In Search of...Something

Beijing -- Anyone in China over the age of, say, 30 has lived through more change than most Westerners can imagine in a lifetime.

In the early 1970s, China was in the grip of the Cultural Revolution, one of the most extreme incarnations of Communism the world has known, a chaotic period when traditional culture and values were all but eradicated. The Maoism that replaced Chinese tradition has since been eviscerated by three decades of economic reforms and opening that began in 1978. Today, it often seems that the pursuit of growth and profit are China's new reigning orthodoxy.

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Not surprisingly, many Chinese feel unmoored by these turbulent ideological swings. There is a growing belief, especially among urban residents who have benefited most from economic change, that China's material success has come without any accompanying moral anchor for society. They argue that this dearth of morality in China's materialistic modern society is the cause of many of the country's well-known woes: corruption, environmental abuses, a growing gap between rich and poor, and even China's hyperreliance on cash, which many argue flows from a lack of trust needed to develop a flourishing credit culture.

The result is a widening search for religious and spiritual traditions to fill the void -- a search that some think could change society as much in coming decades as economic reforms have.

A priest blesses Catholics.

"When China opened up...many of us believed that the market would save China, and let China become stronger and more civilized," says Zhao Xiao, a Beijing-based economist who writes frequently about religion and morality. "And they were right in a way, because people became successful," he says. "But the market isn't perfect.... It stimulates greed and arouses desires."

As a consequence, says Mr. Zhao, "China is going through a new transformation. This transformation will be the most profound for China -- far more important than the superficial changes in wealth."

A Broad Search

That search for answers is surprisingly broad. Protestantism is gaining followers, and the revival of Buddhism is evident in the increasing number of people who wear prayer-bead bracelets -- a rare sight in China just 10 years ago. Among a small but growing class of wealthy executives in Beijing, Baha'i, a factionless faith founded in 19th-century Persia that stresses the unity of all groups including races, classes and religions, is gaining a following.

Xue Yongxin, founder of pharmaceutical company Chengdu Enwei Group who practices both Daoism and Buddhism, says spirituality taught him that financial success would not fulfill him. "A person's [material] fortune is an illusion," he says. "If it's all that you are, then you will lose yourself. And when we lose ourselves we may as well be penniless. Material things just give you an average lifestyle; take your extra money and do something good with it."

Muslims gather to pray.

Even the officially atheist Communist Party is beginning to embrace at least the trappings of spirituality and tradition. During the late Maoist era, worship was off-limits. Christian priests were often imprisoned, and even native traditions -- like the 2,000-year-old philosophy of Confucianism -- were actively stamped out.

China explicitly guarantees "freedom of religious belief" and protects "normal religious activities" in its state constitution, adopted in 1982, four years after Deng Xiaoping initiated economic reforms. But the government has continued to tightly control religious practices -- limiting worship to officially sanctioned services overseen by one of five "patriotic religious associations" governing Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Protestant Christianity and Catholicism.

The party's relationship with religion remains strained -- as recent clashes with T i b e t a n Buddhist m onks show. It crushes movements that it perceives as threats -- such as the spiritual discipline called F a l u n G o n g, the target of a brutal crackdown after its adherents surrounded the leadership compound in Beijing for a silent protest against criticism in the state-run media.

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