Beijing-designated Panchen Lama is a member of the Standing Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference
It is no secret that religion under the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has long been politicized and has become a propaganda and brainwashing tool for the CCP. In fact, a mainland scholar said today (April 1) that Buddhism has also been used as a so-called “public diplomacy tool” by the Chinese Communist Party.
According to the Central News Agency, Liu Yuguang, an associate professor at the School of Philosophy of Fudan University in Shanghai, disclosed this hidden mission of Buddhism at a lecture on “Buddhist Public Diplomacy in China” held by the Institute of East Asian Studies at National Chengchi University in Taiwan today.
Liu Yuguang said that the Chinese Communist Party claims that China is a “Buddhist power” by saying that the total number of Buddhist followers in China exceeds that of Southeast Asian countries. In addition, since the development of Buddhism in its country of origin, India, has been declining, and mainland China has large traditional Buddhism such as Chinese Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism and Theravada Buddhism, the CCP has taken advantage of this and started to promote mainland China as the “new motherland of Buddhism.
Liu Yuguang pointed out that the CCP’s argument is mainly used for internal propaganda, reinforcing the sense that “Buddhism is a Chinese religion” and linking it to nationalism, with the aim of further transforming Buddhism into a tool for foreign relations and public diplomacy.
He cited the Nanhai Buddhist Institute on Hainan Island as an example, where the CCP opened a religious education institution, not to train domestic religious personnel, but to recruit monks from Southeast Asian countries such as Cambodia and Laos, so as to cultivate religious relations with Southeast Asian countries, and to use the influence of religion on politics in Southeast Asian countries to lobby and promote bilateral relations.
Liu Yuguang pointed out the reasons for the failure of the Confucius Institute as a major outreach tool of the CCP, and pointed out that the CCP chose Buddhism as a tool to expand its influence among many religions, not only because there is traditional Buddhism in mainland China, which is more controllable, but also because Buddhist followers are transnational in nature, which can complement the Confucius Institute.
Commentator Zheng Zhongyuan said to this station that Liu Yuguang’s term “public diplomacy tool” is only an obscure term, but frankly speaking, it is a political tool, a tool of united front, and a means of infiltration. In fact, Buddhism in China is no longer a religion, because it is essentially controlled by the atheistic Communist Party, and the management does not believe in Buddhism or God. Liu Yuguang inadvertently helped the CCP officially declare the true function of Buddhism in China, which is to declare that the Confucius Institute is no longer working and that we still have Buddhism. But not quite. There are many more functions that are at play to help the CCP do bad things.
Zheng Zhongyuan calls on the international religious community to recognize this and not to pretend that Buddhism in the CCP is Buddhism in a normal society.
Religion has long been a political tool of the CCP
Last November, Beijing authorities held the 14th meeting of the Joint Conference of National Religious Groups. The heads of the five major religious groups – Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism and Christianity – claimed that they wanted to “unify their thoughts and actions with the decision and deployment of the Party Central Committee” and to engage in the so-called “Chineseization of religion.
At the meeting, Catholic Bishops’ Conference President Ma Yinglin said that Chinese Catholics should “closely unite around the Party Central Committee with Xi Jinping at the core” and adhere to the so-called “four consciousnesses” and “two safeguards”. The “four consciousnesses” and “two safeguards” were upheld.
Earlier, on Nov. 6, Xi’an Daci’en Monastery organized monks to study the communiqué of the Fifth Plenary Session of the Communist Party of China. The abbot of Daci’en Temple, Monk Zeng Qin, emphasized at the meeting that he should unify his thoughts and actions to Xi Jinping’s “important speech” and achieve the “two safeguards”, and so on.
Cai Xia, a former professor at the Central Party School, tweeted, “Xi’s proposal to Chineseize religion is a political abduction of religious figures and their followers by the CCP! Chineseization of religion is the blatant politicization of religion by the tyrannical power of the state. Whether it is Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Christianity or Islam, their clergy have in fact become the CCP’s alternative propaganda ministry, carrying out the CCP’s task of brainwashing and poisoning minds and combining it with stability maintenance to control the minds of their followers and faithful.”
The CCP eventually wants to eliminate all religions
Under the CCP’s strong control, the religious system in mainland China has effectively become part of the CCP system. Religious officials appointed by the CCP are no different from those in other sectors, and the religious community has long been in chaos. For example, Shi Xuecheng, former president of the CCP’s Buddhist Association, was exposed in August 2018 for allegedly sexually assaulting several female monastic disciples, using multiple means of mind control over female disciples, and allegedly being corrupt. In August 2018, Shi Xuecheng, the president of the Chinese Communist Party’s Buddhist Association, was exposed for allegedly sexually abusing a number of female monks, using various means of mind control over female disciples, and for alleged corruption. “Marry your wife and eat meat”, go out in a special car Range Rover, or Audi A8, access to five-star hotels, etc.
The corruption and degradation of the religious community on the mainland is directly related to the religious policies implemented by the Chinese Communist Party on the mainland. He Lizhi, a former senior structural engineer at China’s Ministry of Construction, told The Epoch Times that he witnessed a video of Ye Xiaowen, then head of the CCP’s State Administration of Religious Affairs, speaking internally in August and September 1999. In the video, Ye spoke about the CCP’s religious policy, saying that a more important and difficult task than achieving the goal of communism is that the Communist Party will eventually eradicate all religions on earth and eliminate man’s belief in God.
Ye Xiaowen also says that the CCP implements the elimination of religion through three means: First, by taking the religious leader of that minority nationality and inviting him to Beijing to give you a high official position, so that you can enjoy life and give you the most generous treatment, so that you can forget what to believe in.
The second means is, for those religious leaders or sect heads who do not obey, that is, those who do not listen to the Chinese Communist Party, to crack down severely, cast them into prison, not to give them room to live.
The third means is to intensify atheist education in the vast religious areas, so that the young people, the new generation, will no longer believe in their fathers. In this way, those old believers will slowly cease to exist in these areas over time. Keep the number of people who believe in this religion to a minimum and gradually reduce it, eventually reaching the point where this religion no longer exists.
He Lizhi, who witnessed Ye Xiaowen’s speech, said that in fact, the so-called official religion recognized by the CCP and directly controlled by the CCP is not a religion in the true sense of the word, but a mouthpiece of the CCP.
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