Christianized in its outlook?

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