According to a media report in a Communist Party paper, Christmas is a “forbidden Western festival”. However, pictures of approved celebrations should be disseminated to show that there are no restrictions. According to a media report, the Chinese Communist Party has imposed restrictions on civil and church Christmas celebrations. Christmas is a “forbidden Western festival”, according to a previously unpublished document that was available to the magazine for human rights and religious freedom “Bitter Winter”, as the Asian press service Ucanews reported on Saturday. The guideline also cites an increase in Coronoa cases as the reason for the restrictions, but expressly calls for the implementation of the policy of Sinization, which strictly prohibits the celebration of Western culture and festivals, according to the magazine. According to the order, however, some “cosmetic” Christmas celebrations are to be photographed and broadcast by state-sanctioned churches to show that there are no restrictions. The authorities supposedly want to keppe the paper „Spreading traditional Chinese culture and prohibiting Western festivities“ from December 20 a secret in order to avoid criticism in the West, according to „Bitter Winter“. Christmas was „steeped in deep Western religious culture,“ the magazine further cited: „Some Western nations rely on their advanced technology and culture to spread their values and lifestyle in China and to attract our young people,“ the Communist Party said . Some commercial enterprises also wanted to use these celebrations for their business in order to generate their social impact. „This harms our traditional Chinese culture,“ the document said. The directive also urges people to contact the authorities immediately when individuals or organizations arrange a Christmas event. In particular, teachers and students are forbidden to celebrate this Western festival. You should follow the rule of the CP Central Committee and thus become a role model for spreading Chinese culture. Special representatives have also been appointed to receive and deal with relevant complaints.

If this news is true, it wouldn´t be a big surprise. Communist China is officially an atheist state. It recognizes Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism and Islam, but they are strictly controlled. Unregistered religious bodies have been cracked down on for years. Many Asian states see Christianity and Islam as western, foreign imports of imperialism, which wanted to use missionaries spread the rule of the West. In addition, the CPC displeases the fact that Catholicism has the Pope as the supreme authority, similar to how Bismarck saw the Center Party and Catholicism as a foreign alien international force when the German Reich and the nation state was founded. Therefore, there is also an officially recognized Patriotic Catholic Church in China, which is a slave to the CCP, and an underground Catholic Church, which is suppressed, even after the Vatican signed a compromise paper with the CCP. The CCP also regards Buddhism ( not Tibetean Buddhism) , Daoism and Confuciansimus as expressions of Chinese culture, civilization and history and homegrown, similar to the Falungong mass sect, while the US-allied civil war opponent Chiang Kaitschek and the Soong family were leaning towards Christianity and the leader of the Taiping rebellion saw himself as the new Jesus. On the other hand, the CCP does not see Marxism as an element foreign to Chinese culture – in contrast to the Falungong, who also suspects Western liberalism to be a new form of Marxism and Communism and the root of all evil, whether it is the CCP or liberal democrats, enviromentalists and feminists. The Falungong and the CCP try to portray themselves as real representatives of Chinese culture and civilization as the Falungong does in its „9 Commentaries on the CCP“, the book „How the devil controlls the world“ or in its propaganda show „Shen Yun“ or the CCP with its Confucius Institutes. Different to Christianity the CCP perceives the Falungong which had before the crackdown 1998 according to a report of the CCP 100 million members and sympathizers as homegrown. However in such religious organizations it sees the danger of a counterrevolution and coloured revolution like in Poland the Solidarnosc which was supported by the Pope or the Christian churches in the East German revolution or historically comparable to the Taiping revolt. But one should not forget that Bismarck also persecuted the Catholic Church because he saw it as anti-national and controlled by an internationalist Vatican and suppressed the Center Party as well as the Catholic Church along with the socialists. At best Protetantism was seen as a catalyzer for German nation building as Luther translated the bible in German and broke with the Catholic church and the Vatican, while the ruling Hohenzollern dynasty and the ruling class in Prussia were Protestants too. Ludendorf and the NSDAP perceived this similar, especially since they viewed Christianity as  being un-Germanic and the SS and Himmler´s Ahnenerbe tried to replace Christianity with alleged German and Aryan neopaganism.

But even in the supposedly largest democracy in the world, in Modi-India, the BJP and the Hindu nationalists only see Buddhism and Hinduism as Indian culture and civilization, Islam and Christianity as alien to Indian culture and as relics of imperialist conquests. Accordingly, pogrom-like riots against Indian Christians and Muslims initiated by the BJP and RSS occur again and again, although in the latter case the Islamism fueled by Pakistan and its terrorist attacks in India also play a role. In Vietnam, Christianity is also seen as a foreign religion. When I filled out the form at the tourist office for travel purposes, I was asked whether I was religious because I belonged to the Catholic Church at that time. The background was that the former South Vietnamese dictator Diem as well as the upper class collaborating with French imperialism were Catholics and thus the CPV  and the Vietcong viewed this religion as an expression of foreign colonialism and imperialism, especially since Diem also persecuted Buddhists, aroused the displeasure of the Vietnamese population and brought  the Viet Cong much sympathy That was why the USA also eliminated Diem. This was also the reason that a watchdog from the Communist Party State Security followed me on my visit to the Notre Dame Church in Saigon and then asked me what I was doing in the church. But while Buddhism and Daoism were still tolerated in Vietnam, Confucianism was perceived more as a product of Chinese foreign rule for a while, which is why the Confucian temples in Vietnam were closed for a while, only to be reopened as part of Doi Moi. On the other hand, there were also strange syncretic religious sects like the Cao Dai in Vietnam, who worshiped Lenin, Victor Hugo, Jesus and Buddha together in a bizarre way. Therefore, Christmas is perceived differently in non-western countries than in the West and is part of a culture war and sometimes clash of civilizations. However, as long as religious festivals are materialistic drivers for consumption orgies for the sake of economic growth and spoiled, naughty kids and little emperors they might be welcomed. And „Getting rich“ and „Making a lot of money“ is the Calvin-like religion of the CCP since the Deng era and is not perceived as foreign influence, but homegrown as Protestant-like Confucian work and education ethics.