Islam, Catholicism popular among
younger Chinese: Survey
Wednesday, July 8, 2015
OUTLOOK
Beijing: Chinese
youngsters are increasingly taking to
religion in the officially atheist communist nation,
with Islam having the largest number of
followers under 30 years of age, specially among minorities like
Uygurs and Hui communities.
The China Religion Survey 2015, released by the
National Survey Research Centre (NSRC) at Renmin University here,
found that among the five main religions in China - Buddhism,
Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism and Islam - the latter has the
largest number of young believers.
As many as 22.4 per cent of the believers of Islam
are aged below 30.
Catholicism ranks second with 22 per
cent.
Buddhism and Taoism, however, have the highest
number of followers older than 60, with 54. 6 per cent and 53.8 per
cent, respectively, state-run Global Times reported
today.
The survey included interviews from 4,382 religious
sites across 31 regions between 2013 and 2015.
"Islam tends to have a younger demographic. Most
believers of Islam belong to ethnic minority groups and it is
common for a woman to give birth to several children.
"The children would also become Muslims while it is
very rare to have an adult converting to Islam," Wei Dedong, a
professor of Buddhist studies at the School of Philosophy at Renmin
University of China, who participated in the research
said.
China has about 20 million Muslims, mostly from
Xinjiang which has about 11 million Uygurs.
Xinjiang has witnessed a spate of violent incidents
in and outside the province for the last few years over Uygurs
protests regarding the increasing settlements of Hans from other
provinces.
China blames East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM)
for the violence.
Also, China has substantial number of Muslims among
Hui community in Ningxia province.
Protestantism has the largest number of places of
worship while Buddhism has the highest number of followers in
China.
The figures show that the government is more willing
to take the initiative to take care of the religions and to resolve
conflicts, Wei told Global Times.
Wang Meixiu, a research fellow at the Institute of
World Religion Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences,
said the figure shows that the development of religions in China is
healthy, though there is room for improvement such as the approval
procedures of constructing new buildings and religious site
registration.