Authors: Liao Yiwu

God Is Red (21 page)

BOOK: God Is Red

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Liao:
Did you get a job?

Ho:
Yep. I do web maintenance for a company right now.

Liao:
Have you attended services at someone's house?

Ho:
A couple of times. I know some Christians who even gather and worship inside office buildings. But it doesn't feel right. Worshipping inside a church makes me feel good. I guess my generation just likes beautiful things.

Liao:
You guys pay attention to superficial stuff, the packaging, not the content.

Ho:
What's wrong with that? Since ancient times, humans have always been attracted to beautiful things. We first wrapped ourselves with animal skin. Then we began to wear clothes. It's all about packaging ourselves and looking nice. When we face the Lord, we need to look clean and decent. When the Lord is in heaven, he also keeps the palace clean and neat so he can be in the mood to hear prayers from his followers. If we pick any random place and make it a church in the name of the Lord, then what's the point of building churches? I've seen pictures of beautiful churches in all parts of the world. There must be a purpose in building them, don't you think?

Liao:
A lot of people refuse to attend services at those beautiful churches because they are controlled by the government's Religious Affairs Bureau.

Ho:
Does it matter? The holy figure on the cross above the pulpit is my Lord, whether it was above the pulpit at a government church or inside a living room. It's not President Hu Jintao or Chairman Mao.

Liao:
Well .Â .Â .

Ho:
People in your age group are too political. You guys are too interested in politics. It's different with my generation. Sometimes it bothers me. I attended a house church one time. When we were reading the Bible, a minister or a church elder suddenly stood up. Without getting everyone's approval, he started to deliver a political statement and then asked everyone to pray for so-and-so who had died for the Lord, and then so-and-so who had been arrested by the government. He also asked us to pray for the sins of the government. He totally changed the mood of the gathering, making it depressing and tragic. Several members started to cry after hearing his political plea. I guess I was too young and didn't have that much experience. I felt awkward. I thought,
Why don't we let God do God's work and Caesar do Caesar's? Why do we always mix the two?
The government wants to politicize religion, and some Christians are doing the same thing. These things kill my spiritual appetite.

Liao:
Well, that's an interesting perspective. Do you know a Christian called Wang Yi? I wonder what his response would be to your argument.

Ho:
I've heard of Wang Yi. He lives in Chengdu, right? Isn't he the head of the Christian fellowship group called Autumn Blessing? He's a well-known independent intellectual and constitutionalist or something. The Communist Party is keeping a close eye on him, I'm sure. I think his group has been raided by police a couple of times.

Liao:
Yes. There is another writer, Yu Jie. He's a Christian in Beijing. They are all talented intellectuals and quite brave. They are not afraid of arrest or imprisonment.

Ho:
There are a lot of talented intellectuals within government churches too. Some people choose to be outspoken, and others choose to be low-key. Some want to fight the political fight, and others want to stay away from politics. That's the reality. I've seen Reverend Yuan Zhiming's documentary film,
The Cross: Jesus in China
. I think it's very biased. He focuses too much on history. Chairman Mao and Deng Xiaoping have been dead a long time. Most Chinese don't care about Communism or revolution anymore. Even the Communist officials don't care much about Communismâlike the saying goes, they sell dog meat under the label of a sheep's head. Those Communist officials send their children to the West to receive a different type of education. So why do we still waste our time finding fault with this government? It already feels very insecure for its criminal past. It's better not to provoke the commies.

Maybe I get too much information in my head. Since my brain has limited gigabytes of memory, I just spit them out without filtering. Sorry, I hope it doesn't offend old folks like you. I need to delete some unnecessary files in my head, I guess. Luckily, I have Jesus as my guide. I'm all focused. I think if I keep upgrading my mind, I will do just fine.

Liao:
Do you use a proxy server to get onto overseas websites?

Ho:
Of course.

Liao:
Are you aware of Liu Xiaobo and a document that he and others have drafted? It's called “Charter 08.” It's like a declaration to promote democracy and human rights, including the right to religious freedom. Many well-known Chinese intellectuals have signed their names to the document.

Ho:
You don't need a proxy to access and read “Charter 08.” I saw it posted on several domestic websites. The police keep removing it, but more postings pop up. For a while, they couldn't seem to keep up the pace.

Liao:
Are you in favor of the views outlined in “Charter 08”?

Ho:
For the long term, I'm in favor of it, but I don't support it in the short term. It won't go very far because it doesn't have grassroots support. But I have to say that it was such damn hooligan behavior to arrest Liu Xiaobo before Christmas and then sentence him to eleven years in jail. Sorry, as a Christian, I shouldn't swear, but I think God will forgive me this time. You know, Liu Xiaobo didn't swear. He expressed his view in a civilized manner. Even if the government doesn't agree with him, they shouldn't lock him up. What are they going to do next? For my generation, Han Han is considered an outspoken writer. He is my hero and a hero for thousands of young people today. He's written some very sharp political commentaries. Are they going to jail him too? After Liu Xiaobo serves out his sentence, he'll be sixty. Even if democracy does arrive in China by then, he'll be too old to do anything. He could join the church, get baptized and ordained, and then become a church minister. In this way, he could preach to others. Otherwise, I don't see any other way out for him, do you?

Look, he belongs to a higher level, the level of professors. I would be in the category of junior student. If you use the computer as a metaphor, he's like a Pentium 6 or Pentium 7 while I'm only a Pentium 2. He is way ahead of me and I'm never going to be his match, but if you listen, he and others like him make sense.

Acknowledgments

I
n 2005, Wu Yongsheng, an elder at Fuyintang, the oldest Protestant church in Dali, compiled a book,
The History of Christianity in Dali,
which listed the names of missionaries who had reached the region from around the world, from the mid-1800s to 1949, in order to preach the Gospel. Since many were known only by their Chinese names, it is not surprising that their English names are misspelled, incomplete, or missing. This book is dedicated to the memories of those who lived and preached in Yunnan.

Â Archibald Colquhoun, 1882