Strange, I have been to Mass in China, and, as a matter of interest, in Saudi Arabia as well. Oh, and again for interest sake, I noticed a post the other day that stated that Saudi was 100% islam. Wrong. There are a number of, albiet small, villages within Saudi that are Christian, (and one Jewish). They are not advertised and very few people know of their location but they are there!!!
Back to China, in China there is no government encouragement of religion but, you can worship if you want. Churches and temples do exist, mainly Christian and Bhudist in the East and Islam in the West. Sporadically some minor official or private citizen will make a little noise and people will put their heads above the parapet but that usually dies down quickly and things return to normal.
The greatest problem for those who celebrate the Mass in China is when some well meaning person from the western world decides to take it upon themselves to make a noise in the press etc. and create a reaction from Peking. The general message from the majority of Chinese Christians is for God sake “SHUT UP” and allow us to worship God quietly in our own way and in safety.
To put things into context I once asked a man from the town where I was working,
"What effect has the communist government on China as a whole?
His response was very revealing, he said;
“The communist government has been in China for a little over 50 years, Chinese history goes back 5,000 years so the’ve been in power for about 1% of our total time, what effect do you think that will have?”
If you look at the average Chinese town or village now, you realise that they have virtually no effect. Most towns and most villages have their own “Council” (for want of a better word) who make all the decisions for their own village of town. They will take cognisance of central government but, believe me if they think they can gain an advantage by ignoring Peking, they do.
