NO. 2 FOLK RELIGION IN SOUTHWEST CHINA — GRAHAM 189 



CHANGES IN RELIGION IN WEST CHINA 

 CAUSES 



Before discussing the changes in the religion of West China, we 

 will consider briefly the causes of these changes. They are very many, 

 and the entire picture is very complex, but the major cause is contact 

 with Western civilization. 



Following the discovery of America by Columbus in 1492, there 

 were other great discoveries, such as the route through the Strait 

 of Magellan to Asia and Africa, and around Cape Horn back to 

 Europe. This made possible commerce between the nations of Europe 

 and those of Africa and Asia, including China. Trade developed first 

 by sailing vessels and later by steamships and great ocean liners. Such 

 trade increased year by year and became tremendous. There were 

 also disastrous wars with foreign countries, including England, 

 France, and Japan. The Boxer Indemnity was used by England and 

 the United States to send Chinese students to those countries to ob- 

 tain higher education in the great universities, and these returned to 

 Qiina as apostles of modern ideas. Roman Catholic missions began 

 in the Yuan dynasty, and Protestant missions began in 1807. In 

 time there were thousands of missionaries scattered all over China. 

 Thousands of Protestant and Catholic schools were opened in China, 

 which enrolled hundreds of thousands of students and gave them a 

 modern education, 



Essen M. Gale, in "Salt for the Dragon" (1953 p. 16), notes 

 that the use of the Boxer Indemnity to send students to the United 

 States was a great cause of educational, social, and political trans- 

 formation. He also says (p. 20) that the missionaries in China, 

 through secular teaching, brought about the revolution in China, po- 

 litical in only one of its aspects. He says that many modern move- 

 ments are traceable to the missionaries. He mentions changes in the 

 punishment of criminals and in coinage (p. 84), in business methods 

 (p. 120), in cleanliness, in the addition of railroads (p. 182), in 

 social customs (p. 194), and in transportation (p. 195). George 

 Babcock Cressy, in "China's Geographic Foundations" (1934, pp. vii, 

 7-8), points out that the social, economic, and political changes in 

 China are without parallel, and that one of the greatest changes is 

 that the ocean is no longer a barrier but a doorway to world contacts. 



E. A. Ross, in "The Changing Chinese," points out that contacts 

 and wars with European nations did not greatly shake the confidence 

 of the Chinese people. The Europeans, like other "barbarians" with 



