Ana Brito. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 118-126). / INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Research Object and Methodology --- p.1 / Definition of the Main Concepts --- p.4 / Religion and Ideology --- p.8 / Macao ´ةs Historical Background --- p.10 / Relevance of the Historical Contextualization --- p.13 / Macao ´ةs Present Situation --- p.15 / Chapter PART 1 - --- CATHOLIC RELIGION --- p.18 / Chapter 1 --- Church and Government --- p.19 / Government and Catholic Religion-Changing Strategy --- p.24 / Chapter 2 --- Church and Ethnic Groups --- p.26 / Diocese versus Congregations --- p.26 / Ethnic Differentiation within the Church --- p.29 / Localization of the Church --- p.31 / Chapter 3 --- Conversion and Ethnic Identity --- p.36 / Patterns of Conversion --- p.36 / Why and How Conversion Patterns have Changed ？ --- p.41 / Catholic Religion and the different Ethnic Groups --- p.45 / Chapter PART 2 - --- CHINESE POPULAR RELIGION --- p.50 / Chapter 4 --- Chinese Popular Religion and the Political Power --- p.51 / Chinese Popular Religion and the Colonial Government --- p.51 / Chinese Popular Religion and Chinese Authorities --- p.58 / Chapter 5 --- Analysis of Two Temples --- p.64 / Kun Iam Ku Miu´ؤa Decaying Neighborhood Temple --- p.64 / Kun Iam Tong´ؤa Flourishing Temple --- p.69 / Chapter 6 --- "Kun Iam : Worshippers, History and Belief" --- p.78 / Kun Iam Tong Worshippers --- p.78 / Kun Iam: History and Belief --- p.82 / Chapter 7 --- Relevance of Ritual Practices in Reinforcing Ethnic Identity --- p.87 / CONCLUSION --- p.93 / Religion and Ethnic Identity in Macao: Past and Present --- p.93 / Religious Policy in the People 's Republic of China --- p.95 / Macao1999 --- p.97 / NOTES --- p.99 / APPENDICES --- p.104 / BIBLIOGRAPHY --- p.118 / GLOSSARY --- p.127

Chinese people, like those of many other cultures, understand themselves as belonging to a specific gender, one with social rules and positions that can be difficult to stray from. Such gender norms have existed in China for millennia. There are a number of ways to examine what these gender norms are (or have been), and a number of ways in which one can understand how they dictated the lives of the Chinese people they defined. The present thesis is a translation and study of two Chinese hagiographical collections from the late Song or early Yuan Dynasty. These collections detail the exploits of Daoist transcendents. The first collection translated is concerned with male transcendents, the second with female transcendents. In translating these texts, I seek to understand how gender is portrayed in the lives of exceptional religious figures. As an examination of gender within a patriarchal—or at least male-dominant—society, I expected the female transcendents to be relegated, somehow, to a lesser station. Through my translations I argue that, though they could not wholly extricate themselves from gender norms, religious Daoism, as portrayed in the hagiographies, offered both men and women from certain social obligations. These social obligations include such institutions as marriage and reproduction (for both men and women). The hagiographies also depict a greater sense of equality for Daoist women than they might have found otherwise. At its most ambitious, Narrating Transcendents serves to demonstrate the multivalent function of hagiographies as tools religious communities used to define and guide themselves. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

In the years since Mao Zedongs death, the people of China have been impelled to reevaluate the legacy and character of their still iconic leader. One of the more notable trends in this process of posthumous reevaluation is the tendency of some individuals and groups (most often, the rural peasantry) to interpret the deceased Chairman along theological lines, assuming that his still efficacious spirit will provide protection and good fortune to those who honour him.<p>In exploring the genesis (and continued salience) of these beliefs and practices, the present research delves into popular Chinese religiosity, exploring the porosity of the traditional cosmology, the centrality of perceived spiritual efficacy (ling) in determining the popularity of religious cults, and the theological and cosmological resonances extant within traditional understandings of political leadership. The body of metaphors, narratives, and tropes drawn from this historical overview are then applied to popular characterizations of Mao, with the resulting correspondences helping to explicate the salience of these modern religious interpretations. To further investigate the source of Maos persistent symbolic capital, the present research also explores the role of Cultural Revolution-era ritual in valorizing and reifying the power and efficacy then popularly ascribed to the Great Helmsmans person and teachings. This studys conclusion, in brief, is that participants in the posthumous cult of Mao are utilizing these cultural materials in both traditional and creative ways, and that such interpretations speak to the exigencies of life in the turbulent, ideologically ambiguous culture of modern China. <p>In performing this evaluation, the present research makes use of the standard phenomenological/historiographic approach of religious studies scholarship, though it is also informed by narrative methods, cognitive science, and current perspectives on the role and function of ritual. In particular, the analysis of Mao-era rituals (as a source of Maos continued symbolic potency) is performed using the cognivistic typology of ritual proposed by E. Thomas Lawson and Robert N. McCauley, with additional materials drawn from the research of Catherine Bell, Roy Rappaport, Pascal Boyer and Adam Chau.

In the years since Mao Zedongs death, the people of China have been impelled to reevaluate the legacy and character of their still iconic leader. One of the more notable trends in this process of posthumous reevaluation is the tendency of some individuals and groups (most often, the rural peasantry) to interpret the deceased Chairman along theological lines, assuming that his still efficacious spirit will provide protection and good fortune to those who honour him.<p>In exploring the genesis (and continued salience) of these beliefs and practices, the present research delves into popular Chinese religiosity, exploring the porosity of the traditional cosmology, the centrality of perceived spiritual efficacy (ling) in determining the popularity of religious cults, and the theological and cosmological resonances extant within traditional understandings of political leadership. The body of metaphors, narratives, and tropes drawn from this historical overview are then applied to popular characterizations of Mao, with the resulting correspondences helping to explicate the salience of these modern religious interpretations. To further investigate the source of Maos persistent symbolic capital, the present research also explores the role of Cultural Revolution-era ritual in valorizing and reifying the power and efficacy then popularly ascribed to the Great Helmsmans person and teachings. This studys conclusion, in brief, is that participants in the posthumous cult of Mao are utilizing these cultural materials in both traditional and creative ways, and that such interpretations speak to the exigencies of life in the turbulent, ideologically ambiguous culture of modern China. <p>In performing this evaluation, the present research makes use of the standard phenomenological/historiographic approach of religious studies scholarship, though it is also informed by narrative methods, cognitive science, and current perspectives on the role and function of ritual. In particular, the analysis of Mao-era rituals (as a source of Maos continued symbolic potency) is performed using the cognivistic typology of ritual proposed by E. Thomas Lawson and Robert N. McCauley, with additional materials drawn from the research of Catherine Bell, Roy Rappaport, Pascal Boyer and Adam Chau.