The Role of the Female Christian in the Mainland China Church -- By: Chuan Hang Shan

Journal: Priscilla Papers
Volume: PP 19:3 (Summer 2005)
Article: The Role of the Female Christian in the Mainland China Church
Author: Chuan Hang Shan


The Role of the Female Christian in the
Mainland China Church

Chuan Hang Shan

CHUAN HANG SHAN was born in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of China in 1969. In 1994, he accepted the Lord Jesus as personal savior under the leading of an American missionary. In 1995 he started an evangelical ministry and became a church leader and missionary as well as a businessman in China. Married in 1999, he has three children now. In 2002 by God’s calling, he came with his family to the U.S. and is studying in Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. The author of three books, he is also a professional English-Chinese translator in the Christian field. He will graduate in January, 2006 with a Master of Arts in Religion, with a concentration in Christian theology.

In recent years, more and more attention has been drawn to the Church in Mainland China from the Western World from both inside and outside of the church. David Aikman’s masterpiece Jesus in Beijing,1 Tony Lambert’s China’s Christian Millions2 and a series of books3 by Paul Hattaway have offered a vivid picture of the Church in Mainland China and thus stimulated a great interest among scholars to study the church in China and to predict her future.

The view of these three authors is basically from outside the church in China. In this article, I will convey internal pictures from inside the Church in Mainland China (CIMC). This article will discuss the topic in three sections. I. Developing the Direction of the CIMC; II. Female Leadership in the CIMC; III. Three Reasons for the Opportunity for and the Success of Female Leadership in the CIMC.

I. Developing the Direction of the CIMC

A. A Brief History of the Church in China

At four times in history, Christians have come into China.

  1. In a.d. 635, Nestorian missionaries brought Christianity into China, but Christianity perished in 835.4

  2. In the time of the Yuan Dynasty of the Mongolian Empire (a.d. 1206-1368), the Roman Catholic missionaries, especially a Franciscan, Giovanni of Monte Corvino in 1294, brought Christianity again into China.5 The Mongols called Christianity “Arkagun” according to the Syrian pronunciation,6 but Christianity disappeared when the Ming dynasty took over China.7

  3. In 1583, at the end of the Ming Dynasty of China, the Italian Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci brought Christianity into China,visitor : : uid: ()