Calvin goes to China

It's no secret that the church is growing fastest in the Global South and China. The growth of Christianity in Africa and South America has been dominated by Pentecostalism, as well as a welcome resurgence of conservative Anglicanism. In China though the spread of Christianity has taken on a distinctly Reformed cast. Andrew Brown, a correspondent for the British newspaper The Guardian, reports that Calvinism is flourishing in China.

As always with articles like this one some of the more colorful (and funny) characterizations should be taken with a grain of salt ("Calvinists despise pentecostalists. They shudder at unbridled emotion. If they are slain in the spirit, it is with a single, decorous thump: there's to be no rolling afterwards.") Nevertheless some of Brown's speculations are perceptive as to why Calvinism appeals more to new Chinese Christians than Roman Catholicism or other variants of Protestantism. Wouldn't it be something if the impetus for a worldwide revival of Christianity grounded on the five solas of the 16th century Reformation came from 21st-century China!


HT: Between Two Worlds