A Comparative Analysis of the Response of Chinese Christians to the One Child Policy With the Early Church’s Response to Cultural Norms of Abortion and Gendercide

by Nathan Stam for his PhD

(A link to the full PDF is available at bottom)

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

The growth of Christianity in China during the 20^th and 21^st centuries has been well chronicled from both a popular Judeo-Christian worldview^[1] and a secular interpretation of social science.^[2] Commonly identified factors contributing to the growth of Christianity in China are: 1) a relative relaxation of ideological control beginning with Deng Xiaoping and the 1982 Constitution; 2) new policies allowing the restoration of church properties to their respective churches; 3) the popularity of a faith associated with the economy of the West; and 4) an emphasis on the benefits of a belief system that promotes social stability and common morality.^[3] However, there is much more to the story of the growth of Christianity in China over the past four decades.

This study attempted to connect the importance of sociological issues with the growth of Christianity in a particular culture. Rodney Stark, Professor of Sociology at

Baylor University, wrote a volume entitled The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries. In this work, Stark argues that Christianity was a movement not of the lower classes and the oppressed, but of the upper and middle classes, particularly in urban settings. Stark details a number of advantages that Christianity had over paganism: 1) Christians stayed in cities during plagues, caring for the sick, while others escaped urban areas; 2) Christianity valued women and allowed females to participate in worship, leading to a high rate of secondary conversion;^[4] and 3) Christians freely went to martyrdom while praying for their captors, which added credibility to their testimony.^[5] 

This study sought to show that Stark’s analysis ties into the growth of the church in the modern world as well. In The Rise of Christianity, Stark makes the case that the church grew into the dominant influence in Western culture because, among other things, pagans practiced infanticide while Christians valued the lives of their children. In addition, Christians built strong families while pagans did not.^[6] Over time that made a difference in demographic patterns. Similarly, the population control practices of the

One-Child Policy in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has implications for Chinese Christians today, particularly in the church’s ministry to families, as Chinese Christians exercise a form of civil disobedience.  

The thesis of this dissertation is the following: The Early Church’s response to abortion and gendercide and the Chinese Christian church’s response to abortion and  gendercide in the context of the One-Child Policy has similarities and implications for the church today, particularly in its ministry to families. The general research question that this dissertation sought to address is what effect a Christian ethic of life has on the growth of Christianity in a totalitarian society.

Importance and Contribution of this Study

Though the Chinese do not have many ways to protest government policy, they have been able to protest the One-Child Policy by having more children, or by not aborting once a child is conceived. Although it is true that many affluent Chinese consider having a second child a status symbol,^[7] it is also possible to find many Christians who are being obedient to God’s command to love their children and not to harm them (Psalm 127:3–5). This study explored several of these stories and connected the obedience of Christians with the growth and health of their families. 

            On October 29, 2015, the Fifth Plenum of the Central Committee held in Beijing announced that the thirty-five year old policy allowing parents to have only one child had officially concluded, and families were now permitted to have two children.^[8] Claims made by various news outlets including the Wall Street Journal^[9] cited the escalating  demographic crisis as a primary cause for the policy change, and the desire, led by President Xi Jinping, to “rebrand [China’s] human rights record.”^[10] Despite the relaxation of policy over the past three years, demographers have not been able to identify a meaningful difference in births.^[11][12] The implication is that even though couples are allowed to have two children, they are still choosing to have only one.^[13] There are several reasons, but the simplest answer is that a one-child family has become the social and economic norm.^[14]

Despite the recent change in population policy, the author believed this study was valid because of the possible implications for growth in Christian populations for the

future. The author had confidence that the data confirmed that Chinese Christians, in contrast with the general population, possessed a higher view of marriage and family, and had more children.

Research Methodology

The purpose of the research was to ascertain predominant sociological issues influencing family health and growth among Christians in the PRC. An ethnographic interview was used to determine if there is indeed an intentional correlation between a Christian ethic of life and the growth of Christian families in the context of a thirty-five year coercive family planning system.^[15] This was an inductive analysis aimed at uncovering the meaning of religion in the lives of Chinese Christians.

The participants in the study were Christian Chinese nationals and naturalized U.S citizens. The population of the study included twelve Chinese nationals in country and fifteen U.S. naturalized citizens residing in North Carolina. Participants were contacted personally, by telephone, or by email to request their participation in the research project. For fluency of language and logistics, nationals facilitated the twelve in-country interviews. The participants were chosen at random from both a house church network in

Hebei province and from a local Three Self Patriotic Movement^[16] network in Hebei using local contacts in the region.^[17] The author conducted the interviews for the fifteen Chinese residing in North Carolina. 

The first part of the survey asked participants to identify their demographic setting, including sex, age, church association, and education.^[18] The second part asked participants to identify the predominant influences on their decision-making concerning family planning. The author utilized three categories of questions in the ethnographic survey—family structure, social structure, and religious structure.^[19]   

The historical methodology for examining the origin of the One-Child Policy in Chapter Two consisted of analyzing three key historical figures instrumental in the creation of China’s population control policies.^[20] In Chapter Three, the dissertation included a broad survey of historical accounts beginning with the first century and concluding with the Edict of Milan using both primary and secondary sources from the Early Church. Octavius by Marcus Minucius Felixprovided primary material for investigating the Early Church’s ethic concerning a common cultural prenatal practice, as did Musonius Rufus’ Discourse 15, which provided the perspective of Stoic Philosophy. Other primary materials contributing to a survey of the Greco-Roman ethic of life included Aristotle’s Politics, Plato’s Republic, Celsus’ De Medicina, Tertullian’s A Treatise on the Soul, and Seneca’s The Histories. Secondary sources supplemented the investigation of Early Church population practices.

Definition of Terms

Early Church refers to the beginning of the Christian movement. For the purposes of this  dissertation the movement begins with the first century and concludes with the Edict of Milan in 313 AD.^[21] Pagan indicates the non-Jewish Roman population that generally regarded Christianity as peculiar, bizarre and dangerous to the socio-political structure. Pagan ethic refers to a polytheistic value system that elevates self-preservation and is characterized by the absence of any absolute authority. In a pagan ethic, moral values are at their essence, good advice, and are grounded in a humanistic foundation.^[22]

One-Child Policy denotes the population control policy formally instituted on September 25, 1980 in the PRC under the auspices of Mao Zedong that limited a majority of the Chinese population to only one child. This social engineering program focused on depressing the birth rate, with the goal of economic prosperity. The Two-Child Policy is the current iteration of population policy in China, enacted on October 29, 2015, and it allows for the majority of families in China to bear two children. There are exceptions— for example, the number of children can fluctuate based on if either parent is from a

“one-child” family, or if the family is from a minority people group, but in the general urban setting families are currently encouraged to have two children.^[23]

Gendercide in a broad sense indicates the killing, abandonment, and trafficking of young girls, but specifically for this study the term refers to sex selective abortion or infanticide where female infants are killed in utero.^[24] Infant abandonment in this dissertation refers to female infants left to die post-partum.^[25] Gender imbalance deals with sex ratios as the number of boys per one hundred girls. The World Health Organization defines a “biologically natural sex ratio” as one hundred and five, which means that one hundred and five boys are born for every one hundred girls (105:100).^[26]

Availability of Resources

The author accessed multiple sources over the course of this study. Much of the works listed in the bibliography were available at either the Library at Southeastern Baptist

Theological Seminary, The Hunt Library at North Carolina State University, or Davis Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Other works were available through interlibrary loan and the exchange program of North Carolina Private Academic Libraries. Dissertations, theses, and many of the articles cited were made available  through WorldCat and ProQuest.

Chapter Summaries

This opening chapter contains the introduction to the dissertation, beginning with a brief  summary of pertinent background regarding population control policies. Following the background, the thesis of this work was stated. The author then documented the particular  methodology employed in the study as well as the impact made by this dissertation regarding possible implications for growth in Christian populations for the future. A definition of terms was included, and each term was elaborated upon textually as the study developed. 

            Chapter Two focuses on a summary of the One-Child Policy in China. The author surveys a historical progression of its origin and then transitioned to an examination of the policy’s implementation and enforcement from 1980–2015. The demographic consequences of social engineering are explored including the current gender imbalance and Chinese family size and characteristics. Finally, the chapter includes a summary of society’s response to population control and the current status of family planning in the People’s Republic of China.

Chapter Three presents an analysis of family planning practices in the Early Church—specifically focusing on fertility, gendercide and abortion issues in the cultural milieu of the first three centuries A.D. The chapter focuses on the claims made by Rodney Stark from his study on the role of women in Christian growth.^[27] The author then examines the Greco-Roman view on infanticide as recorded by Seneca, Tacitus, Plato, Aristotle, and others.^[28] This study includes a description of ancient abortion procedures and then contrasts these practices with the Christian rejection of invasive birth control methods that caused pagans to have low fertility. This chapter briefly examines the writings of Justin Martyr, Marcus Aurelius and Minucius Felix on the issue of Christian fertility and population increase.

Chapter Four begins by summarizing the research methodology and then presents demographic data collected from participants utilizing the ethnographic survey tool. The responses from participants in the study are organized and presented in Chapter Four topically and conclusions are drawn from isolating four themes.

            The final chapter of this dissertation concludes with practical implications this study yielded for missiology. The author compares the Early Church response to abortion and gendercide with the Chinese Christian response to coercive family planning in the context of the One-Child Policy. The author offers several possibilities of Christian influence including a brief discussion of constructive noncompliance in Chinese culture. In the conclusion, the author summarizes the dissertation’s argument and offers suggestions for further study.

Conclusion

This dissertation attempts to connect the significance of sociological issues with the growth of Christianity in Chinese culture. The study presents a historical survey of both the implementation and enforcement of the One-Child Policy, as well as the current status of family planning in China. The author investigates the Roman Empire’s practices of abortion and gendercide and describes the Early Church response. An ethnographic survey is used to capture the experiences of Chinese Christians and gather data relating to family, religion and society. Finally, similarities in Christian response to cultural norms of abortion and infanticide between the two historical periods of the Early Church and

One-Child Policy are noted, as well as relevant differences.

CHAPTER TWO

A HISTORY OF THE ONE CHILD POLICY IN CHINA

At the founding of the People’s Republic of China on October 1, 1949, the nation consisted of a population of 540 million. By 1980 the population surpassed 800 million.^[29] According to economist Avraham Ebenstein from Hebrew University in Jerusalem, this extraordinary surge resulted in global concern that China was destined for a “Malthusian collapse.”^[30] Ebenstein elaborates, “The breakdown would be characterized by unchecked population growth that eventually outstrips growth in the food supply and results in massive famine.”^[31] Regarding the dire situation facing China, historian Jonathan Spence records,

In the early 1950s, some of China’s foremost economists had warned of trouble if close attention was not paid to the nation’s overall population picture. A host of factors supported this conclusion: the new marriage law of 1950 that allowed women as well as men the opportunity to leave uncongenial partners and find new ones; the drop in infant mortality because of improved health care; a rise in life expectancy because of better diet and health care for the elderly; the closing of monasteries and convents; the banning of prostitution, which brought even more women into the marriage market; and the persistence of the Chinese people in seeking prosperity and lineage continuity alike through numerous progeny.⁴ Chinese leaders’ fear of a Malthusian collapse came to fruition in 1958–1962 through Mao Zedong’s failed economic-planning known as the Great Leap Forward.^[32] In pursuit of utopia, Mao collectivized the entire nation. The result was the death of 45 million people, mainly from starvation, during a five-year period—one of the largest “mass murders” in human history.^[33]

Origin of the One-Child Policy and Historical Overview

In an article on challenging common myths surrounding the One-Child Policy, Martin King Whyte, Wang Feng and Yong Cai propose Mao’s approach to population issues after 1949 was far more practical than ideological. They observe, “By the mid-1950s, confronted with the challenges of managing the country and feeding its population, Mao and other leaders began to sing a different tune.”^[34] Early the following year, in the  original version of his speech on February 27, 1957, “On the Correct Handling of

Contradictions among the People,” Mao conveyed the same idea in more detailed terms: 

Our country has so many people, which no country in the world can compare with. It would be better to have fewer births. (Re)production needs to be planned. In my view, humankind is completely incapable of managing itself. It has plans for production in factories, for producing cloth, tables and chairs, and steel, but there is no plan for producing humans. This is anarchism—no governing, no organization and no rules. This government perhaps needs to have a special ministry—what about a ministry of birth control? Or perhaps establishing a commission, as part of the government?^[35]

For Mao it was a simple step moving from central planning of the economy to central planning of family size. In 1964, Mao’s Birth Planning Commission within the State Council was established to lead birth control efforts soon after China’s population recovered from the nation-wide famine.^[36] 

Policies dealing with control of family size were initiated after Mao launched a campaign to encourage families to have more children, leading to birthrates of over four children per family in the late 1950s.^[37] His subsequent policy reversal regarding population growth was characteristic of Mao’s personality and heavily influenced by the “pseudo-science” of New Population Theorists, led by Ma Yinchu.^[38] Mao became convinced that an economically strong China would not come from a large population,  but from a decrease in population that would effectively lead to greater stability and status as a global super power.^[39] Though the birthrate had dropped from six children per family in the late 1960s to slightly under three children per family by 1980, Chinese officials had confidence that forcibly containing population growth would “directly correlate to economic prosperity.”^[40] Chai Ling, founder of All Girls Allowed, writes, “As a result, a coercive policy was born that would impact the most intimate aspect of every

Chinese citizen’s life—their family.”^[41]

China’s One-Child Policy was formally instituted on September 25, 1980, in an open letter from the Chinese Communist Party.^[42] The population goal of the policy was for couples to bear 1.6 children after exceptions were taken into account.^[43] Some common exemptions included parents who were “only children” themselves (they have no siblings), rural families whose first child was a girl, and ethnic minorities because of their already limited populations. Population-control activists in the West affirmed the One-Child Policy including the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)^[44] whose goal, according to Executive Director Nafis Sadiq, was to achieve “the lowest level of population in the very shortest time.”^[45]

Social scientist and demographer, Steven W. Mosher, elaborates concerning the

United Nation’s approval, “Western population-control advocates, therefore, welcomed China’s 1980 policy with a mixture of euphoria and relief.” Mosher continues, “Euphoria because the world’s most populous nation was at last getting serious about its numbers, and relief because China would now dam up its seas of people before they could inundate the world.”^[46]

The United Nations and affiliated global entities such as the Population Institute and the World Bank continued to praise China’s family planning policy as worthy of emulation around the world.^[47] In 1994, Dr. Richard Cash of the Harvard School of Public

Health congratulated the State Family Planning Commission on having had “a very strong family-planning program for many years,” and counseled China to not allow its

“people to slip back into having larger families.”^[48] 

Mosher continues, 

Having underwritten the China program, population-control advocates were soon acclaiming its achievements, and even expressing approval of many of its methods. The United Nations picked 1983, a year of unusually severe coercion inside China, to present the first United Nations Population Award to the PRC. The decision was criticized in many quarters—the American Nobel Prize-winning economist, Theodore W. Schultz, immediately resigned in protest from the Population Award advisory commission—but the U.N. was undeterred. As a family-planning “high tide” ripped through the Chinese countryside, U.N.

officials lauded China “for the most outstanding contribution to the awareness of population questions.” That same year, the IPPF welcomed the Chinese Family Planning Association to full membership, declaring the goals of the Chinese program entirely consistent with its own. Commendations from the World Bank and the Better World Society of Washington, D.C., followed.²²

Wemer Fomos of the Population Institute, a group with close ties to the UNFPA, declared in 1982 that the Chinese program was one that “the world should copy.”^[49] The World Bank, in its 1984 Development Report, contended that “voluntary” incentives “need be no more objectionable than any other taxes or subsidies,” and went on to describe the Chinese program in laudatory terms.^[50]

Ma Yinchu

Ma Yinchu’s New Population Theory was particularly influential in developing the theory connecting the restriction of population growth with economic prosperity. Ma, an

American-educated president of Peking University, spent most of his formative years at Yale and Colombia University where he was heavily influenced by the fiscal theories of Hegel, Kant and Keynes and eventually received a doctorate in economics before returning to China and founding the Chinese Economic Society. After the Sino-Japanese war Ma became allied with Zhou Enlai, the first Premier of the People’s Republic of

China, and seemingly convinced Mao of the negative impact of population growth. After Mao realized his initial judgment was flawed, he exiled Ma for twenty years for counterrevolutionary ideas and decided in 1957 that a large population directly correlates to national power. 

Richard Jackson details Ma’s fall from grace after Mao reversed policy. “Ma’s standing was completely undercut,” Jackson writes. “He was particularly attacked as a bourgeois and Western ‘Malthusian’ and forced to recant.”^[51] Mao was obsessed with emulating the success of the Soviet machine and took particular offense at the fact that the Communist Party in Russia had never had a discussion concerning population control policy. Jackson writes that Ma’s fall from grace was so drastic that he was used as an example for aspiring Chinese population specialists.^[52] 

Ma argued that a smaller population is always beneficial to a nation’s prosperity, environmental protection and construction of a harmonious society. He contended that many of the world’s problems, such as deforestation, global warming, acid rain and the disappearance of glaciers, were all directly related to rapid population growth. A strictly enforced family planning policy would help to advance economic growth in a nation that had struggled mightily under the leadership of Mao. Nathan Vanderklippe, Asian correspondent for The Globe and Mail, comments, 

When the Communists took over in 1949, Mr. Ma was among China’s most prominent academic voices. He served as president of Peking University and was friends with Zhou Enlai, the first premier of the People’s Republic of China. And Mr. Ma was worried about babies. The first census of Communist China, in 1953, counted 600 million people, a shocking rise from 450 million in 1947. The prospect of the population cresting a billion was suddenly possible–and frightening. If China wanted to make each of its people wealthy, Mr. Ma reasoned, it would be easier to do so if there were fewer of them. Besides, he added, China didn’t have the land to feed so many new mouths. As a fix, he proposed a “new population theory” that embraced the widespread use of childrestraint propaganda, encouraged birth control, offered incentives for small families, and called for bureaucratic dissuasion of large families.^[53]

While the Communist Party’s Family Planning Commission eventually adopted Ma’s population policy proposals in the late 1970s and his New Population Theory became a foundational pillar for the reasoning behind the One-Child Policy, it is important to note that he maintained a lifelong opposition to abortion as a means of population control. In “New Population Theory,” Ma underscores his aversion to abortion: “Abortion kills the fetus in the mother’s womb which has the right to life.

Abortion should not be permitted unless the pregnancy endangers the mother’s life.”^[54] Ma also believed that abortion modulated the importance of contraception, was detrimental to the mother’s health, and increased the burden on the medical community.

Ma was later exonerated following Mao’s death.^[55]

Song Jian

Song Jian graduated from Moscow University and eventually became president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering. While his background was in mechanics and cybernetics, specializing in the development of antiballistic missiles, Song was responsible for the development of “Population Control Theory” in the 1980s. It was his training in cybernetics that enabled Song to work out a theory of bidirectional limits to the Total Fertility Rate.^[56]

            Mathematician Renaud Helbig proposes that in the 20^th Century no mathematician had a greater consequential worldwide impact than Song Jian. Helbig explains, “Song Jian is unique in his direct impact on the lives of millions of individuals in a very short time. It was Song Jian who persuaded the Chinese government of the 1980s to implement a policy that would harshly influence their society for more than thirty years: the onechild policy.”^[57] Helbig adds that Song was responsible for the first draft of the open letter that would later be published through the Central Committee of the Communist Party enacting the One-Child Policy in 1980.^[58]

Song followed the directives of Deng Xiaoping, who encouraged scientists to apply their skills toward the developmental and economic issues the People’s Republic of China was facing in the 1980s, and he took an interest in the demographic issue that had plagued the nation over the previous two decades. Helbig describes Song’s process:

Back in China, he organised a team of mathematicians and engineers that devised a population growth model. Like all models, this one aimed at representing reality in mathematical terms as a means to make predictions; in that case, the goal was to project an estimate of the evolution of Chinese population over the next century according to a birth rate imposed to the whole of society.^[59]

Interestingly, Song’s population model was developed by his team on one of the few existing computers in China at the time, which was normally reserved for the military. Helbig records the calculations of Song’s simulation, “The results presented by the machine were indisputable: given a population of almost a billion in 1979, it was absolutely necessary that Chinese women did not have more than one child throughout their lives in order to come back by 2080 to a population figure that was deemed reasonable (700 million people).”^[60] 

Song’s findings were met with resistance, but he eventually was able to gain the support of Deng Xiaoping and other party leaders who were taken aback by the computations, but who agreed that immediate and decisive action had to be taken.^[61]

Although Chinese birth control policies had begun a decade earlier, Song’s “Population Control Theory” in the 1980s was instrumental in ushering in a new era of family planning policy. While Ma provided the theoretical foundation for population control,

Song Jian delivered the engineering computations, which facilitated action.

Zhou Enlai

Zhou Enlai fought side by side with Mao against the Nationalists and Chiang Kai-shek from 1946 until 1949. On October 1, 1949 when Mao stood on the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Tiananmen Square and established the People’s Republic of China, Zhou joined him as the first Premier of the People’s Republic of China and served until his death in 1976.  Mao and Zhou had their differences, and their relationship is best described as an enigma. Biographers Wenqian Gao and Lawrence R. Sullivan explain, “Mao was a man of immense talent, but he could not run the entire show by himself. He needed Zhou Enlai. Throughout the decades to come, Mao was plagued by this paradoxical relationship.” Gao and Sullivan continue, “He had to keep Zhou at bay to prevent him from ever gaining the upper hand; at the same time, to stay ahead of the game and keep his eye on the big picture, Mao grew even more dependent on Zhou Enlai.”^[62]

Zhou had the unenviable task of mediating, albeit indirectly, between Mao’s utopian Socialist vision and other Communist Party cadres bent on reversing disastrous policy decisions. This included programs regarding family planning. In direct contradiction to Mao’s thinking at the time, Zhou Enlai gave a speech at the Eighth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in 1956 in which he twice mentioned the need to advocate for birth control prior to Mao’s policy reversal.^[63][64]

Under the leadership of Zhou Enlai, family planning policies aimed at limiting 

fertility were first attempted in 1971. Prior to the implementation of the One-Child Policy the government had campaigned for voluntary birth control and discouraged large families.^[65] The goal of these policies was to reduce the birthrate from thirty per thousand to twenty per thousand by 1980. The campaign was similar to current policy—a twochild limit.^[66] Zhou’s mantra was, “late, sparse, and few.”^[67] 

John Bryan Starr identifies the three pronged strategy of this early attempt, “Couples were encouraged to delay marrying until their late twenties, to space their children at least four years apart, and to limit themselves to two children.”^[68] Under Zhou’s leadership the campaign was partially successful in reducing the birthrate, but projections in 1978 suggested that it was not enough to slow down the population growth.^[69] Deng Xiaoping agreed with Zhou’s insistence that there was a direct correlation between economic growth and limited population, and decided that further family planning limitations had to take place. As the State Family Planning Committee began to piece together a formal family planning and birth control policy, the Committee took five main factors into account: “The availability of land suitable for agriculture throughout

China, the overall age profile of the population, the balance of urban and rural growth,

the characteristics of the labor force, and the levels of education attained by the population.”^[70] These factors were short sighted and naïve at best.

Ultimately, Zhou remains a complicated figure in history. He was warmly regarded by the Chinese people and was far less ideological than Mao. However, he is also regarded as complicit in the application of programs that have directly cost the lives of millions of Chinese over the years. Ma Yinchu was the theorist, Song Jian the engineer, and Zhou was the implementer. He directly applied and enforced the One-Child

Policy.

Implementation

From the early 1980s the government struggled with the One-Child Policy being an expensive unfunded mandate. Starr comments, “Although the state claims that nearly $1 billion is spent annually on implementation of the birth-control program, virtually all that money comes from local governments, which … find themselves paradoxically funding the birth-control program exclusively from fines levied against those who violate it.”^[71] 

Stuart Gietel-Basten, Associate Professor of Social Policy at the University of

Oxford, authored an article in 2015 pointing out the complication of ending the OneChild Policy. He argues that disbanding family planning policy overnight would lead to chaos and writes, “In 2005, it was estimated that that over half a million staff were directly involved in family planning policy at the township level and above, added to 1.2 million village administrators and 6 million ‘group leaders.’”^[72]

After the Family Planning Commission discovered that in 1981 almost 6 million babies were born to families with one child, threatening the family planning population policy, they took decisive action.^[73] Spence observes, “The government intensified the rigor of its birth-control programs, ordering compulsory IUD insertion for women who had borne one child, and compulsory sterilization of either husband or wife after the birth of a second child.”^[74] Every married couple had to apply for a birth permit from their local Family Planning Office before becoming pregnant and quota systems for birth control officials were established on both the provincial and municipal level. Spence adds, “There were reports of couples fleeing as local sterilization teams entered their villages, and some birth-control cadres felt so threatened that they requested armed escorts.”^[75]

Ebenstein records, “Following a forced sterilization and abortion campaign in 1983 that created domestic unrest, Chinese policymakers began considering revisions to the policy. By allowing some mothers to have a second child, the government hoped to discourage violations and increase public support for the policy.”^[76] Eager to encourage  acquiescence, the Family Planning Commission extended a variety of enticements. Starr writes,

In Guangan County, in Sichuan, in the early 1990s, these included subsidies. Although a subsidy comes to no more than a dollar a month, this constitutes a 3 percent increase in the average household income there. There is also access to a pension plan, additional land in the household’s farming contract, a reduction in the grain tax, and, finally, tuition assistance for a family with one child.^[77]

Party administrators awarded land contracts to rural families if they signed an agreement not to give birth to a second child while they worked the acreage. If they broke the contract these peasants were subject to exorbitant fines or even faced losing the property. 

By 1984 the Central Committee’s Family Planning Office instituted policy in which provinces were subject to distinct reproductive limitations based on provincial demographics. While urban residents remained under a strict one child limitation, rural residents were generally allowed to have a single additional birth (a 1.5 child policy) and families in remote counties were permitted even more children to help work the land.

These remote families only accounted for 1% of the population.^[78] 

Because of the variety in enforcement and response, which the central government could discern through the data of each year’s national census, the Family Planning Office used a quota reward system for local Planning Officials who carried out the birth control policies.^[79] Many provinces linked job promotion with an official’s ability to meet or exceed population planning targets,^[80] thus providing a powerful structural incentive for officials to employ coercive measures in order to meet population goals.^[81] If the officials did not meet these quotas, they were either punished or lost the opportunity to earn promotions.^[82] According to All Girls Allowed, teachers who violated birth quotas were at risk of losing their retirement benefits.^[83] Starr identifies the problematic nature of enforcing the One-Child Policy,

The birth-control program is yet another good example of the problems in the power grid of China’s political system. The central government has come up with a program it wants implemented everywhere, but it must rely on local authorities—indeed, government at the very lowest level of the political system— to enforce it. And, like pollution control, the birth-control program is an unfunded mandate. Since the program is both highly unpopular and unfunded, local governments have either modified, delayed, or thwarted it.^[84]

for each woman with two daughters whom they fail to sterilize. Conversely, they are promised a reward of 500 yuan (US$77) for each tubal ligation that they see through to completion.

The quota structure was an unreliable source of compliance. In addition, quotas were frequently met by compelling pregnant women to undergo abortions^[85] often under threat  of job loss, personal harm, and even massive fines.^[86]

Enforcement

Regarding the problematic issue of enforcing national policy through local authorities

Spence details the hierarchy and function of provincial governments, 

Political life in a given province was directed by three officials: the first party secretary, the governor, and the ranking military officer from the PLA—the regional commander if the provincial capital was his headquarters, otherwise, a senior officer from the military region in which the province was located. These three officials took responsibility for different aspects of the province’s life. The party secretary oversaw ideological work, mass campaigns, rural policies, and personnel assignments; the governor supervised education and economic development; the PLA officer saw not only to military needs, but also to various economic endeavors. These three positions each had their own staff and bureaucracy responsible for carrying out the governing of the province all the way down to townships. At the base of the structure every working Chinese man or woman was registered in the unit with which he or she worked (the danwei)…. The party leaders in each danwei had immense power over their danwei members, since their approval was needed in such areas as job assignments, educational opportunities, travel at home or abroad, or for permission to marry and to have a child.^[87]

Coercion ordinarily begins with verbal harassment of noncomplying couples: women are urged to undergo sterilization, and pregnant ones are urged to have an abortion.^[88] Starr comments, “Those who resisted are threatened…. There is fairly widespread evidence of the destruction of personal property in retaliation against those who do not cooperate.”^[89] Elizabeth L. Gerhardt, Professor of Theology and Social Ethics at Northeastern

Seminary, details the consequences of the 1983 and 1991 sterilization campaigns in China: “Thirty million women were forcibly sterilized,” she writes. “In addition to the dehumanization of women through forced sterilizations and abortions, it is estimated that millions of baby girls have been killed and abandoned in China.”^[90]

Enforcement of the policy applied to all segments of the population. Chai Ling, Director of All Girls Allowed, reports that in 2007 Hubei Province expelled 500 cadres and dismissed 395 government officials, including three provincial lawmakers and four members of the local Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, for having  ‘‘unauthorized’’ children.^[91] 

Nicholas Eberstadt, political economist at the American Enterprise Institute, relates a high-profile court proceeding that took place from February to April 2010 in Jiangsu Province. A 30-year-old female plaintiff sued the local Family Planning Bureau, claiming that she had been barred from a civil service position in the county government for giving birth to a child before marriage. Eberstadt writes, “Although she married the father soon after the child’s birth, the court ruled that the Family Planning Bureau’s original decree citing the birth as out of wedlock held, which did make her ineligible for the government position.”^[92]

One law in Guangdong Province gives the following orders to officials:  

Strictly prohibit out-of-plan second births or multiple births; those who have outof-plan pregnancies must adopt abortion measures, force those who exceed birth limits to have an abortion. Out-of-plan children will not be allowed to enjoy benefits for villagers; for a period of 15 years, parents of out-of-plan children will not be allowed to enjoy benefits for villagers, gain employment at a village-run enterprise, or be granted documents.^[93]

Some local governments offer rewards to informants who report out-of-plan pregnancies and other population planning violations. Vicky Jiang documents in a 2011 Annual Report to the U.S. Congress, “Officials mentioned rewards for informants in amounts ranging from 100 yuan (US$15) to 6,000 yuan (US$926) per case for verified information on violations by either citizens or officials, including concealment of out-ofplan births, false reports of medical procedures, and falsified family planning documents.”^[94]

Mosher shares an email correspondence from 2014, entitled, “Better to be a Criminal in China than a Pregnant Mother.” In summary, the correspondence gives five reasons why criminals in China have more rights than a mother who gives birth to an outof-plan child.^[95] First, there is the issue of finding work. Many businesses require applicants to submit a “Family Planning Certificate.” In contrast, many criminals can, at the least, apply for many jobs. Second, according to Article 37 in China’s Constitution, criminals cannot be tortured, detained without probably cause, have the legal right to sue, etc.^[96] In contrast, violators of family planning policy have no rights. They can be legally detained and are subject to forced abortion and sterilization and are unable to take legal action. Third, a suspect of a crime can only be arrested after certain authorities have issued a warrant, and the arrest has to be carried out by the Public Security Bureau. A violator of the One-Child Policy, however, faces recriminations from the Family Planning Bureau, which frequently operates outside the law by not allowing legal counsel and violating other civil liberties. Fourth, a criminal’s unborn child is protected. The administration of a sentence is frequently deferred until after the mother has given birth. In comparison, the unborn child of a family who has violated family planning policy must be terminated immediately. Finally, no matter where a criminal is detained, in a local jail or a state prison, they are permitted to communicate with their family. On the other hand, a pregnant woman and her family members can be held incommunicado for however long the Family Planning Bureau wishes to hold them.^[97]

In an op-ed for the New York Times, Ma Jian writes of her experience in southwest China in 2009:

Almost every one of the pregnant women I spoke to had suffered a mandatory abortion. One woman told me how, when she was eight months pregnant with an illegal second child and was unable to pay the 20,000 yuan fine (almost $3,200), family planning officers dragged her to the local clinic, bound her to a surgical table and injected a lethal drug into her abdomen. For two days she writhed on the table, her hands and feet still bound with rope, waiting for her body to eject the murdered baby. In the final stage of labor, a male doctor yanked the dead fetus out by the foot, then dropped it into a garbage can. She had no money for a cab. She had to hobble home, blood dripping down her legs and staining her white sandals red.^[98]

The consequences of such actions are not difficult to fathom. Ma Jian continues, “It is not surprising that China has the highest rate of female suicide in the world. The one-child policy has reduced women to numbers, objects, a means of production; it has denied them control of their bodies and the basic human right to determine freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children.”⁷²

In 2010, regulations requiring women who violate family-planning policy to terminate their pregnancies still existed in the provisions of the Population and Family Control Regulation of Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang provinces. An additional 10 provinces—Fujian, Guizhou, Guangdong, Gansu, Jiangxi, Qinghai, Sichuan, Shanxi, Shaanxi, and Yunnan—required unspecified “remedial measures” to deal with unauthorized pregnancies.^[99] In 2010, the abortion rate among women in China was 29.3 percent, which far exceeds the average level of other developed nations, and in the population of 20–29 year-old young women, the abortion rate was 62 percent.^[100]

In May of 2013, Zhang Ping was forced to the local Family Planning Office for a required abortion. Ping was already in her third trimester, but the local officials ignored a provincial ban on late-term forced abortions and proceeded with the abortion. Following the surgery, Ping experienced a hemorrhage and died early the next day.^[101] As more and more human rights groups across the globe became increasingly aware of the reality of coerced abortion in China the pressure upon the Family Planning Commission in Beijing grew tremendously.  

In response to the universal condemnation of forced abortion, the Chinese government began outlawing late-term forced abortion at the national and provincial levels. This action took place on July 19, 2012. In a speech to the Family Planning Commission’s semi annual meeting, Chairman Wang Xia instructed family planning officials to immediately halt late-term forced abortions and to “guide families to plan voluntarily.”^[102]

Social Compensation Fees

Couples who violated the One-Child Policy were subject to fines, known as “social compensation fees,” that often amounted to two to four times the local annual per capita income. These fees were the most common form of penalty for failure to abide by the policy. Depending on the province, the minimum fine nationwide was on average around the equivalent of a year’s income ($400).^[103] If a family’s income exceeded $400 the social compensation fee could be as much as 1.5 times the annual income.^[104]

            While these fines have provided a significant deterrent for the general working class populace, there is still a small segment of population that accumulated a great deal of wealth due to Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms in the 1980s, and have not been as drastically impacted by social compensation fees. The rich upper class and celebrities who have ignored the country’s family planning policy because of their wealth and have had more than one child will have to pay a heavy price, according to a senior official with the National Population and Family Planning Commission.^[105] Not only are they required

to pay exorbitant fines, but they are also named publicly. Known as the “Shame List,” the names of the cultural elite who have as many children as they would like are recorded in an official “bad credit” file and are disqualified for any honors from society. In addition, public disclosure of an individual’s family planning crimes results in a revocation of an individual’s right to be nominated as a deputy to the local people’s congress, political consultative conference or other significant posts.⁸⁰

For example, wealthy couples in East China’s Zhejiang Province who chose to ignore family planning policy by having two children faced fines of up to 1 million yuan ($129,000). In Shanghai, the minimum fine was 63,000 yuan ($10,200) and the maximum fine was 413,800 yuan ($67,000), which equaled 11.4 years of average urban annual income and 25.8 years of average rural annual income.⁸¹

Mosher provides a summary of family planning policy enforcement:

Home-wrecking, unlawful detention, heavily punitive fines, and like measures continue to be, as they have been from the late 1970s, the whip hand of the program. Women are psychologically and physically pressured to abort unauthorized children, to the point of being dragged to the abortion mill. Networks of paid informants are used to report on unauthorized pregnancies; entire villages are punished for out-of-plan births. Officials conduct nighttime

raids on couples suspected of having unauthorized children, and they keep

of being the latest high-profile violator of China’s one-child policy. The People’s Daily, the Communist Party mouthpiece, alleged that Mr. Zhang had fathered seven children with four different women. The truth is: for the rich, the law is a paper tiger, easily circumvented by paying a “social compensation fee”—a fine of 3 to 10 times a household’s annual income, set by each province’s family planning bureau, or by traveling to Hong Kong, Singapore or even America to give birth. The extremely affluent Zhang received an enormous “social support fee” of 7.48 million Yuan.  Faced with the options of asking for an administrative review, filing a lawsuit, or simply paying the fine, Zhang chose to accept the financial penalty. Authorities will deposit his money in the national treasury.”

• See “‘One-Child’ Policy Violators to Be Put on Shame List,” n.d., http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-03/02/content_817358.htm.
• “One?Child Policy Fines Relative to Income Levels in China, A Report by All Girls Allowed. November 1, 2012.” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/sites/default/files/One-

Child%20Policy%20Fines%20Relative%20to%20Income%20Levels%20in%20China%20%20A%20Report%20by%20All%20Girls%20Allowed.pdf.

detailed records on the sexual activity of every woman in their jurisdiction. There are prison cells—with bars—to detain those who resist forced abortion or sterilization. (Forced sterilization is used not only as a means of population control, but sometimes as punishment for men and women who disobey the rules.)^[106]

While all the consequences of contravening family planning laws have been dire, one of the greatest tragedies resulting from a long-term program of social engineering has been the rise of the suicide rate in China, particularly among females.

Suicide

In March 2013 in Henan Province, Yang Yuzhi, a mother of four, committed suicide by hanging herself inside a Family Planning Office after two failed forced sterilizations. Yang was forced to undergo an unsuccessful sterilization surgery in 1995 and again had to endure sterilization surgery in 2006. These two botched attempts resulted in intestinal infections requiring regular medication as well as chronic pain. It is estimated that in some rural provinces like Henan, suicide is the most common form of death for women ages fifteen to thirty-four.^[107]

All Girls Allowed reports that later in the same year Ai Guangdong ended his life in Hebei Province because he was unable to pay One-Child Policy fines. Ai, father of five, earned 5,000 yuan ($823) a year from growing corn. When Ai had his second daughter in 2003, the Family Planning Office charged him 7,000 yuan ($1,153) for violating the One-Child Policy. After his third child was born, the penalty soared to 60,000 yuan ($9,882), which he was unable to pay. Local officials confiscated 3.5 tons of corn from Ai before he finally committed suicide by drinking pesticide.^[108]

The Beijing Suicide Research and Prevention Center reported in 2009 that China not only had the highest rate of suicide among females in the world, but that the suicide rate for females was three times higher than for males.^[109] Suicide is the leading cause of death for adult women living in rural areas in China and a total of 56 percent of the world’s female suicides occur in China.^[110] The U.S. State Department reported in 2017 that five hundred women in China commit suicide every day.^[111] A major cause of the high rate is easy access to pesticides contributing to the prevalence of suicides among rural women.^[112] The U.S. Congressional-Executive Commission on China affirms that “violence against women and girls, discrimination in education and employment, the traditional preference for male children, birth-limitation policies, and other societal factors contribute to the high female suicide rate.”^[113] Steven Mosher agrees, “China’s women have the highest suicide rate in the world, not to mention the highest rates of breast cancer, all in consequence of having had their babies killed in utero by a state ruthlessly bent on population control.”^[114]

Current Status

In 2013, Simon Rabinovitch detailed events for the Financial Times from the annual session of the Chinese parliament:

The government merged the commission that enforces the one-child policy with the health ministry. Some analysts believe the move could presage a more rapid shift away from strictly enforced birth controls. “After the ministerial restructuring, the power of the family planning unit will be reduced,” said He Yafu, a Chinese demographer. “It won’t have the ability to design policies and it will have less say in the country’s population strategy.^[115]

After the supervision of family planning was given to the health ministry, Rabinovitch quoted Yang Yuxue, the deputy head of the Family Planning Unit, “The idea of easing the ageing problem by increasing the fertility rate is like drinking poison to quench thirst.”^[116]

Nevertheless, on October 29, 2015 the Fifth Plenum of the Central Committee held in Beijing announced that the thirty-five year policy allowing parents to have only one child was officially concluded and that families were now permitted to have two children.^[117] Claims regarding the reasoning for the change cited the escalating demographic crisis and the desire of China, led by President Xi Jinping, to “rebrand its human rights record.”^[118]

The Two-Child Policy led to unintended consequences. One example is China’s

labor market. In spite of regulations that prohibit gender discrimination and labor laws, over the past three years companies have been reluctant to hire young women because of their disinclination to finance multiple maternity leaves.^[119] A 2017 survey from Human Rights Watch found that 75 percent of companies had become reluctant to hire women in the wake of the Two-Child Policy.^[120]

Are Families Having More Children?

Despite the relaxation of family planning policy since the Two-Child Policy’s enactment, demographers have not been able to identify a meaningful increase in births. This reality defies reports from the state media describing a baby boom in Beijing with long lines reserving beds at hospitals and maternity wards booked months in advance.^[121] A justifiable conclusion is that although couples are allowed to have two children, they are still choosing to only have one child.^[122] There are several reasons for this development, but the simplest one is that a one-child family has become the social and economic norm. 

Author and journalist Howard W. French describes this reality: 

Demographers expect this reform to make little difference, though. In China, as around the world, various forces, including increasing wages and rising female workforce participation, have, over several decades, left women disinclined to have large families. Indeed, China’s fertility rate began declining well before the coercive one-child restrictions were introduced in 1978. By hastening and amplifying the effects of this decline, the one-child policy is likely to go down as one of history’s great blunders. Single-child households are now the norm in China, and few parents, particularly in urban areas, believe they can afford a second child.^[123]

Stuart Gietel-Basten, Associate Professor of Social Policy at the University of Oxford, argues changes in family planning policy will not affect China’s population in any meaningful way, stating, “In fact the change is really a very pragmatic response to an unpopular policy that no longer made any sense.”^[124] A 2013 article in the Wall Street Journal by Chao Deng addresses the economic factors relating to the relaxed policy by suggesting that while a shift in policy could help address the future decrease in work force, a change in policy would not significantly address the expenses of raising an additional child.^[125] Simon Denyer and Congcong Zhang of The Washington Post concur, “Indeed, when the one-child policy was first relaxed in 2013, allowing parents who grew up as only children to have a second child, just 18 percent of the 11 million eligible couples applied to do so, Wang [Feng] said, a response he called ‘lukewarm.’”^[126] The implementation of the Two-Child Policy saw an 11.5 percent increase of births over the previous year, but the following year the number of births decreased 3.5 percent.^[127] While 45 percent of births were in families with one child already the increase of 1.31 million infants in 2016 fell far below the official projection of an added 3 million births annually over the next five years.^[128]

A survey on Sina Weibo showed 37 percent of respondents would opt out of having a second child.^[129] Reasons given were the high costs of a semester of kindergarten (10,000 yuan), prenatal care, further education costs, housing, food, and even skepticism regarding the domestic production of dairy products harkening back to a 2008 scandal.^[130]

Starr elaborates on this reluctance:

Urban couples are generally better educated, and worldwide there is a correlation between the level of education (particularly that of women) and the decision to limit births…. In most cases both urban parents work outside the house, and, because childbearing disrupts the woman’s career, it is more likely to be delayed and limited.^[131] 

The predicament facing the Chinese government is that it could find that it is simpler to persuade the population to have fewer children than to increase their family size.^[132]

An article by Tabitha Speelman in the Wall Street Journal chronicles the impasse surrounding this issue. Speelman quotes Tan Yudan, “It

[new family planning policy]

does open up a legal pathway to a second child, but if I want to have two kids, I can only marry a man who is a single child, or someone belonging to a minority. This limits my dating options by more than 50%.”^[133] Tan, who recently earned a Beijing hukou,^[134] continues:

I should not have to worry whether or not the person is a single child. Instead, I would rather focus on how happy we could be in marriage. What if I had a boyfriend with siblings right now? Would I break up with him? Luckily, I am single, so I have the chance to consider looking for someone suitable. But that also means that, without even considering a potential’s boyfriend character, talent, economic situation or looks, my pool of potential partners greatly decreases.^[135]

These are a few of the reasons many couples are saying “No” to a second child. A survey by the Ministry of Health and Family Planning cited by Chinese state news media Xinhua states that 15 to 20 million people are eligible to get another birth permit, but only half of them are actually willing to have two children.^[136]

In August 2018 The People’s Daily urged families to give birth to children and warned of the impact of a low birth rate on the nation. Zhang Yiqi, the author of the oped, counseled the government to provide support for families who sought to have multiple children and the release of a new official postage stamp commemorating the Year of the Pig featuring multiple children hints that a complete repeal of the long standing population policy could be forthcoming. Yi Fuxian, a scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, comments, “The issuance of the pig family stamp, while subtle, is a clear sign that they are going to abandon all birth restrictions.”^[137] Other sources report that “proposals under discussion would replace the population-control policy with one called ‘independent fertility,’ allowing people to decide how many children to have….

The decision could be made as soon as the fourth quarter.”^[138]

Denyer and Zhang report on efforts by the Chinese government to encourage increased fertility, 

Provinces all across China have offered women longer maternity leave, often adding several months to the old standard 98 days. In villages, new slogans are being dreamed up by party committees and draped across buildings and walls. “Train your body, build up strength, get ready for the second baby!” one slogan said, according to reports in an online forum. “Get to sleep early, stop playing cards, work hard to produce a child!” exhorted another. “No fines, no arrests. Go ahead and have a second child if you want one!”^[139]

Denyer and Zhang conclude by summarizing the feelings of many urban residents, 

Xi Wei, father of a 9-year-old boy, said that he and his wife won’t be trying for another child. Their son does extra classes after school and all day on Saturday, and parents and child all feel exhausted by the social pressure for him not to “fall behind.” As only children themselves, Xi and his wife also don’t think there is anything wrong with growing up alone. “After all these years, everybody is inclined to just have one child. Everybody’s used to it,” he said. “How can you have a second child when the whole society has hostile and incompatible resources towards it?”^[140]

Longer maternity leaves, new party slogans, and various economic incentives have not proven to this point to be motivation enough to create the rise in childbirths that the Chinese government desires. 

Planned Birth Laws

While the Two-Child Policy has been in existence for three years, and there are rumors of further changes to family planning policy in the future, the practice of forced abortion still existed in 2018.^[141] Families with two children were still prohibited from having  another child, and cohabitating couples that became pregnant were counted as out-ofquota, according to a report from Population Research Institute.^[142] If these unwed couples married within sixty days after the infant’s birth, they were granted an exception.^[143]        In specified provinces, the Two-Child Policy was being enforced as rigorously as the One-Child Policy. In Henan, Article Twenty-Five of the Planned Birth regulations

states, 

Any person who engages in one of the following behaviors must, under the direction of Planned Birth technical service cadres, be given remedial measures to terminate their pregnancies: Those who are pregnant and not married; Those who have already given birth to one child and become pregnant again without a birth permit; Those who use illicit means to obtain a birth permit and become pregnant.^[144]

Article Forty-Three of the Guizhou Planned Birth regulations suggests eugenics, “If either husband or wife suffers from a serious congenital defect, etc., and is, in the opinion of medical science, unfit to reproduce, they must undergo sterilization; if already pregnant, she must terminate the pregnancy in timely fashion.”^[145] Comparable regulations were also found in Hainan, Jiangxi and Fujian provinces. In addition, private companies were terminating employees in 2018 for violating the Two-Child Policy, and in Hubei, were required to “cooperate with forcing migrant workers to have abortions.”^[146]

Birth Control

Following the 1982 census there was a strong indication of an enormous pool of women in their childbearing years.^[147] Consequently, Chinese fertility policy was redirected toward limiting fertility as a significant aspect of Deng Xiaoping’s reforms.^[148] China developed its own version of the contraceptive pill and significantly expanded the  national distribution and propaganda network devoted to promoting birth control.^[149]

Mosher comments,

Communist propaganda displayed along busy streets and other public places made the cost of noncompliance clear. One such sign, strung high over a busy street, read: “If you are supposed to wear an IUD but don’t, or are supposed to have your tubes tied but don’t, you will be arrested on sight!” In some cases, women who failed to report for a pregnancy screening had their homes destroyed by rampaging Planned Birth police.^[150]

Even the vaginas of rural women were routinely checked to ensure that there was no recent birth.^[151] A director of a village family planning center in Guangdong Province gave other examples of invasive enforcement to journalist Ma Jian.^[152] A record book was presented to Jian that meticulously charted the menstrual cycles and pelvic examination results of every woman of childbearing age in the village. The director of the planning center said that 98 percent of the 280 women were fitted with IUDs, and that every three months he broadcasted an announcement through the village summoning every woman for a mandatory ultrasound to check that her IUD was still in place.^[153] If a woman refused to appear for her inspection, she was subject to heavy fines or even sterilization if she refused to appear for over six months.^[154]

In 2017 the central government began a campaign to remove previously inserted

IUDs for all women who were eligible to have another child.^[155] The new policy was  received with a lukewarm response. This reaction was perhaps precipitated by the government’s continued silence on coercive procedures. As Abbamonte and Mosher report, “Documentary film-maker Ai Xiaoming, now 63, said she was forced to have an IUD fitted, but then left with it for decades with no further check-ups…. It hasn’t helped that the Chinese government has never apologized for the way it has brutalized women.

Nor has it ever, not even now, offered to compensate women forced to use the device.”^[156] The New York Times records Han Haoyue, a columnist on Weibo, as writing, “To say they are offering free removal as a service to these tens of millions of women— repeatedly broadcasting this on state television as a kind of state benefit—they have no shame, second to none.”^[157]  

            Unfortunately, for many of the women who were forcibly inserted with the IUDs this change of policy comes too late—they are well past fecundity. Because of their age these women are not eligible for IUD removal. If they desire their intrauterine device removed they are made to pay out of pocket.^[158] 

Gendercide

A major factor in the practice of gendercide in China was the development of reproductive technologies—specifically ultrasound. For a time the practice of a pre-natal sonogram was used to identify sex. Consequently, when a girl was identified many  women chose to have an abortion. As a result, the Family Planning Council outlawed the use of ultrasounds in 2000 for determining gender in an attempt to curb this practice.^[159] However, the use of illegal equipment remained prevalent in determining sex, and in other cases midwives were reported as terminating female infants by strangling them with their mothers’ umbilical cord as they were delivered.^[160] It was estimated in 2000 that more than half of all the abortions in China were due to the practice of prenatal sex selection.^[161]

            Avraham Ebenstein writes, “Parents under tighter fertility control are characterized by lower fertility and higher sex ratios among births, indicating that parents are engaging in sex selection to satisfy their dual interest in complying with the fertility policy and having at least one son.”^[162] Ebenstein reports on the total of 37 million girls that have disappeared in China since 1980 and observes, “Prenatal selection and infanticide can account for a female deficit of roughly 9.3 million missing girls in China’s 2000 census.”^[163] Many of these girls who went unreported at birth due to local birth quotas were later reported sometime between the ages of ten and twenty.^[164] The exact number is unknown, but the majority remains unregistered and unable to benefit from household registration laws enacted in 1958.^[165]

All Girls Allowed reflects on the account of Xiao Mei, a victim of the burgeoning sex trafficking industry:

Because she was a girl, her family mistreated and even tortured her. Her mother and grandmother tried to kill her by putting her in boiling water. She survived, but still bears the physical burns on her body–and the emotional burns of being told that she’d never be good for anything but a prostitute. All this merely because she was a girl. We heard multiple stories about village elders encouraging parents to send their daughters to the city to work, with the naive (and sometimes not) assumption that the girls would make money for their family.^[166]

There are approximately 4 to 6 million sex workers in China, and trafficked brides can be bought for as little as $460 in certain places.^[167] The U.S. Department of State’s 2013 Trafficking in Persons Report describes Chinese criminal syndicates and local gangs active in the trafficking of girls throughout the nation.^[168] The report cites China’s birth limitation policy and a cultural preference for sons as the underlying cause of prevalent sexual exploitation of females. The Department of State details one example in July 2012 where eight girls under the age of 14 were kidnapped and forced into prostitution. Each of the five people arrested for the crime of commercial sexual exploitation were local government officials and businessmen.^[169]

Gender Imbalance

Another consequence of China’s family planning policy is the growing gender imbalance. China’s National Bureau of Statistics predicts that by 2020 China will be home to 40 million more men than women under the age of 20.^[170][171] Decades of gendercide have resulted in a surplus of males who are now struggling to find wives. Increased prostitution, trafficking, and violent crime are just some of the outcomes of this substantial bachelor population.^[172]

            Andrea dan Boer and Valerie M. Hudson elaborate further in The Washington Post:

A surplus of 40–50 million bachelors throughout the mid to late 21st century will have a significant effect on China’s stability and development as a nation: Male criminal behavior drops significantly upon marriage, and the presence of significant numbers of unmarriageable men is potentially destabilizing to societies. In the case of China, the fact that a sizeable percentage of young adult males will not be making that transition will have negative social repercussions, including increased crime, violent crime, crimes against women, vice, substance abuse and the formation of gangs that are involved in all of these antisocial behaviors.^[173]

It is evident that China is dealing with a considerable demographic crisis. A China

Family Development report estimates that by 2040 the total number of Chinese families will increase to 500 million.^[174] Some demographers suggest that it is already too late to reverse China’s demographics.^[175] The Washington Post reports, “Even if sex ratios were rectified today, young adult sex ratios in China will result in a significant gender imbalance in the adult population for the next 30 years.”^[176]

Eberstadt cites projections that by 2030 more than a quarter of Chinese men in their 30s will not have married.^[177] This particular demographic of men has a moniker, shengnan, which means, “leftover men.”^[178] In 2015, a Chinese businessman in his 40s reportedly sued a Shanghai-based introductions agency for failing to find him a wife, having paid the company 7 million yuan ($1 million) to conduct an extensive search.^[179] In 2014, a computer programmer from the southern city of Guangzhou attempted to propose to his girlfriend and purchased ninety-nine iPhones, the equivalent of two years’ salary, as part of an elaborate proposal. He was turned down in front of friends and colleagues and photos of the event were quickly shared through social media.^[180]  Problematic sex ratios have also resulted in the creation of outdoor marriage markets. At one of China’s largest markets in Shanghai the “matchmaking corner” is populated by parents who post hand-written advertisements for their single children. Some parents have been known to visit the market every week for years with no success.^[181]

Additionally, New York Times columnist, Nicholas Kristof, reports that there are disturbing market responses to the shortage of brides: life-size, anatomically correct “female dummies,” selling for at least $5,000. He asks, “If China is running out of women, why not make fake women?” Mei Fong, Kristof’s co-author, explains. Fong interviews a manufacturer who experimented with skin substitutes (silicone and rubber), hair (synthetic and human), and breast size (C to EE). “They really are designed to take the place of real women,” says Vincent He, and he’s proud of their resilience. “The nipples—they are very tough,” says He, tugging at one to demonstrate to Fong. “Normal ones could never withstand such treatment.”^[182]

Family Size and Characteristics

China’s Ministry of Health and Family Planning reported in 2014 that China’s 430 million families were shrinking and aging.^[183] Since the 1950s the size of Chinese families has decreased from 5.3 to 3.02 people per family. Chai Ling notes, “While the decrease

in family size has been gradual over the past few years, China’s families steadily continue to shrink. From 2010 to 2012, family size fell from 3.10 to 3.02.”^[184]

            Another significant finding of the family planning report was the ever-increasing age of China’s families. The typical Chinese family is now commonly comprised of four grandparents, two parents, and one child. “160 million of China’s 430 million families now have this ‘4–2–1’ makeup,” according toLing. China currently has over 180 million people over the age of 60—a figure that authorities expect to grow to 330 million by 2050.^[185] The large aging population has become a burden for Chinese society because there is a significant shortage of young people that are able to provide for the older generation. The Ministry of Health’s report found that 90 percent of China’s elderly live at home rather than in assisted living facilities.^[186] Ling confirms, “Another survey found that 37.5 million of China’s elderly were unable to care for themselves in 2013.”^[187]  Concerning this demographic catastrophe, Feng Wang describes the rapid aging shift for the China Economic Quarterly,

China’s aging process is happening far more quickly than in most other countries, largely thanks to the speed of its demographic transition from high death and birth rates to low death and birth rates. It took China only 50 years to increase life expectancy from 40 to 70 years, compared to 100 years in Western industrialized countries. China reduced its fertility level from five to two children per couple in just 25 years, just one-third of the time taken in the West. The impact on China’s future age structure is clear: it will take less than 30 years for the share of the population aged over 65 to rise from the current 9% to 25%. In other aging countries like Italy, Germany, and Russia, it will take the best part of a century.^[188]

In addition, Boer and Hudson from The Washington Post report,

China is different from the other aging countries of the world in that a) it is not yet fully developed, b) most of its population is still poor, and c) it has the highest sex ratio in the world. By 2055, China’s elderly population will exceed the elderly population of all of North America, Europe and Japan combined, and this is exacerbated by the now declining working-age population. China’s impressive economic growth has been facilitated by its expanding working-age population: The population ages 15–64 increased by 55 percent between 1980 and 2005, but this age cohort is now in decline due to the declining fertility rate. In 2012, the working age population declined by 3.5 million and is expected to continue to decline unless there is a dramatic shift in China’s fertility rate.^[189]

Howard French, Professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, details the consequences of a dramatic and rapid workforce decline:

China today boasts roughly five workers for every retiree. By 2040, this highly desirable ratio will have collapsed to about 1.6 to 1. From the start of this century to its midway point, the median age in China will go from under 30 to about 46, making China one of the older societies in the world. At the same time, the number of Chinese older than 65 is expected to rise from roughly 100 million in 2005 to more than 329 million in 2050—more than the combined populations of Germany, Japan, France, and Britain.¹⁶⁵

The subsequent issues of pension coverage, health care, and the absence of personal savings, particularly in rural settings are particularly concerning to a nation once predicted to overtake the United State’s economy. French concludes, “The consequences for China’s finances are profound. With more people now exiting the workforce than entering it, many Chinese economists say that demographics are already becoming a drag on growth.”^[190]

Hidden Children

Chinese children conceived and born in violation of the One-Child policy are known as “hidden children”—those who are outside the boundaries of Chinese society.^[191] While an exact number is unknown, estimates run into the tens of millions.^[192] Mosher writes, “Unlike illegal immigrants in the United States, who are generally treated with some compassion, these children have no rights. Anyone and everyone can mistreat them, and they are totally without recourse.”^[193]

Celia Hatton, a journalist for the BBC, chronicles the stories of hidden children who are denied an identity under the One-Child policy.¹⁷⁰ In an article published in

January 2014, she describes the life of Zhang Rundong, a three-year old boy living in

Shandong Province. An important detail that separates Zhang from other boys his age, Hatton suggests, is that he does not exist. “Because Zhang Rundong is the second child born to his parents,” Hatton writes, “Chinese Family Planning Officials deemed him

‘over-quota’ and subsequently denied him the right to a legal identity. As punishment for having a second child, the Chinese government withheld Rundong’s identity papers from his parents, his key to medical care, education, travel, and even access to public libraries.”^[194]

            In Kay Ann Johnson’s China’s Hidden Children, she shares the story of Li Rong and Wang Aiying, a couple who lost their fifteen year old son in a drowning accident. One day shortly after the incident Li walked by a junkyard where he heard the sound of an infant crying. Johnson recounts,

Investigating, he found a newborn girl, barely alive and apparently left to die. Li scooped the baby up and ran home with her, fearing she would die in his arms, and then he and his wife warmed her up and fed her with powdered milk. They took turns staying awake around the clock for days to keep her alive. Li and Wang used all their savings to pay medical bills, and to try to cajole the authorities to give her an urban registration, a hukou necessary for attending school. Officials resisted giving the hukou, angering Li, who noted that he and his wife had saved the authorities the cost of raising the child. “Perhaps the government would have  preferred she had died in the garbage dump,” he said.^[195]

Hatton also relates the story of Li Xue, a twenty year old growing up in Beijing: Li is the second in her family, born outside the One-Child Policy.^[196] She has lived her whole life without the identification that would allow her to access government services. “I couldn’t get regular health checks as a baby, and I wasn’t able to receive any kind of basic vaccines,” Li said. “I couldn’t go to school to receive the compulsory nine-year education. Now, I don’t even have an identity file. I haven’t received any education, and no work place would accept me. Everyone needs to provide an identity card to take a train anywhere and to see a doctor. Right after I was born, my father went to the local police station to get my registration. My father visited several government departments with me in his arms, and tried to bring the case to court. I grew up little by little during this process, and reached school age.”^[197] In an almost unheard of action, Li and her family sued the local police station for dereliction of duty.¹⁷⁵

In 2013, a sixteen-year-old girl in a similar situation drank pesticide in an attempt to end her life after she learned that she could not attend college.^[198] Cai Yanqiong lived in Sichuan Province and was informed that her lack of government registration barred her  from taking China’s college entrance exam. “Cai, who has one older brother, was raised by a single father who came under the jurisdiction of the One-Child Policy,” Chai Ling reports. Ling adds, “In Sichuan, fines for violating the policy range from $4,200 to $31,400 while the average annual urban income is $2,919. Because her father could not afford the fine, Ms. Cai never received a hukou, the government registration needed for access to medical care, public transportation and education.”^[199] Cai tried to attend different area schools throughout her elementary years, but was unable to even procure school lunches without a hukou.^[200] Meanwhile, in Cai’s hometown of Chishui, Family Planning Officials denied her father’s requests for the fines to be waived. “Cai resorted to making up her own government identification number using her birth date,” Ling records.

“She also wrote a note that read, “Dear brother, Dad, Mom, Grandma and Grandpa …. I’m so sorry to all of you. I have a lot to say to you all at this moment, but time won’t wait for me. I’m standing at the track of my memory, seeing my memories as pictures passing in front of me.”^[201]

China’s 2010 census estimated 13 million people existed without official documentation—a population almost the size of Ontario.^[202] John Bryan Starr comments on the practice of giving birth in secret and the subsequent population discrepancy:

Once a female child is born, the simplest method to avoid having her count against the family’s quota of children is not to record her birth. The gradual relaxation of social control associated with the reforms and the possibility of going away from home to give birth have made it easier to conceal births from those charged with limiting their number. The widespread incidence of this practice was revealed in the 1990 census…. The census showed the Chinese population to stand at 1.13 billion, a figure that exceeded projections by some 13 million. [Most of this discrepancy] was due to the number of female children whose births had gone unrecorded.^[203]

Steven Mosher relates the account of Li Aihai, who conceived too quickly after having her first child, a daughter. After Li fled her hometown to escape the draconian measures of the local Family Planning Office, she safely delivered her son in a neighboring county. Upon her return, Li discovered that local officials were furious and that she had a monumental task ahead of her to “regularize her son’s status.” Li’s son “was currently a black child,” family-planning officials explained to her.^[204] Mosher summarizes the officials’ communication to Li concerning her son:

Because he was conceived outside of the family-planning law, he did not exist in the eyes of the state. As a non-person, he would be turned away from the government clinic if he fell ill, barred from attending a government school of any kind, and not considered for any kind of government employment later in life. He would not even be allowed to marry or start a family of his own. The government had decreed that ‘black children’ would not be allowed to reproduce; one generation of illegals was enough.^[205]

The officials informed Li, however, that if she paid a fine of 17,000 yuan ($2,000), her son would be granted a national identity number, and would receive fair treatment. However, he would still be required to pay double fees for his school supplies.¹⁸⁴

The Consequences of Long Term Social Engineering 

On March 14, 2017 the Chinese Health Ministry reported the following statistics for its family planning practices since 1971:

• 336 million abortions performed;
• 196 million sterilizations conducted;
• 403 million intrauterine devices inserted.^[206]

These numbers equate to seven million abortions, two million sterilizations and seven million intrauterine devices inserted every year.^[207] Scholar and author, He Yafu, reports that dating back to 1980 fines levied for violation of the One-Child Policy have provided the government with an estimated two trillion yuan in revenue.^[208]

China has developed into a global superpower fulfilling Mao’s ambition that the world would take China seriously. Particularly under the leadership of President Xi Jinping, China has made enormous strides in the areas of finance, infrastructure, political alliances, and defense.^[209] Despite the current economic boom, however, there are already signs that a crisis is imminent. China is in the midst of a transition from a plentiful workforce, which is relatively young, to a diminished workforce with a population that is past its prime.^[210]  

While the effects of a thirty-five year family planning policy are substantial, it is accurate to note that family planning is not the only reason for fertility decline. China’s National Population and Birth Planning Commission conducted an internal study that claimed the One-Child Policy had prevented 400 million births by 2005, which directly contributed to global well being including the reduction of 1.3 billion tons of carbon emissions in China. Whyte, Feng and Cai argue that the claim has at least three serious flaws,

First, the number is based on a ‘what if’ scenario that is completely unrealistic….By predicting a birth rate that is unrealistically high—17 per cent higher than the average of the comparison group as of 1990, 29 per cent higher in 1998, and as much as 45 per cent higher in 2005—the estimate of total births prevented is clearly a wild exaggeration….Second, the major part of the fertility decline occurred in the 1970s, prior to the one-child policy. Third, this claim totally ignores the most significant source of fertility decline worldwide:

economic development.^[211]

An interview with Norman Cheng serves to comment further on the consequences and effects of long-term social engineering. Cheng is a Professor of Demographics at a leading university in China. The author of this study interviewed Cheng on a range of topics including the current sex rate at birth ratio (SRB), fertility rates, and sociologist

Rodney Stark’s claims regarding population replacement.^[212]

Regarding SRB, Cheng references an April 2009 study by the British Medical Journal,which found that China has 32 million more boys than girls under the age of twenty.^[213] While the average worldwide ratio of male to female newborns is 105:100, statistics show that the peak ratio in the People’s Republic of China was 120:100 in 2008.

It is estimated that in some provinces the number is even higher, reaching 130:100.

Cheng argues that the strict birth control policies of the One-Child and currently TwoChild Policy are to blame. The evidence is that there is no other nation in the world with a higher SRB than China.^[214] Cheng does not believe that the Two-Child Policy will effectively mediate the gender imbalance, as nations with a high SRB such as Taiwan and South Korea have not implemented any kind of family planning program. The gender imbalance, according to Cheng, can only be affected through a seismic shift in culture including gender equality.

Cheng also comments on the efficacy of the 2015 shift to a Two-Child Policy regarding the population replacement rate and points to one of the One-Child Policy exceptions as evidence that there will not be a significant shift in births. The government, according to Cheng, was fearful that more parents would take advantage of being allowed to have two children (as couples from one child families had been able to do since 2013). In fact, the reality was just the opposite. While the expected number of births was 11 million the actual result was a mere 1.5 million children after a year and a half. Cheng concludes that this does not mean the Chinese do not desire more children. Instead, he claims that the high pressure and stress facing young modern families, and the fact that there are no public policies for helping to alleviate these stressors, is to blame. Cheng references a “birth desire survey,” which shows that among eligible couples 50.4 percent have the desire to have a second child, 32.4 percent did not want to have a second child, and 17.2 percent were undecided. In addition, Cheng’s research suggests that the move to the Two-Child Policy came “at least two years too late.”

He argues that based on the 2010 census the number of childbearing women at ages 30–34, 35–39, 40–44, and 45–49 were 47.64, 57.63, 61.15, and 51.82 million,

respectively. When the Two-Child Policy went into effect five years after the 2010

so, including India and South Korea, but they were not able to maintain population control to such an extend as China has been able to maintain.

census women in the 45–49 demographic entirely lost their fecundity and women in the 40–44 demographic were extremely close to losing their fecundity.^[215] The total number of women who lost their fecundity during those five years totaled more than 110 million. Even though women in the 30–39 demographic still had the ability to have a second child they fell into the category of high-risk delivery. This meant that the two-year delay of implementing the Two-Child Policy affected over one hundred million families with serious consequences for society. Another outcome of long-term social engineering mentioned by Cheng is the sizeable presence of shidu in China. Journalist Fan Liya explains,

Meaning “lose only,” shidu is a term that has been used by the media since 2010 to refer to parents who have lost their only child and are no longer able to have another. According to a 2013 report by the China National Committee on Ageing, a government branch overseeing the country’s increasingly grey society, there are at least one million shidu parents in China, and the number is increasing by 76,000 a year.^[216]

“It’s definitely becoming a very serious social problem,” notes Cheng, although he does not believe a government subsidy is much of a solution. “Although the government has some policies in place, in practice, assistance remains very poor,” he states.^[217] The government did not anticipate all of the possible consequences of a strict family planning policy from the beginning and Cheng believes that today “psychological trauma and issues associated with aging” are more urgent difficulties than poverty for shidu parents.  “It’s a feature of Chinese society that once two elderly women meet, they will talk about  their children,” Cheng explains. “For shidu parents, that’s another bitter conversation.”

Conclusion

While the One-Child Policy officially came to an end after thirty-five years (1980–2015), its repercussions continue to be felt. Even with modified family planning policies, the severity of enforcement is unchanged in many instances, as local family planning offices have gradually and reluctantly adopted revised regulations. Officials, who previously received “compensation” from out-of-quota births have been forced to seek supplements to their meager income from a smaller pool of potential violators.^[218]

            Although the government might have intended enforced family planning to last one generation in order to combat the potentiality of a surging population, the societal impact and loss of life has been monumental. An aging population, a substantial decrease of numbers in the work force, a significantly distorted sex ratio at birth, and continuing  fertility decline point to an alarming demographic trajectory for the People’s Republic of

China. 

CHAPTER THREE

ANALYSIS OF RESPONSES TO ABORTION AND GENDERCIDE PRACTICES IN

THE EARLY CHURCH AND THE CONSEQUENT GROWTH OF THE EARLY

CHURCH

Edward Gibbon, in the eighteenth century, and Adolf Harnack, in the early twentieth century each authored an influential scholarly work addressing the growth of early Christianity.^[219] Subsequent studies have explored and developed the same theses proposed by these two historians in different forms, but have not added anything particularly new to the discussion.^[220] In fact, New Testament scholar and historian at the University of Edinburgh Larry Hurtado argues that many of the supposedly distinctive factors of growth had parallels in pagan society and were not unique to Christianity at all.^[221] The cost of conversion was high and largely prohibitive. 

Hurtado presented a lecture in 2016 at the University of Marquette entitled, “Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?” in which he argues that the social and political costs to individuals for converting to Christianity were overwhelming. Politically, leaders of the Christian movement were targeted from the beginning, and this eventually trickled down to lay believers as well. A simple accusation of being a Christian introduced the dangerous possibility of being brought before a

Roman magistrate.⁴

Regarding communal consequences, Hurtado emphasizes the cost of conversion upon relationships, both familial and social. Humiliation, social ostracism, and slander from neighbors, business associates, and family members were all real possibilities for Christians in the Greco-Roman world. It was not uncommon for the cultured elites to treat believers with disdain and attack Christians as intellectually inferior.⁵ If Hurtado’s claims are accurate, then what factors contributed to such a rapid increase of Christianity

the claim that Christianity was attractive because it “offered close relationships in which adherents formed a fictive family of brothers and sisters.”  Hurtado agrees that Christian community did indeed foster close relationships, but that this kind of brotherhood was hardly unique to Christianity. Other voluntary associations of the time used similar familial language and offered meaningful relationships to adherents. In the case of care of widows and orphans, Hurtado simply makes the point that this was only beneficial to widows and orphans. It would have been hardly an attraction to those who were well off or at least able to take care of themselves. And again, this kind of care had some, albeit limited, parallels in other groups during the first three centuries. “Status consistency” refers to people who were unable to climb the social ladder because of their birth or rank. Hurtado poses the question, “Why would such people . . . find it attractive to commit to small, insignificant circles of people of varied social status, whose religious identity marked them in the eyes of the larger society as suspicious, strange, even contemptible?” Even if a person was able to become part of that group, how would that identity lead to greater social acceptance? Larry W. Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries? (Milwaukee: Market University Press, 2016) 110–113.

• Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?, 110.
• Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?, 112.

over the first three centuries?^[222] While there is no single answer to this question—a whole series of factors have been demonstrated as crucial—it is perhaps surprising to find one significant explanation relating to a prenatal and postnatal ethic of human life.

Rodney Stark, in The Rise of Christianity, makes the novel claim that it is quite reasonable to assume that a “nontrivial” portion of Christian growth was due to superior fertility among Christians.^[223] Both the Early Church and historical scholars have found this superior fertility directly connected to a Christian ethic of human life and family.

In 59 B.C. Julius Caesar approved legislation that granted land to fathers of three or more children. Three decades later Augustus enabled laws that gave political preference to fathers of three or more children and imposed sanctions upon childless couples. Many emperors continued these policies through the years. However, as Stark records, they were unsuccessful at promoting fertility in first century Rome.^[224] Arthur E.

Boak reports “[policies with] the aim of encouraging families to rear at least three children were pathetically impotent.”^[225] Stark confirms Roman Senator and historian Tacitus as affirming that childlessness prevailed throughout the Roman Empire.^[226] Not  only was there general childlessness, but there was also a decrease in overall population.^[227]

While it is true that the plagues of the first few centuries after Christ played a significant role in the decline of the Roman Empire’s population, Stark finds the low fertility rate of Romans more significant because of the current below replacement levels in the cases of China, Japan, Korea, Singapore and other Asian nations. Even during periods with no plague or famine in the Roman Empire, the population was not replacing itself. Stark gives the reasons for a stagnating population, “The primary reason for low Roman fertility was that men did not want the burden of families and acted accordingly: many avoided fertility by having sex with prostitutes rather than with their wives, or by engaging in anal intercourse.”^[228] The pagan ethic of human life and family was such that the Roman Empire could no longer sustain itself. Bioethicist Mark J. Cherry comments on this ethic that flourished in the Roman Empire:

Thereby severed from any transcendent account of moral truth, human flourishing is not to be found in submitting to God or living within a richly textured traditional religious culture; cardinal moral value is instead assigned to individual liberty conceptualized as autonomous self-determination. Persons as secular moral beings are to free themselves from the supposedly irrational superstitions of traditional religion, choosing instead to be autonomous and self-determining individuals, who shape their moral values and perceptions of the good life for themselves.^[229]

Joe Carter, an editor for The Gospel Coalition, has written a helpful article on fertility rates. Carter notes that demographers use the word “fertility” to refer to the output of reproduction.^[230] While there are several different measures for fertility rate the one most useful for this study is the total fertility rate (TFR). The TFR measures the total number of children who have been born or who are likely to be born in a woman’s lifetime.^[231]

            Carter states that the TFR is a key factor in the growth of a population, all other factors being equal.^[232] Demographers today agree that a TFR of 2.1 is necessary to ensure a broadly stable population.^[233] “The TFR is also known as the replacement rate,” Carter writes, “Since the total number of children replaces both the mother and the father and accounts for the number of children who won’t live to childbearing age.”^[234] Carter ultimately warns against the negative consequences in a given population of a declining

TFR: “This would lead to economic stagnation and hardship for those who remain in those areas. These factors could lead to a spiral of instability that can have a spiritual effect on communities that last for generations.”^[235]

            Rodney Stark’s research on TFR in the Greco-Roman world demonstrates a

startling correlation between sex ratios and fertility for Christian communities: 

If women made up 43 percent of the pagan population of Rome (assuming a ratio of 131 males to 100 females), and if each bore four children, that would be 172 infants per 100 pagans, making no allowance for exposure or infant mortality. But if women made up, say, 55 percent of the Christian population (which may well be low), that would be 220 infants per 100 Christians—a difference of 48 infants. Such differences would have resulted in substantial annual increases in the proportion of the population who were Christians, even if everything else were equal.^[236]

The Roman Empire recognized its own demographic calamity as evidenced by the attempts of the cultured elite to legislate larger families. Still, low fertility could not be halted through legislation alone. If there was to be significant change the Roman world required a significant shift regarding its pagan views on human life and family, specifically the practices of infanticide and abortion.

Infanticide and Abortion in the Greco-Roman World

Stark’s research on infanticide in the early Greco-Roman world provides a starting point for this study. He notes, “Even when Greco-Roman men did marry, they usually produced very small families—not even legal sanctions and inducements could achieve the goal of an average of three children per family. One reason for this was infanticide— far more babies were born than were allowed to live.”^[237] This practice was reflected in the writings of ancient historians. Tacitus argued that the Jewish admonition that it is a sin to kill an unwanted child was yet another one of their sinister and revolting practices.^[238] Seneca agreed and suggested that the drowning of children at birth was not only a common practice, but also a practical one.^[239] 

While acknowledging the prevalent practice of infanticide in the Greco-Roman world, William V. Harris remains skeptical on this point, however, concerning Seneca’s reported method of termination. Harris writes, “As to the treatment of handicapped infants in imperial times, it may be doubted on practical grounds that they were usually drowned. In all likelihood most of them were promptly eliminated by the midwife.”^[240] Whether or not Harris is correct in his assessment, the point remains that the practice of infanticide was widespread in the first three centuries of the Early Church.^[241]

Infanticide as Infant Exposure

Harris has written extensively on the practice of infanticide, or what is termed infant or child exposure in the Greco-Roman world, and he notes that this practice proportionally affected female infants with much more frequency than their male counterparts.^[242][243] “We have extremely strong reasons for supposing that the exposure of infants,” Harris notes,

“very often resulting in death, was common in many different parts of the Roman Empire, and that it had considerable demographic, economic and psychological effects.”^[244] The inclination to expose unwanted female infants, in particular, has been almost universally acknowledged by historians of the Roman Empire. Thomas Africa records that even in comparatively large Roman families more than one daughter was rarely ever reared.^[245] Andrew Lintott documents a series of inscriptions in a study found in his seminal Violence in Republican Rome that reconstructs six hundred Roman families, and concludes that only six of these families raised more than one daughter.^[246] The ubiquitous practice of gendercide was a threat to the female population of Rome.

In a well-known letter written from Hilarion, a Roman soldier, to his wife, Alis, the motivation for terminating the newborn’s life was gender based. Hilarion desired a son, and his wife had given birth to a daughter. Hilarion writes to Alis,

Know that I am still in Alexandria. And do not worry if they all come back and I remain in Alexandria. I ask and beg you to take good care of our baby son, and as soon as I receive payment I shall send it up to you. If you are delivered of a child [before I come home], if it is a boy keep it, if a girl discard it. You have sent me word, “Don’t forget me.” How can I forget you. I beg you not to worry_.^[247] 

Harris comments further on the common practice of gendercide, 

Many Romans set a relatively low value on the lives of new-born children, especially girls; a corollary is that they also set a relatively low value on having their own children as their heirs. On what then did they set a relatively high value? On ensuring that the children they did bring up did not suffer from extreme want, and at a higher social level that they had the economic means to live lives as civilized and comfortable as those of their parents.^[248]

According to Harris’ research, the infant would typically be left in an abandoned place or where trash was often accumulated.^[249] Whether prompted by poverty, economic concerns including the family’s desire to conserve property for future inheritance, or other factors, the general population deemed infant exposure a necessity.^[250] Ray Laurence, Professor of Ancient History at Macquarie University, suggests that infant exposure was simply a safer late form of abortion considering the dangers of the abortive procedure. He proposes that in the minds of the Romans, exposure saved a child from a life of impoverishment.^[251]

Regarding the influence of poverty in the context of infanticide, historians recognize that in the first three centuries A.D. life offered hard choices.^[252] Harris writes, 

The act of exposing an infant rather than killing it outright can seem to modern minds to be a hypocritical evasion, especially if it is concluded that the majority of the victims died and that parents generally expected this…. For a family living in dire poverty, in particular, not to expose might seem as likely to lead to the death of some member of the family as exposure was to kill the newborn.^[253]

The pagan ethic of human life and family offered little hope to communities locked in a cycle of impoverishment and despair.

Infanticide as Sex Selection

Reflecting the pagan view that could justify gendercide in society the Greek comic

Posidippus wrote a couplet based on a well-known aphorism in the ancient world,

Everyone, even if he is poor, rears a son,

But exposes a daughter, even if he is rich.^[254]

Posidippus’ words are not shocking considering that scholars commonly document the system of infanticide as sex selection in the Greco-Roman world.^[255] Harris highlights the practice of gendercide from the conclusion of his study on Hellenistic, Egyptian and

Roman child exposure customs, “It is certainly hard to think that in the Roman Empire as a whole male infants were exposed as often as female ones. Indeed one of the reasons why the Romans relied heavily on child-exposure to control population was that, unlike contraception or abortion, it permitted them to choose the sex of their children.”^[256] Mark

Golden, Senior Scholar and Professor Emeritus in the Department of Classics at the

University of Winnipeg, adds,

We need not believe that fathers (or mothers) who exposed newborn daughters were motivated by actual hostility, conscious or even unconscious, towards them. But a tendency to expose daughters more readily than sons implies that it was more important to raise boys than girls, and that men were valued more highly than women. To quote a standard textbook of demography: “Wherever infanticide is practised, female infanticide is the rule … supplemented by the elimination of defective and unhealthy offspring and those undesirable by reason of some magical (e.g., multiple births) or social (e.g., illegitimacy) factor. Infanticide is thus associated with the higher valuation of males.”^[257]

John M. Riddle, History Professor at North Carolina State University, analyzes abortion and contraception in his work, Ancient Rome in Contraception and Abortion from the

Ancient World to the Renaissance.^[258] Riddle argues that physicians in Rome had a more than adequate medicinal knowledge of abortifacients and contraceptive herbs. Etienne Van de Walle suggests that if Riddle’s thesis proves true, then the general populace would also have access and knowledge regarding abortifacients and would have only chosen to practice child exposure if there were some other motive for doing so.^[259]While Van de Walle disagrees with Riddle’s conclusions based on insufficient demographic evidence, it is reasonable to conclude, based on Riddle’s extensive research, that while herbs and medicine were used to limit family growth, the motive for child exposure was a means of sex selection.^[260]

Gendercide and Marriage

The gendercide of female infants had a direct correlation on the average age of girls at first marriage in the Roman Empire, which was around fifteen.^[261] Men were required to wed young brides since the population of eligible females was significantly below the

average sex ratio at birth (SRB).^[262] J. B. Birdsell, an anthropologist from UCLA,

published a study entitled Human Evolution in which he makes the argument that in societies which kill up to fifty percent of their female infants each male still has the opportunity to find a spouse if he waits long enough and if the females marry in early adolescence.^[263] It is probably true that one reason Roman men married females at such a young age is that they were more likely to marry a virgin, but an even greater concern was the shortage of women. Stark points out, “A society cannot routinely dispose of a substantial number of female newborns and not end up with a very skewed sex ratio, especially when one adds in the high mortality rate associated with childbirth in all ancient societies.”^[264] It was not uncommon for women to marry again and again. Harnack records that Cicero’s daughter, Tullia, “married at 16 … widowed at 22 … remarried at 23 … divorced at 28 … married again at 29 … divorced at 33—and dead, soon after childbirth, at 34.”^[265] Stark agrees with Birdsell and confirms his theory with anecdotal evidence, “As to the histories, silence offers strong testimony that Roman girls married young, very often before puberty. It is possible to calculate that many famous Roman women married at a tender age: Octavia and Agrippina married at 11 and 12, Quintilian’s

wife bore him a son when she was 13, Tacitus wed a girl of 13, and so on.”^[266] 

Cambridge sociologist M. K. Hopkins conducted a well-regarded study based on Roman inscriptions on the age of Roman girls at marriage.^[267] Hopkins examined 287

tombstones that enabled him to tabulate ages of predominantly upper class females as well as separate women out on basis of religion. Hopkins concludes from his findings, “Pagans were three times as likely as Christians to have married before age 13 (10 percent were wed by age 11). Nearly half (44 percent) of pagans had married by age 14, compared with 20 percent of Christians. In contrast, nearly half (48 percent) of Christian females had not wed before age 18, compared with a third (37 percent) of pagans.”^[268] Not only are Hopkins’ findings noteworthy statistically, but they become even more significant when combined with Stark’s discovery that young pagan girls who married older men were forced to consummate their marriage at once, in many cases not waiting

for the onset of puberty. Stark remarks,

Unfortunately, the literary sources offer little information about how pre-pubertal girls felt about these practices, although Plutarch regarded it as a cruel custom and reported “the hatred and fear of girls forced contrary to nature.” I suggest that, even in the absence of better evidence and even allowing for substantial cultural differences, it seems likely that many Roman girls responded as Plutarch claimed. Thus, here too Christian girls enjoyed a substantial advantage.^[269]

Mark Golden’s demographic projections led him to conclude that one in five females could not be married at the conventional age, and, indeed, might never be married if parents raised all of their female infants.^[270] The implication, according to Golden, was that families in antiquity faced a financial tragedy in such circumstances. Golden observes, “The longer a girl stayed at home, the more costly her upkeep—and the less likelihood of her marrying at all. What if she didn’t marry?”^[271] The prospects in such cases were generally either prostitution or concubinage.

Moral Apathy, Philosophers and Infanticide

It is evident from both the edicts of the emperors in the first century A.D. and from the testimonies of ancient Roman historians such as Tacitus and Seneca that infanticide was a prevalent method of family planning during the time of the Early Church, but what did  the ethicists and philosophers of the time think about such matters? Although the question of whether or not Greek and Roman philosophers were ambivalent to the reality of infanticide has been debated for decades, recent research in the fields of osteoarchaeology and anthropology has served to illuminate the discussion. 

Simon Mays, an archaeologist from University of Southampton, published an article concerning infanticide in Roman Britannia. In his research he draws upon DNA evidence from the skeletal remains of children in south England to demonstrate the widespread reality of infanticide across the Roman Empire.^[272] Mark Golden discerns, “Any Greek or Roman who reached the age of marriage could look forward to burying one or more, often very small ones…. What I do suggest is that in a world in which such deaths and burials were routine, so to speak, the intensity and duration of the emotional responses were unlike modern reactions.”^[273] Golden argues for the reality of demographic determinism where affection and love “were not to be expected in pre-industrial populations.”^[274] Affection and love for children as the modern world knows it, Golden contends, could not be present in a context with such a high mortality rate.^[275] Golden quotes Lawrence Stone to this effect, “The omnipresence of death coloured affective relations at all levels of society, by reducing the amount of emotional capital available for prudent investment in any single individual, especially in such ephemeral creatures as infants.”⁵⁹ 

In scientific terms, this view of geographic determinism was to preserve the mental stability of society. Mays’ archaeological study reveals that in the pagan world, children made little impact, whether through life or through death. “They were rarely commemorated,” Golden observes.⁶⁰ Cicero, the Roman statesman and philosopher, expresses this attitude of ambivalence succinctly, “If a child dies young, one should console himself easily. If he dies in the cradle, one doesn’t even pay attention.”⁶¹

In part because of this general apathy regarding the death of the young, but also for the purported good of the state, ancient philosophers supported the practice of infanticide. The weight of classical philosophy concurred with the practices of the Romans. Stark notes, “Both Plato and Aristotle recommended infanticide as legitimate state policy. The Twelve Tables, the earliest known Roman legal code, permitted a father, or paterfamilias, to expose any female infant and any deformed or weak male infant.”⁶² To “expose” refers to the practice of abandoning an infant outdoors where the child

percent with a life expectancy of 35 years. The probability of a newborn child surviving to adulthood in Roman Italy has been calculated at roughly 50 percent.

• Golden, “Did the Ancients Care When Their Children Died?,” 154.
• Golden, “Did the Ancients Care When Their Children Died?,” 155.
• Cicero, Cicero: Tusculan Disputations, Revised edition (trans. John Edward King; Cambidge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1927), Book 1. 93.
• Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 118.

would typically fall victim to the elements or to wild animals.^[276] Aristotle adds, “There must be a limit fixed to the procreation of offspring, and if any people have a child as a result of intercourse in contravention of these regulations, abortion must be practiced.”^[277] In Politics, Aristotle argues for the termination of deformed children for the good of the state,

As to the exposure and rearing of children, let there be a law that no deformed child shall live, but that on the ground of an excess in the number of children, if the established customs of the state forbid this (for in our state population has a limit), no child is to be exposed, but when couples have children in excess, let abortion be procured before sense and life have begun; what may or may not be lawfully done in these cases depends on the question of life and sensation.^[278]

Plato concurs with his pupil, and advocates in The Republic for making abortions mandatory for women who became pregnant after the age of forty in order to limit the population.^[279] He records a conversation later in The Republic between Socrates and

Glaucon in which Socrates argues that infants born with any disability must be killed:

And then, as the children are born, they’ll be taken over by the officials appointed for the purpose, who may be either men or women or both, since our offices are open to both sexes. Yes. I think they’ll take the children of good parents to the nurses in charge of the rearing pen situated in a separate part of the city, but the children of inferior parents, or any child of the others that is born defective, they’ll hide in a secret and unknown place, as is appropriate. It is, if indeed the guardian breed is to remain pure.⁶⁷

Seneca rationalizes abortion as beneficial for the long-term health of the mother. He writes: “Mad dogs we knock on the head; the fierce and savage ox we slay; sickly sheep we put to the knife to keep them from infecting the flock; unnatural progeny we destroy; we drown even children who at birth are weakly and abnormal. Yet it is not anger, but reason that separates the harmful from the sound.”⁶⁸ Dio Chrysostom, the

Greek orator and philosopher, writes concerning slaves, 

In the case of slave women, on the other hand, some destroy the child before birth and others afterwards, if they can do so without being caught, and yet sometimes even with the connivance of their husbands, that they may not be involved in trouble by being compelled to raise children in addition to their enduring slavery.⁶⁹

The consequences of this pagan ethic espoused by the ancient philosophers are seen plainly in Lawrence E. Stager’s discovery of a late 20^th Century excavation of a Roman

villa:

A gruesome discovery in the sewer that ran under the bathhouse…. The sewer had been clogged with refuse sometime in the sixth century A.D. When we excavated

and dry-sieved the dessicated sewage, we found the bones … of nearly 100 little

For a man–his daughter, his mother, his daughter’s children, and his mother’s ancestors; for a woman–her son and his descendants, her father and his ancestors. Having received these instructions, they should be very careful not to let a single fetus see the light of day, but if one is conceived and forces its way to the light, they must deal with it in the knowledge that no nurture is available for it. That’s certainly sensible.” ⁶⁷ Plato, Republic, Book 5, 460 b-c.

• Seneca the Younger, Of Anger, ed. The Perfect Library (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2015), I, 15, 2–3.
• Dio Chrysostom, Dio Chrysostom: Discourses 12–30, trans. J. W. Cohoon (Cambridge, Mass:

Harvard University Press, 1939), Slavery 2, 8.

babies apparently murdered and thrown into the sewer. Examinations of the bones revealed them to be newborns, probably day-olds.^[280] 

Stager and his colleagues were unable to determine gender, but regardless, the bones bring to light a key source of population decrease. 

The Greek historian, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, records the following account to give context for the permissiveness of killing newborn infants, under the auspices of

Romulus in the 7^th Century B.C.,

By these institutions Romulus sufficiently regulated and suitably disposed the city both for peace and for war: and he made it large and populous by the following means. In the first place, he obliged the inhabitants to bring up all their male children and the first-born of the females, and forbade them to destroy any children under three years of age unless they were maimed or monstrous from their very birth. These he did not forbid their parents to expose, provided they first showed them to their five nearest neighbours and these also approved. Against those who disobeyed this law he fixed various penalties, including the confiscation of half their property.^[281][282]

The requirement of a committee of five neighbors seems dubious as a Roman practice in the early centuries of Christianity, but in a general comment on the Twelve Tables and Roman law W. V. Harris concludes, “In any case it is reasonable to infer that the Romans of the late Republic did not rear all their healthy male infants, or all their first-born female infants, and that the abandonment of other female infants was fairly common and not heavily censured.”⁷² The law granted the father absolute power to order any female in his household to abort, or to kill, expose, or abandon infants.^[283] 

Harris’ research on the law of Romulus distinguished between three types of killing of the young: 1) abortion; 2) infanticide; and 3) the killing of one’s children beyond the first year of life. Harris writes concerning this edict,

[The law] seems to assume that parents will sometimes kill children under three years of age whom they have accepted, but it forbids the killing of physically normal children below that age; the point of this age stipulation was probably to make the parents wait until an age when they were practically certain to have become too attached to the child to kill or expose it.^[284]

The consensus among historians is that the Romans generally condemned the practice of killing children after they had been accepted into their families. Nevertheless, the moral indifference of the philosophers and society at large regarding infanticide is readily apparent, and the same pagan ethic is unmistakable regarding the practice of abortion in the Roman Empire.

Abortion Practices in the First Three Centuries

Celsus, the Roman medical author, admonishes surgeons in his De Medicina that an abortion “requires extreme caution and neatness, and entails very great risk.” He advises that “after the death of the fetus” the surgeon should slowly force his “greased hand up the vagina and into the uterus.”^[285] Celsus instructs, “The surgeon should then insert a smooth hook and fix it into an eye or ear or the mouth, even at times into the forehead, then this is pulled upon and extracts the fetus.” He continues, “If the fetus was positioned crosswise or backwards … a blade be used to cut up the fetus so it could be taken out in pieces.” ^[286] After the procedure, the woman’s thighs should be tied together and her pubic area covered with “greasy wool, dipped in vinegar and rose oil.”^[287] Pliny the Elder, describes several examples of medical procedures,

But say, that in these cases it might be tolerable to set down in their books some poisons: what reason, nay what leave had those Greeks to shew the means how the brains and understanding of men should be intoxicated and troubled? What colour and pretence had they to set down medicines and receipts to cause women to slip the untimely fruit of their womb, and a thousand such-like casts and devices that be practiced by herbs of their penning? For mine own part, I am not for them that would send the conception out of the body unnaturally before the due time: they shall learn no such receipts of me.^[288]

Even the Greek physician Hippocrates advocated for certain kinds of abortion. He writes,

It was in the following way that I came to see a six-day-old embryo. A kinswomen of mine owned a very valuable danseuse, whom she employed as a prostitute. It was important that this girl should not become pregnant and therefore lose her value. Now this girl had heard the sort of thing women say to each other–that when a woman is going to conceive, the seed remains inside her and does not fall out. She digested this information, and kept a watch. One day she noticed that the seed had not come out again. She told her mistress and the story came to me. When I heard it, I told her to jump up and down, touching her buttocks with her heels at each leap. After she had done this no more than seven times, there was a noise, the seed fell out on the ground, and the girl looked at it in great surprise…. It was round, and red, and within the membrane could be seen thick white fibres, surrounded by a thick red serum; while on the outer surface of the membrane were clots of blood.^[289]

While this passage seems to speak approvingly of abortion, there is debate among medical historians regarding the exact translation of the Hippocratic Oath.^[290] One section of the classic version has a potential reference to abortion. G. E. R. Lloyd argues for a translation of this reference that reads, “Neither will I give a woman means to procure an abortion.”^[291] However, Dr. Owsei Temkin suggests that this particular phrase should be rendered instead: “I shall not give a woman an abortive suppository.”^[292] Whether or not the intent of the Hippocratic Oath was to only prevent certain kind of abortions it is possible that Hippocrates’ writings could be used to justify the practice of late-term abortions. 

Soranus, a seminal Greek pioneer in the field of gynecology who worked in Rome, suggested that midwives examine newborns for any defective parts. If any aspect of the body did not function properly it would be appropriate to either let the infant die, or to terminate. Soranus concludes, “And by conditions contrary to those mentioned, the infant not worth rearing is recognized.”^[293]

            Even the Roman poets were well acquainted with the widespread acceptance of abortion. Ovid, in Book 2 of The Amores, pens this stanza:

Why cheat the full vine of the growing cluster, and pluck with ruthless hand the fruit yet in the green? 

What is ripe will fall of its self:

let grow what has once become quick;  a life is no slight reward for a short delay. 

Ah, women, why will you thrust and pierce with the instrument  and give dire poisons to your children yet unborn.^[294]

The final couplet sounds like Ovid is questioning the morality of abortion, but he is simply describing the common procedure. And in Fasti, Ovid writes, “Every matron vowed not to propagate the line of her ungrateful spouse by giving birth to offspring; and lest she should bear children, she rashly by a secret thrust discharged the growing burden from her womb.”^[295] Ovid’s reference to a “secret thrust” is somewhat of a mystery and perhaps poetic imagery, but tools used for abortions were very real. Tertullian describes an abortion kit used by Hippocrates in A Treatise on the Soul,

A flexible frame for opening the uterus first of all, and keeping it open; it is further furnished with an annular blade, by means of which the limbs within the womb are dissected with anxious but unfaltering care; its last appendage being a blunted or covered hook, wherewith the entire fetus is extracted by a violent delivery. There is also a copper needle or spike by which the actual death is managed.^[296]

In a culture of apathetic acceptance of such rituals as described by Tertullian it is safe to conclude that there must have been a general sense of brokenness amongst the pagan population where these practices not only existed in secret, but found overwhelming public support. The cost of terminating life in the womb bore consequences not only spiritually, but demographically as well.

Abortion and Low Fertility Rates

Just as infanticide contributed to low fertility rates among pagans in the Greco-Roman world, abortion was also a major factor.^[297]  The frequency of abortions combined with the dangerous techniques implemented each contributed to population decline. It was not uncommon for women to die after the procedure, or to become infertile, which further contributed to the low fertility rate and skewed sex ratios.^[298] Mark J. Cherry writes, “The perceived positive utility of abortion and infanticide, to get rid of less than physically perfect or otherwise unwanted children, together with the social devaluing of females led historically to a decrease in women and a generally low female-to-male ratio.”^[299]

Author Michael J. Gorman, New Testament scholar and Professor of Biblical Studies and Theology at St. Mary’s Seminary and University, notes that given the hazardous conditions surrounding the abortion procedure it is no surprise that abortion was a major cause of death among women during the Greco-Roman period.^[300] One of the reasons why abortions were in such high demand was the reality of extramarital sexual activity between unmarried men and women—including women who would become pregnant while their husbands were away from home. Gorman also notes economic factors as a reason for abortion despite the fact that the procedure was so risky—rich women utilized abortions to avoid splitting up inheritance between many heirs and poor women sought to avoid children they could not afford.⁹¹

While recognizing these significant realities, Stark contends:

The very high rates of abortion in the Greco-Roman world can only be fully understood if we recognize that in perhaps the majority of instances it was men, rather than women, who made the decision to abort. Roman law accorded the male head of family the literal power of life and death over his household, including the right to order a female in the household abort. The Roman Twelve Tables did suggest censure for husbands who ordered their wives to abort without good reason, but no fines or penalties were specified.⁹² 

Gorman documents one example of Stark’s contention. He records a specific instance involving the Emperor Domitian in the first century A.D. After he impregnated his niece, Julia, he ordered her to have an abortion, which she did not survive.⁹³

Non-Christian Objections to Abortion and Infanticide        

Even in cases where the practices of abortion and infanticide were publicly criticized, the reasoning rarely pertained to a changing ethic concerning the intrinsic value of human

waited, uncertain whether missing periods really meant that she was pregnant, until the second trimester. But a primary consideration was that parents who wanted male but not female offspring will have allowed pregnancies to go to term and then, if nature went against them, exposed their infant daughters.” W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 15. See also Michael J. Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church: Christian, Jewish & Pagan Attitudes in the Greco-Roman World (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1982).

⁹¹ Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 28. ⁹² Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 120.

⁹³ Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 28.

life; instead, it was the welfare of the family, the state, or the city, that was of utmost importance. Cicero, In Defense of Cluentius, suggests, 

I remember a case which occurred when I was in Asia: how a certain woman of Miletus, who had accepted a bribe from the alternative heirs and procured her own abortion by drugs, was condemned to death: and rightly, for she had cheated the father of his hopes, his name of continuity, his family of its support, his house of an heir, and the Republic of a citizen-to-be.^[301]

Michael Gorman details the acts of Caesar Augustus, in both 18 B.C. and A.D. 9, who promoted childbearing instead of abortion for the benefit of the Roman state through two separate edicts.^[302] However, as Gorman points out these edicts never outlawed abortion. 

This reluctance can be mainly traced back to the belief of the Stoic philosophers that an unborn child was not human. Papinian, a Roman jurist, connects Stoic views on this issue to its codification as Roman law.^[303] Gushee comments on this development, “During the fateful transition to Christendom, reverence for the sacred worth of every  human life was extended in some important respects and receded in others. A world  without authorized gladiator contests, crucifixion, and infanticide was a better world, in large part due to Christian influence translated into imperial law.”^[304] When Roman laws were finally codified to outlaw abortion in the early third century A.D. they were concerned with the rights of the husband relating to losing a child and did not consider abortion as an act of murder.^[305]

Although not a pagan in the same sense as the Greeks and Romans, the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria writes,

Divine ordinance forbids the exposure of infants, “which, has become an everyday impiety among many of the other nations because of their natural inhumanity.” Parents who do it thereby accuse themselves of hedonism, misanthropy, murder, and–the worst of curses–child-killing. “Some do the deed with their own hands,” strangling or suffocating them or causing them to drown. “Others carry them to a deserted place, exposing them, so they claim, to the hope of safety, but in reality to the most dreadful misfortunes,” for animals and birds come to devour them. Sometimes passers-by take pity on them and look after them. Those who kill infants are the cruelest and most merciless of men.^[306]

Philo expands on his accusation against parents who expose their children as guilty of self-indulgence and infanticide in even stronger evocative and condemnatory language:

They defend infanticide with lucid demonstrations, those people, some of whom are murderers of their own children by choking their first breath out of them, cruel as they are and horribly lacking in feeling, others by throwing them into a river or the deep sea after having fastened some heavy weight on them that they may sink faster; others again take them to the wilderness to expose them, hoping, as they say themselves, that the child may be saved, but actually so that they will die a ghastly death. For all the beasts that feed on human flesh will come along unchecked and feast on the babes, an enjoyable meal—a meal which the only ones who should have taken care of them, and more than all others were bound to save them, the father and the mother, have prepared. And then the meat-devouring birds of prey come flying to gnaw on the left-overs, that is if they have not noticed it before, for in that case they fight the land-beasts for the entire prey.^[307]

While pagan opposition to abortion and infanticide was not common, there were still points of connection with the Early Church that the apologists and early Christians were able to build on as Christianity began to move out into the Empire.

The Response of Early Christianity to Abortion

New Testament scholar, Larry Hurtado, recognizes the Early Church’s growth into

Christian communities and writes, 

I underscore the point that in addition to noting similarities to other Roman-era groups, we should also seek to identify particular features of early Christianity that made it distinctive among the many other options of the time. There must have been features of early Christian faith that made it not only distinguishable but also worth the consequences often involved in taking it up.^[308]

What were those features that Hurtado mentions and how did they relate to superior fertility in Christians mentioned by Stark in his research?

In contrast to the prevailing pagan ethic, early Christians were both pro children and family oriented. Hurtado notes, “We can see that there is a major difference in the historical effects of early Christian behavioral exhortation.”^[309] The emphasis on behavioral practices and social mores was unusual in the pagan world, particularly as these ethics were considered central to religious practice.^[310] This can be seen specifically regarding the early Christians’ attitude towards infanticide and abortion.^[311] Both practices were viewed as abhorrent and an affront to the life-giving character of God. Stark argues that this reflected Jewish influences in Christianity.^[312] Jewish historian, Josephus, writes

to this effect, “The law, moreover, enjoins us to bring up our offspring, and forbids women to cause abortion of what is begotten, or to destroy it afterward; and if any woman appears to have done so, she will be a murderer of her child.”^[313] A collective effort by the Christian community to shape behavior and morals, in contrast to the pervasive pagan practices of the wider culture, served to not only warn followers of Jesus against such customs, but also to proclaim a different kind of humanity to the pagans.^[314]  Over the first three centuries of growth, the Early Church was able to retain a distinct moral vision regarding the value of human life. Stark comments on the culturechanging ethic of Christian morals, “Perhaps above all else, Christianity brought a new conception of humanity to a world saturated with capricious cruelty and the vicarious love of death…. Christians effectively promulgated a moral vision utterly incompatible with the casual cruelty of pagan custom.”^[315] In effect, Christianity provided converts with a new way to be human and faith in Christ restored a broken humanity, both individually and corporately. David P. Gushee describes this new ethic as “a seamless, holistic 

commitment to the sacred worth of every person.”^[316]

The Influence of Doctrine

Hurtado advocates for the uniqueness of the Judeo-Christian view of the sanctity of human life in the first three centuries A.D. He proposes the doctrine of a loving God as an important factor in the attractiveness of Christianity to the pagan world. He contrasts the God of Scripture with the pagan polytheism of the Greco-Roman world and suggests that the Judeo-Christian emphasis on a transcendent deity who loved the world and even sought out a relationship with humanity was revolutionary.^[317] 

Gushee emphasizes “that the earliest Christians did not see themselves as founding a new religion but as celebrating God’s fulfillment of his long-awaited promise to redeem Israel.”^[318] Jesus, the Messiah, had broken into the world and inaugurated his Kingdom through his birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension. The ethic of Jesus was an upside down Kingdom characterized by peace and justice and love. The formerly oppressed and the marginalized were now the beloved. The resurrection of Christ provided the broken and persecuted believers with hope. Gushee adds, “And this was a Jesus who was loved, not just imitated. Here was a Saviour to be loved, not just a teacher of Truths, founder of a Religion, or centre of a Faith. He was adored, worshiped, cherished, and clung to; he was alive, more real than any other reality.”^[319] The power of love poured out by the Judeo-Christian God upon the world changed the way Christians interacted with pagans. 

Pagans also used the word “love” when talking about the gods, but in an altogether different sense. Whereas the Greco-Roman world used the language of philia to delineate a vague sort of friendly disposition characteristic of the gods’ attitude toward humanity, the early Christians used agap?.^[320] Hurtado suggests that this word choice for Christians implied a moral commitment to the beloved and a relational intensity. This sort of love was not only used by God concerning humanity, but was also to characterize the love that humans had for one another.^[321] In the early Christian movement, this revelation of God, characterized by love, also required that his followers treat one another with charity and respect as fellow image bearers.^[322] Gushee comments, “The Sermon on the Mount played an especially visible role in early Christian moral exhortations. Early Christian commitment to nonviolence in such a desperately violent world offers the best example of a faith community transfixed by the example of its source and head, its

Saviour and Lord.”^[323]

Early Christians took seriously the cultural mandate that God gave to Adam and

Eve in Eden:^[324]

And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (Gen 1:28) And that God also reaffirmed to Noah: “Then God said to Noah, “Go out from the ark, you and your wife, and your sons and your sons’ wives with you. Bring out with you every living thing that is with you of all flesh—birds and animals and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth—that they may swarm on the earth, and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” (Gen 8:15–17 ESV)

Out of the cultural mandate flowed an ethic of human life and family, and consequently, the early Christian community viewed infanticide and abortion as murder in contrast to the views of the surrounding pagan culture. Hurtado notes, “Indeed, the emphasis on God’s love and the appeal for an answering ‘love-ethic’ characterizing Christian conduct comprise something distinctive. We simply do not know of any other Roman-era religious group in which love played this important role in discourse or behavioral teaching.”¹¹⁸ The doctrine of the redemptive love of God, and humanity as recipients of this agap? love, were foundational for how the Early Church approached the issue of the sanctity of human life.

The Early Christian Tradition

Records of the earliest Christian reaction to abortion and infanticide follow the example of the Jewish community before them. Justin Martyr writes in the mid-second century A.D., “And again we do not expose children lest some of them, not being picked up, should die, and we become murderers. But whether we marry, it is only that we may

Michael W. Goheen, The Drama of Scripture: Finding Our Place in the Biblical Story (Baker Academic, 2004), 38.

¹¹⁸ Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 65.

bring up children; or whether we renounce marriage we live in perfect continence.”^[325] The Didache instructs, “Thou shalt not murder a child by abortion nor kill them when born.”^[326] Michael Gorman quotes the Sentences of Pseudo-Phocylides in his research: “A woman should not destroy the unborn babe in her belly, nor after its birth throw it before dogs and vultures as prey.”^[327] Minucius Felix, at the end of the second century, connects pagan religion to contempt for life:

And I see that you at one time expose your begotten children to wild beasts and to birds; at another, that you crush when strangled with a miserable kind of death. There are some women [among you] who, by drinking medical preparations, extinguish the source of the future man in their very bowels, and thus commit a parricide before they bring forth. And these things assuredly come down from your gods. For Saturn did not expose his children, but devoured them. With reason were infants sacrificed to him in some parts of Africa.^[328]

Also composed in the late second century, an anonymous Christian writing known as the Epistle to Diognetus delineated certain distinctives that marked Christians from the rest of humanity.^[329] These distinctives include Christians “participating in everything as citizens,” but having to “endure everything as foreigners,”^[330] but also, “Marrying like everyone else, and having children, but they do not expose their offspring.”^[331] 

Hurtado comments on the Epistle to Diognetus: “In the case of this particular text, therefore, the claims about Christian beliefs and behavior addressed to this Diognetus are also likely indicative of what was advocated and urged within various Christian circles of the time.”^[332] The text clearly seeks to balance living peaceably in a hostile cultural setting while maintaining distinguishing Christ-honoring behaviors.^[333]

In his plea to emperor Marcus Aurelius, Athenagoras writes,

We say that women who use drugs to bring on an abortion commit murder, and will have to give an account to God for the abortion … we regard the very foetus in the womb as a created being, and therefore an object of God’s care … and we do not expose an infant, because those who expose them are chargeable with child-murder.^[334] 

The Early Church’s vehement reaction to abortion and general infanticide is considerable. It also advocated for the dignity and wellbeing of women in a way hitherto unknown to pagan society.

Greco-Roman Response to Gendercide

A survey of two instrumental Greco-Roman apologists elucidates a Stoic and Christian response to gendercide. Following a brief exploration of Christian identity in Acts this study examines Marcus Minucius Felix’s Octavius and Musonius Rufus’ Discourse 15.

9 8

A New Way of Living in Acts

C. Kavin Rowe, in his historical discussion of Acts, writes extensively on the collision of worldviews articulated by Luke and contends for a reassessment of Luke’s political intention. Rowe writes,

No longer can Acts be seen as a simple apologia that articulates Christianity’s harmlessness vis-à-vis Rome. Yet neither is it a direct call for liberation, a kind of theological vision that takes for granted the solidity of preexistent political arrangements. Rather, in its attempt to form communities that witness to God’s apocalypse, Luke’s second volume is a highly charged and theologically sophisticated political document that aims at nothing less than the construction of an alternative total way of life—a comprehensive pattern of being—one that runs counter to the life-patterns of the Greco-Roman world.^[335]

Christianity and the pagan culture surrounding the Early Church were competing realities. Rowe comments on several of Luke’s narratives, “The accounts of the Christian mission in Lystra (Acts 14), Philippi (Acts 16), Athens (Acts 17), and Ephesus (Acts 19) do not merely target one particular aspect of pagan religion but display narratively the collision between two different ways of life.”^[336] Rowe writes, “The dissolution of patterns basic to Greco-Roman culture is nothing less than the necessary consequence of forming life-giving communities.”^[337] In the case of gendercide “life-giving communities” can be taken literally. These communities of Christ-followers quickly became “a force for cultural destabilization.”^[338] Rowe concludes, 

Reading Acts as a document that explicates ‘the Way of the Lord’ (Acts 18:25) thus allows us to see that Luke’s redescription of cultural dissolution as the gracious act of God in bringing the pagan world out of darkness—his insistence that Christianity is not a governmental takeover but an alternative and salvific way of life—is a reading of the world in deeply and ultimately Christian terms.^[339]

One practical implication of an alternative total way of life was the Early Church’s response to gendercide.               

Marcus Minucius Felix and Octavius

Minucius Felix’s apology Octavius takes its name from Octavius Januarius, a friend and student of Felix. Octavius was a follower of Jesus and a provincial lawyer. Although Octavius was also an apologist for Christianity during the time of the persecutions in the late second century A.D. none of his works or lectures have survived. In Octavius, Felix, also a lawyer, presents his friend in dialogue with the pagan Caecilius patterned after the dialogues of Cicero. At the conclusion of the work Caecilius declares himself converted to Christianity.^[340]

            In Chapter 9, Caecilius accuses early Christians of practicing a rite of initiation characterized by the slaughter and blood of a baby,

To turn to another point. The notoriety of the stories told of the initiation of new recruits is matched by their ghastly horror. A young baby is covered over with flour, the object being to deceive the unwary. It is then served before the person to be admitted into their rites. The recruit is urged to inflict blows upon it—they appear to be harmless because of the covering of flour. Thus the baby is killed with wounds that remain unseen and concealed. It is the blood of this infant—I shudder to mention it—it is this blood that they lick with thirsty lips; these are the limbs they distribute eagerly; this is the victim by which they seal their covenant; it is by complicity in this crime that they are pledged to mutual silence; these are their rites, more foul than all sacrileges combined.^[341]

G. W. Clarke insists that this charge was an infamous slander made against Christians and was due to a pagan misunderstanding of the Eucharist. It originated from the ritual use of an embryo or infant in black magic. Pliny would later remark that the Christians’ food was harmless, demonstrating that he was aware of the charge of cannibalism.^[342]

In Chapter 30, Octavius responds to Caecilus concerning the slander of infanticide, 

And, in fact, it is a practice of yours, I observe, to expose your very own children to birds and wild beasts, or at times to smother and strangle them—a pitiful way to die; and there are women who swallow drugs to stifle in their own womb the beginnings of a man to be—committing infanticide before they give birth to their infant.^[343] 

Felix’s argument of moral virtue in Christianity is grounded in the assertion that the

“slander of infanticide” is more appropriate to pagan rites and practices and abhorrent to God.^[344] Octavius imagines that the only people who could be guilty of such a heinous act are those who are capable of believing such a practice exists—the pagans.

            Octavius traces the practice of infanticide to the pattern given by the pagan gods of Rome. He argues, “Saturn, indeed, forbore to expose his own children; he  devoured them.”^[345] This example, Felix contends, directly contributed to the ritual of  infanticide in the Roman Empire. Octavius continues, “Parents used to do right, therefore, in some parts of Africa, to sacrifice their babies to him, suppressing with endearments

and kisses their wailing for fear they should sacrifice tearful victims.”^[346] The dialogue concerning infanticide concludes with these provocative remarks:

There is little to distinguish between such men and those who devour wild beasts from the amphitheatre all smeared and stained with man’s blood and glutted with his flesh and limbs. But for us it is not right either to look at or to hear of acts of manslaughter; in fact, we are so careful to avoid human blood that in our meals we do not allow even the blood of edible animals.^[347]

It is clear from Felix’s rhetoric the revulsion early Christians experienced when they witnessed or encountered reports of child exposure.

            Regarding Christian marriage, Minucius Felix writes, “But with us modesty is paraded not in our appearance but in our hearts: it is our pleasure to abide by the bond of a single marriage; in our desires for begetting children, we know one woman or none at all.”^[348] This fidelity was in extreme contrast to the practice of the pagans. Ray Laurence clarifies,

In practice, young men often did not marry until they were twenty-five…. it would appear that once they shed their toga praetexta, they sought sexual pleasure in the brothels. In Roman comedy, young men are frequently represented as having fallen in love with prostitutes, much to the horror of their fathers…. There was almost an expectation that youths would drink to excess, have sex with as many people as possible and attack passing strangers in the night.^[349]

Cherry comments on this point, “In its presumption of the permissibility of sexual freedom and experimentation in the pursuit of personal gratification, bioethics straightforwardly reflects the permissive background worldview of Western culture.”^[350] The societal repercussions of such an ethic in a world with high mortality rates must have been considerable.

Musonius Rufus and Discourse 15

Musonius Rufus, an Etruscan born in Volsnii, lived in the first century A.D. Nero exiled Musonius in A.D. 65 to the island of Gyara for his outspokenness and “noble way of living.”^[351] By vocation a Roman Knight, and greatly admired by Pliny the Younger, Musonius returned to Rome under the Emperor Galba where he almost lost his life for instructing soldiers in “pacifist propaganda”—specifically, “peace was to be preferred to the calamities of war.”^[352] Eventually, Musonius was banished again by Emperor

Vespasian and died in exile circa A.D. 101.

            Musonius was well known for his counter cultural views on women, and it is highly likely that many of his contemporaries followed his lead in articulating equality for women and men. Hierocles, Callicratidas, Perctione, Phintys, Nicostratus, and Clement of Alexandria all wrote in language similar to Musonius’ position—women could possess all virtues, and the distinction between the sexes was not moral, but biological.^[353]

            There remain two fragments of Musonius’ lectures that address the relationship of parents and children—specifically, the question of whether parents should raise all of their children. In these lectures, Musonius condemned gendercide not because it was unethical; rather, it was a transgression against the family and the gods.^[354] In particular, abortion was a violation of the will of Zeus of whom Musonius wrote, “[Zeus] is the guardian of the family, from whom wrongs done to the family are not hidden.”^[355] 

Musonius had other objections as well. As a Stoic philosopher he affirmed that the seed of humans contains part of their souls. Hence, child exposure was contrary to nature. W. V. Harris comments, “Musonius further claimed that civic duty requires large families; so do respect for the lawgivers who supported this aim, and respect for the gods and especially for Zeus, guardian of the family. So does honour, which comes to the man with many sons. Finally, brothers are useful.”^[356] Geytenbeek, a Greek scholar, adds, “As far as can be ascertained he is the first moralist who both emphatically defends the rearing of many children and disapproves of exposure, for which he even uses the word

‘murder.’”^[357]

There is nothing recorded in the preserved lectures concerning rights the infant child might have. In response to the common lamentation of poverty as just cause for gendercide, Musonius rejoins, “From where the little birds, which are much poorer than you, feed their young?”^[358] Hurtado comments on the writings of Musonius and other pagan philosophers who voiced opposition to child exposure:

Musonius and philosophical traditions in general appealed to the individual’s sense of honor and the avoidance of personal shame, shame in the eyes of others and so also internally, as the basis for the demands of living by their principles.

But early Christian texts typically invoked divine commands, appealed to the divine calling laid upon believers to exhibit holiness, and, notably, invoked the mutual responsibility of believers to one another in their behavioral efforts, reflecting an emphasis on the formation of a group ethos.^[359]

The apostolic teaching of the Early Church emphasized the importance of day-to-day living and replaced “social shame” with a theological basis for life.

The Subsequent Growth of Christianity

The Early Church in the first three centuries was a distinctive religious movement. Based on his study of the role of women in Christian growth, Rodney Stark claims “superior

Christian fertility played a significant role in the rise of Christianity.”^[360] In contrast to the Greco-Roman world at large, Christian communities did not have their sex ratios affected by gendercide, and even maintained an excess of women to men based on evidence of gender differences in conversion during the first three centuries.^[361] This was due, in part, to the direct relationship of women being afforded a higher status in the Christian community and the particularly high responsiveness of women to the Christian message.^[362] 

R. L. Fox records a study of an inventory of property removed from a Christian house church in the North African town of Cirta. In A.D. 303 the Christians had gathered for distribution to the poor 82 women’s tunics compared to 16 men’s tunics in addition to 47 pairs of female slippers. Fox concludes that both Christians and pagans recognized the predominance of women in the membership of churches.^[363] Harnack also notes that “women of all ranks were converted in Rome and in the provinces; although the details of these stories are untrustworthy, they express correctly enough the general truth that

Christianity was laid hold of by women in particular, and also that the percentage of

Christian women, especially among the upper classes, was larger than that of men.”^[364]

            The sex ratios that existed in the Roman Empire during the first three centuries A.D. could only occur when there has been a significant interference with life.^[365] This study has attempted a survey of obstacles prevalent in the Greco-Roman world, and Stark notes the result, “Given these practices, even in childhood, before the onset of the high female mortality associated with fertility in pre-modern times, females were substantially outnumbered among pagans ….Moreover, it wasn’t just the high mortality from childbirth that continued to increase the sex ratios among adults.”^[366]

In contrast to the pagan world, followers of Jesus maintained a rate of natural increase. Their fertility rates were noticeably higher than their pagan counterparts, and the Christian mortality rates were substantially lower.^[367] The Early Church forbade all forms of abortion and infanticide, and removed the major causes of gender imbalance that existed amongst the pagans. Accordingly, Stark can confidently conclude Christian fertility played a significant role in the rise of Christianity.^[368]

            Concerning the low fertility rates of the pagans, Tertullian declares, “To the servant of God, forsooth, offspring is necessary! For our own salvation we are secure enough, so that we have leisure for children! Burdens must be sought by us for ourselves which are avoided by the majority of the Gentiles, who are compelled by laws, who are decimated by abortion.”^[369] Regarding Tertullian’s recognition of his surrounding culture’s tragedy, Stark makes the following point: “The differential fertility of Christians and pagans is not something I have deduced from the known natural decrease of the Greco-Roman population and from Christian rejection of the attitudes and practices that caused pagans to have low fertility. This differential fertility was taken as fact by the ancients.”^[370] 

In Harris’ research regarding the Roman demographics of the early centuries of the Christian movement he emphasizes that while it would be a mistake to allow a discussion of child-exposure to revolve around a demographic model due to the abundance of evidence of other societies’ population stability despite the practice of infanticide, there is still a strong correlation between average life expectancy at birth and the frequency of infanticide in a society.^[371] Addressing the population of the Roman

Empire in the 2^nd century A.D., Harris writes,

The most recent study … concludes that average life expectancy at birth lay somewhere between twenty and thirty years (in other words, it remains very uncertain). The author sees no difficulty in accepting a high level of infanticide. This model includes a mortality rate of 30.6 per cent in the first year of life. As Frier has shown, however, a higher rate of infant mortality is quite consistent with a stable population. His own model includes a mortality rate of 35.8 per cent in the first year. An infant mortality rate as high as this, or nearly so, should be hypothesized to accommodate the level of child-exposure, more often than not fatal, that the evidence reviewed here would lead one to expect.^[372]

Low life expectancy combined with low fertility rates resulted in a culture of hopelessness and death that spilled out into other practices including chariot races and gladiatorial contests in the coliseum.^[373]

A High View of Marriage and Life

According to Stark, one of the primary causes of low fertility was a patriarchal society that did not have a high view of marriage.^[374] In fact, the Roman censor Quintus Caecilius

Metellus Macedonicus proposed in 131 B.C. that the senate make marriage obligatory because so many men chose to remain single. Augustus made the same proposal to the Senate a century later, but it was not received with any more interest than the first time it was proposed.^[375] Stark concludes,

In the final analysis, a population’s capacity to reproduce is a function of the proportion of that population consisting of women in their childbearing years, and the Greco-Roman world had an acute shortage of women. Moreover, many pagan women still in their childbearing years had been rendered infertile by damage to their reproductive systems from abortions or from contraceptive devices and medicines. In this manner was the decline of the Roman Empire’s population ensured.^[376]

In contrast to the pagan attitude of ambivalence, or outright disdain towards marriage, Christian practice held marriage in the utmost regard.^[377] Followers of Jesus affirmed marriage as instituted by God at creation (Gen 2:20–25) and also insisted that

Jesus reaffirmed marriage as an institution from God in the Gospel accounts (Matt 19:3–

6). Hurtado concludes the book, “Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?” by arguing that it was certain beliefs and teachings that attracted pagans to Christianity more than any social factors. John Barclay agrees, “After all that can be said about social trends and sociological models, a decisive ingredient in the spread and impact of early Christianity is in fact early Christian ideology (dare I say, theology?).”^[378] 

Hurtado contends that it was not merely an intellectual assent to doctrine that characterized Christian growth, but that there was an affective impact in the experience of Christians. Even the prayers of the Early Church as recorded in the Liturgy of St. Basil demonstrate the foundation for a counter-cultural ethic of life: “O God, who knowest the age and the name of each, and knowest every man from his mother’s womb.”^[379] Directly influencing the Early Church’s resolve to remain true to their faith was the doctrine of a loving God.^[380] Stark references the dialogue between Caecilius and Octavius and observes that Octavius argues, “that day by day the number of us is increased” which is attributed to “our fair mode of life.”^[381]

One practical example of an affective impact was in the way that the Early

Church treated widows. Stark notes,

Pagan widows faced great social pressure to remarry. Augustus even had widows fined if they failed to remarry within two years. Of course, when a pagan widow did remarry she lost all of her inheritance, it becoming the property of her new husband. In contrast, among Christians, widowhood was highly respected and remarriage was, if anything, mildly discouraged. Thus, not only were well-to-do Christian widows enabled to keep their husband’s estate, the church stood ready to sustain poor widows, thus allowing them a choice as to whether or not to remarry.^[382]

In these conditions Christian women possessed far greater advantages in their lives compared to their pagan counterparts. They enjoyed superior equality and marital security.

The Apostle Paul follows Jesus’ example in Matthew’s Gospel (Matt 19:1–6) and roots an ethic for marriage in the creation account:

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband. (Eph 5:25–33)

Stark further comments on marriage in the Early Church:

If a major factor in low fertility among pagans was a male-oriented culture that held marriage in low esteem, a major factor in higher fertility of Christians was a culture that sanctified the marital bond. As noted, Christians condemned promiscuity in men as well as in women and stressed the obligations of husbands toward wives as well as those of wives toward husbands.^[383]

In the same way, the early Christian community deferred from their pagan counterparts in regards to the practice of birth control. Primarily, this was centered on sexual practices. Stark observes that medical historians are convinced that the ancient world had, at the very least, a tolerable comprehension of reproduction and “developed a substantial inventory of preventive measures.”^[384] The chewing of various plants such as  Queen Anne’s lace, contraceptive devices inserted into the vagina, goat bladders as condoms, honey, ointments, and even pads of soft wool were used to block the path of semen to the uterus.^[385] Apart from contraceptive techniques men and women practiced sexual variations to prevent pregnancy. These varied from mutual masturbation to a preference for anal sex.^[386] Jack Lindsay notes, “Heterosexual anal intercourse was very common. It was used as the simplest, most convenient, and most effective form of contraception.”^[387] The Christian community emphatically rejected anal intercourse, and in so doing, spurned the patterns of their Greco-Roman pagan counterparts that further led to population decrease.^[388] Finally, Stark notes, “Given their attitudes about marriage and their distant relationships with their wives, many Greco-Roman men seem to have depended on the most reliable of all means of birth control, avoiding sex with their wives.”^[389] In contrast to their pagan neighbors Christians approached marriage with a fundamentally different mindset. Stark writes, “In fact, devout Christian married couples may have had sex more often than did the average pagan couple, because brides were more mature when they married and because husbands were less likely to take up with other women.”^[390] 

Not only did early Christians differ with pagans on the practice of certain birth control methods, but also in the moral foundations of their ethic for valuing the life of infants. Whereas the Stoic philosophers and others appealed to the civic duty of families, the Christian response was often pointed in its appeal to a moral conscience grounded in a theology of God. Hurtado writes, “As we have seen in considering the practice of infant exposure, early Christian writers often expressed a view held also by at least some pagans. What made the early Christian stance in such matters different was not always the sentiment itself but that it was openly expressed and was intended to shape social behavior.”^[391] The Christian response was intended not only for the benefit of disciples of

Jesus, but for the general public. 

In a milieu of antagonism towards Christ followers, which required of them discretion and wisdom in how to engage the broader culture, the issue of infanticide was one practice that the early Church spoke out against vociferously.^[392] Stark concludes his study on Christian fertility in the early church:

It was for this reason that I devoted much attention to establishing that the primary causes of a population decline in the Greco-Roman world did not apply to the Christian subculture. It thus seems entirely proper to assume that Christian population patterns would have resembled the patterns that normally apply in societies having an equivalent level of economic and cultural development. So long as they do not come up against limits imposed by available subsistence, such populations are normally quite expansive. Lack of subsistence was not a factor in this time and place, as the frequent settlement of barbarians to make up population shortages makes clear. We can therefore assume that during the rise of

Christianity the Christian population grew not only via conversion, but via fertility ….All that can be claimed is that a nontrivial portion of Christian growth probably was due to superior fertility.^[393]

Cherry adds, “Rather than celebrating abortion and infanticide as liberation from the tyranny of biological forces, through its experience and worship of God, Christianity recognized in abortion and infanticide a further enslavement to the passions.”^[394] These practices did not represent liberation, but rather roads to damnation.^[395]

Secondary Conversions

Another factor in growth directly connected to a Christian ethic of human life and family, and specifically related to children was the social occurrence of secondary conversions—a religious conversion that results precisely from a relationship with another convert. In the particular context of early Christian growth, Stark refers to conversions resulting from the marriage of Christian women to non-Christian men.^[396] 

To illustrate, consider the following example,

After person A converted to a new faith, that person’s spouse agreed to “go along” with the choice, but was not eager to do so and very likely would not have done so otherwise. The latter is a secondary convert. In the example offered by Chadwick, upper class wives were primary converts and some of their husbands (often grudgingly) became secondary converts. Indeed, it frequently occurred that when the master of a large household became a Christian, all members of the household, including the servants and slaves, were expected to do so too. Keep in mind that once immersed in the Christian subculture, even quite reluctant secondary converts can become ardent participants.^[397]

Hurtado recognizes the reality of these mixed marriages as addressed in 1 Pet 3:1–7. He writes, “[Here] we have another reference to the possible tensions in the marriages of believers to unbelievers, particularly the situation of believing wives married to unbelieving husbands. The text first urges Christian wives to be submissive to their own husbands, aiming through ‘the purity and reverence’ of their lives to win them over ‘without a word.’”^[398] If the Early Church had taken a rigid stand against such marriages, it ran the risk of alienating Christian women who might choose to abandon the faith over the prospects of remaining single as well as amassing a population of young, unwed females. At the same time, a surplus of eligible Christian women provided the opportunity for secondary converts and even more growth in Christian communities.

Stark also examines 1 Pet 3 along with 1 Cor 7:13–14 and concludes that both Peter and Paul, at least to some extent, were able to tolerate exogenous marriage.^[399] He posits, “Peter and Paul hoped that Christians would bring their spouses into the church, but neither seemed to have the slightest worry that Christians would revert to, or convert to, paganism.”^[400] The high level of commitment exhibited by Christians in the face of danger and persecution in the Roman Empire served to reinforce the belief that they would be prudent and cautious when entering into exogenous marriages.^[401]

The case of Poponia Graecina, an early convert to Christianity and member of the upper class in Rome, is particularly instructive. “It is uncertain whether her husband Plautius ever became a Christian,” Stark writes, “although he carefully shielded her from gossip, but there seems to be no doubt her children were raised as Christians.”^[402] The Early Church recognized the numerical and moral advantage of children being raised in the faith even in exogenous marriages.^[403] Michael Walsh agrees when commenting on a decision by Ignatius of Antioch that Christians could marry only with the permission of the local bishop, “Ignatius’ proposal may have been an attempt to encourage marriage between Christians, for inevitably marriages between Christians and pagans were common, especially in the early years. The Church did not at first discourage this practice, which had its advantages: It might bring others into the fold.”^[404]

Stark comments on the benefits of secondary conversion, “The fact that there was such a shortage of women in the empire seems sufficient to have produced the apparent population decline. And it most certainly gave Christians a significant advantage, not only in fertility, but also in producing substantial rates of conversion through marriage.”^[405] In the Roman Empire there was such a remarkable shortage of pagan brides  that many Christian girls had to marry pagan men. The resulting mixed marriages saw husbands committing to Christianity at significant rates, and it is reasonable to say this phenomenon would not have happened had it not been for their marriage to believing females.^[406] In the Greco-Roman world women were proportionately far more likely to become primary converts, and their pagan husbands secondary converts.

Conclusion

This chapter offers historical evidence for the growth of Christianity being significantly influenced by doctrinal positions on a Christian ethic of human life and family and fertility rates of Christians versus pagan families. Stark writes, “So, substantially more Christian (and Jewish) female infants lived.”^[407] As these female infants lived and thrived in Christian families and communities, a high level of exogenous marriages took place resulting in even more conversions and growth in the Christian faith. 

By the 4^th Century A.D. the Roman Empire sought measures to curb the instances of infanticide, perhaps in response to general economic decline. Hans Zinsser details the desperation of the Empire by describing the admission of “barbarians” as settlers of empty estates and to fill the army.^[408] In March A.D. 374, Flavus Valentinian Augustus addressed Probus, who was in command of Italy, Africa and Illyricum, and he issued the first clear edict condemning child-exposure in the Roman Empire’s history:

Let everyone give nourishment to his own progeny. If, however, anyone thinks of exposing it, he will be subject to the statutory punishment. But we leave no opportunity open to masters and patrons (sc. to reclaim children), if a decision based on pity collects those whom they have exposed (as it were) to death: he will not be able to call his own a being whom he held in contempt when it was at the point of death.^[409]

W. V. Harris comments on Valentinian’s motivation, “The criminalization of childexposure, with its potentially considerable repercussions in the spheres of marriage and sexuality, can easily be seen as an attempt on the part of Christian emperors to assert ideological control in the reproductive lives of their subjects.”^[410]

In The Rise of Christianity, Stark makes a convincing case that the Early Church grew into the dominant influence in Western culture because, among other things, pagans practiced infanticide while Christians valued the lives of their children, and Christians built strong families while pagans did not.^[411] Mark Cherry aptly describes the spiraling trap of the pagan ethic, which Christians were able to avoid:

Without appeal to God, and His unique perspective on reality, morality and bioethics are trapped in immanence. Absent God, there exists no standpoint outside of particular cultural sociohistorically conditioned perspectives from which to communicate any deeper perspective of reality or of the bioethics that such a perspective on reality would secure.^[412]

The Early Church was able to capture God’s perspective on morality and bioethics and place an inestimable value on the lives of children and on the well-being of the family unit.

CHAPTER FOUR

DATA AND COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

The general research question that this study addresses is what effect a Christian ethic of life has on the growth of Christianity in a totalitarian society. Specifically, are there parallels between the Early Church’s response to Greco-Roman cultural norms of abortion and gendercide and Chinese Christians’ response to similar cultural norms in the context of the One-Child Policy?

The design considerations for this project’s qualitative method follow concerns of methodologists, Yvonna S. Lincoln and Egon G. Buba in Naturalistic Inquiry. Lincoln and Guba list ten concerns in preparing a qualitative dissertation: 1) Determining the focus of the inquiry; 2) Determining the fit of paradigm to focus; 3) Determining the fit of the inquiry paradigm to the substantive theory selected to guide the inquiry; 4) Determining where and from whom data will be collected; 5) Determining successive phases of the inquiry; 6) Determining instrumentation; 7) Planning data collection and recording modes; 8) Planning data analysis procedure; 9) Planning the logistics; and 10) Planning for trustworthiness.^[413]

Research Methodology

The first three considerations concern the assumptions that underlie this study.^[414] Sampling  was purposively conducted based upon Strauss and Corbin’s grounded theory approach.^[415] An inductive analysis was used to condense raw data into a summary format and to establish a clear link between the research question and the summary findings. The procedure for condensing the data began with data coding that included multiple thorough readings of all responses. The responses were then organized around four major themes. If a comment addressed more than one theme, it was coded in each of the themes. Data that was chosen for presentation in this chapter specifically addressed the research questions of the study. 

Sampling and Sample Size

The author used “criterion sampling” and identified and located participants who either experienced or are experiencing the pressures of family planning policy in China.^[416] For the purposes of this study, all participants were selected because they are Chinese Christians and their experience is relevant to the study.^[417] The research design intentionally incorporated a wide range of perspectives. The population of the study includes twelve Chinese nationals and fifteen U.S. naturalized citizens residing in North Carolina.^[418] The participants in China were chosen at random from both a house church network in Hebei province and from a local Three Self Patriotic Movement^[419] (TSPM) network in Hebei using local contacts in the region.^[420] The author conducted the interviews for the fifteen U.S. naturalized citizens. Personal acquaintances of the author conducted the twelve incountry interviews.^[421] The author was personally acquainted with two of these participants, and the other interviews were chosen from referrals given by naturalized citizens. One particular gatekeeper^[422] was instrumental in providing access to the participant pool, which is a deliberate representational sample of Chinese Christians affected by the OneChild Policy.^[423] Each participant was willing to discuss sensitive issues such as government control, family planning policies, and the influence of Christian faith.

Instrumentation

An ethnographic interview was used as the survey instrument to determine if there was a correlation between a Christian ethic of life and the growth of Christian families in the context of a thirty-five year coercive birth control system.^[424] Participants were contacted either in person, by telephone, or via email, to request their participation in the project. For fluency of language and logistics, nationals facilitated the twelve in-country interviews. All surveys were confidential and included an Agreement to Participate

Form.^[425]

            The survey began with a prepared opening statement, “The research in which you are about to participate is designed to explore the Christian response to abortion and gendercide in China in the context of the One Child Policy. The author for purposes of dissertation research is conducting this research. In this research, you will answer questions in three categories—family structure, social structure, and religious structure. Any information you provide will be held strictly confidential, and at no time will your name be reported, or your name identified with your responses.” Following the opening statement, the author obtained informed consent by asking the participants to sign an Agreement to Participate form. Each participant was informed that anonymity would be honored and a pseudonym would be utilized in the study’s report. 

Next, the survey asked participants to identify their demographic setting, including sex, age, church association, and education.^[426] The second part of the survey  asked participants to identify the predominant influences on their decision-making concerning family planning and other social justice issues. The questions employed in the interviews were worldview questions.^[427] The survey included three categories of questions—family structure, social structure, and religious structure.^[428] The survey produced textual data and focused the interview on the research question.

Data Collection and Procedures

The interviews conducted were open-ended, resulting in “mid-high fidelity and little structure.”^[429] Interviews gathered in Hebei Province were recorded in a combination of  audio recordings and field notes while interviews in Shanghai were collected through surveys. Interviews gathered in the United States were recorded using field notes, including a journal to record impressions and responses. Data analysis was conducted based upon Strauss and Corbin’s grounded theory approach with three steps of coding: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding.^[430] Open coding was used to become familiar with the data by reading through the surveys repeatedly. Axial coding allowed the author to organize the data into categories. Finally, selective coding permitted the author to develop a central narrative revolving around four themes.^[431] The subsequent data  reduction process selected and focused the data in the field notes and transcripts for intelligibility. This process included “smoothing out” language for efficiency.^[432] The author utilized data reduction for the study to remain focused on salient research questions.

Validity

The trustworthiness of the research design concerns the reliability, internal validity and external validity of this study.^[433] The ethnographic interview can be replicated without difficulty in other contexts and with other researchers. The demographic coding scheme is both simple and reproducible. The internal validity of the study is corroborated through spending an extended amount of time with the participants and in comparing participants’ responses with other data available through scholarly research in the area of the OneChild Policy. Participant surveys are adequately noted so that the “generalizability” of the study is transferable to other settings.^[434]

Study limitations are primarily due to sampling. Data from each participant was collected in one interview, followed by occasional emails or text messages for further clarification. A comprehensive interpretation of the relationship between Christian faith and the growth of Christianity in China cannot be attained through one interview. While the author attempted to gather as much information as needed for this work by  conducting interviews, collecting data, and forming observations, the findings presented in this study need to be explored further.  

Triangulation

Triangulation is utilized in qualitative studies to enhance the quality of the investigation. It is employed to provide different types of data and to mix intentional samples. While there are several methods of triangulation, this study employed triangulation of sources, which examines the consistency of data sources using a uniform survey tool.^[435] Data for this study was solicited from multiple sources in order to substantiate evidence and develop common themes. Participants included mainland Chinese in two different  geographic locations as well as naturalized U.S. citizens currently residing in North Carolina. The study pool included a wide range of ages, educational levels and members of various socio-economic means. In addition, some of the participants came from a onechild background while others had multiple siblings.

Credibility

The author brings certain biases to this study. First, the author is a missions pastor at  Apex Baptist Church in Apex, North Carolina. Second, the author has both lived and  worked in Sichuan, China, including a two-year term with the International Mission  Board (2004–2006). The author lived for one year in Tianjin, China (1990–1991). Third, the author is involved with Hand of Hope Pregnancy Resource Center in Raleigh, North Carolina, and served on its Board of Directors from 2007–2009. With these preconceptions in mind, the author strove to remain as objective as possible throughout the study.^[436]

Demographic Data

The composition of the participant pool was 56 percent female and 44 percent male. In the sample, 68 percent were married, 62.5 percent of the unmarried participants were male. Respondents with children equaled 72 percent, while 32 percent of participants had more than one child. The average number of children in the participant pool was 1.16.^[437] The participants’ ages ranged from 25 to 65 years. The average age of the participants was 39.72 years. 

              Regarding generational breakdown: 24 percent of the participants belonged to the

Boomer Generation; 40 percent belonged to Generation X; and 36 percent were Millennials. Participants who were an “only child” accounted for 36 percent of the sample, while 58 percent had at least one sibling. Occupations included journalists, lab engineers, pastors, linguistics professors, students, movie producers, software engineers, attorneys, and housewives. Graduate degrees were held by 40 percent of participants while 52 percent had a Bachelor’s Degree or various Associate or Technical Degrees. Participants who completed their educational experience upon graduating secondary school accounted for 8 percent of the sample. Hometowns included representatives from Beijing, Shanghai, Dalian, Xinjiang Province, Shandong Province, Hubei Province, Sichuan Province, and Jilin Province. Urban residents accounted for 64 percent of the population pool, and 36 percent came from a rural background. The fifteen participants residing in North Carolina had lived in the United States for an average of 10.5 years. Family church, or house church, participation accounted for 63 percent of the sample, and

37 percent were associated with the TSPM.

Surveys

Participant responses to the survey were organized around four themes, which included: 1) The changing dynamics of Chinese families relating to economics and freedom; 2)

Christian faith and gender equality; 3) A Christian ethic of life and social justice; and 4) The relationship between religion and government. Once these overarching patterns within the data were consolidated they were analyzed to identify similarities presented in

Chapter Five between the Early Church’s response to abortion and gendercide and

Chinese Christians’ response in the context of the One-Child Policy. 

The first theme is significant as this study attempts to connect the importance of sociological issues with the growth of Christianity. With the transformation of family structure and an evolution of family values into an increasingly urban Chinese context, Christians have distinctive opportunities to display a Christian value system in the way they disciple their families.

The theme of the connection between Christian faith and gender equality is important as this study attempts to demonstrate similarities between the Early Church response to sex-selective abortion and infanticide and the Chinese Christian response to sex-selective abortive practices. Specifically, Christians have a distinctly different view concerning the respective value of gender in comparison to the non-Christian population in China. Christians affirm that women are made in the image of God in the same way that men are. 

The third theme of this study serves to illustrate another similarity between Chinese Christians and the Early Church. Chinese Christians demonstrate a gospelcentered ethic of human life and family through their moral choices in which every human being is treated as unique gifts from God. This includes the unborn as Christians refuse to abort their children and sometimes take extreme measures to carry their children to term. 

The final theme of the relationship between religion and government is important to this study as it shows the commitment of Chinese Christians to the Bible as their ultimate authority. While participants acknowledge their duty as Christians to obey the governing authorities, they also disclose how their faith informs their unwillingness to comply with unbiblical public policy. This addresses the research question: What effect does a Christian ethic of life have on the growth of Christianity in a totalitarian society? By remaining faithful to the truth of the Gospel, Christians are able to persist in obedience and multiply both biologically and through conversion.

The Changing Dynamics of Chinese Families

Each of the participants verified that the dynamics of family life in China have changed drastically over the past three to four decades. These changes can be grouped into three categories: economic development, social engineering, and cultural diffusion.^[438] Families have shrunk in direct response to rapid economic growth and to family planning policies. The study’s participants came from a wide range of family patterns including single person households, single parent households, households with multiple children, and dual income households.

NCFDL had multiple siblings and came from a rural background in southwest China. He agreed that China’s social structure is changing, particularly in the realm of family. NCFDL suggested that in traditional China women made the important decisions, however today decisions are generally mutual.^[439] Due to recent economic and technological growth the younger generation was able to earn substantially higher wages than its parents. Because of wage increases, the current generation had the power to make decisions and had freedom to challenge traditional patterns of behavior. NCFDL surmised that in modern China those who did well economically were empowered to make decisions for the family and had freedom to determine their own course.

Consequently, older generations were more likely to listen to their children’s opinions. 

NCKLL, a Ph.D. student agreed, “My parents’ generation moved to the city. This led to quite a bit of change. People have access to more money now.” DLM, an unmarried millennial, highlighted the willingness of families to move from rural areas to  urban centers. She said that she witnessed change in family dynamics, particularly over the last decade. In the past the father worked outside the home while the mother tended to domestic life and the father’s mother had the most authority in the family. In 2018, each parent worked outside the home, the grandparents played a significant role in raising the children, and the wife was more important than the husband’s mother. DLM referenced the out of balance sex ratio and commented that since it is difficult for men to find wives, the mother-in-law no longer had primary authority, which served to facilitate potential marriage partners as potential wives felt more autonomy.

The lines of authority have transferred to younger sons and daughters in the work force as a new generation bore the majority of labor demands. Meanwhile the older generation stayed behind in the countryside and took care of the family and grandchildren.^[440] NCFDL noted, however, that in general the younger generation still felt like it has the responsibility to take care of their parents. Particularly in the context of the

One-Child Policy, “only children” bore the weight of a substantial “social burden” to care for each set of parents.^[441] It was not unusual for children to have bought a house for their parents near their own residence. NCJIY also mentioned the reality of families living together. The grandparents took care of the children while the parents worked during the week.

            NCDLH, a millennial Christian, emphasized the change to family structure, and the decrease in family size. As he grew up in rural southwest China the majority of his classmates fit the “only child” pattern. NCMLL, another millennial living in the United States, shared that his childhood experience was filled with friends who were the only child in their respective families. NCJIY affirmed that families were becoming increasingly smaller as a consequence of social engineering. 

NCTQQ, a software engineer in the United States, mentioned that for her Boomer

Generation two children was considered a small family. In 2018, the nuclear family in

China typically fit the 4–2–1 pattern suggested by family planning officials in the 1970s.^[442] Normally, NCJIY said, this new arrangement was satisfactory. However, if the  parents came from different locations then this presented logistical problems for the family. For example, which set of grandparents received a visit during Spring Festival? NCJIY solved this conundrum by inviting her parents to live with her family for an entire year. 

NCLYS, a mother of three preschoolers, shared a consequence of the 4–2–1 family dynamic known throughout China as “The Little Emperor.” According to LYS, this new reality was directly attributable to the One-Child Policy. Each child had six adults that focused on that child’s every need. NCTQQ commented that the family treated  this one child like a “treasure.” The result of being the center of attention, according to NCLYS, is that these children were spoiled. They did not care what anyone else had to say and were quick to quit when life became difficult. They had no desire to pursue a vocation and work hard because they believed that their family would take care of them.^[443] NCJMZ, a business consultant residing in the United States, observed that these “little emperors” drove expensive cars and assumed money was the answer to all of life’s difficulties. They frequently cheated in school because they did not care about the consequences and believed their parents would always provide them with finances to live comfortably.

Whereas in previous generations families were able to gather together with extended relations, it was much more difficult to have this sort of family interaction with a small nuclear family. NCJEY, a stay-at-home mother, grieved this change in society. She shared a recent conversation with her mother, who was one of seven siblings. Every week her mother gathered with her sisters and brothers and played mahjong and shared a meal. NCJEY believed this kind of camaraderie is what should characterize family and lamented the fact that her generation did not make the same effort to gather. According to  NCJEY, Generation X, was too busy with their own children. Even when she traveled to her hometown, she rarely encountered her own cousins as their time was consumed with the demands of parenting. NCJEY related the story of a Chinese New Year’s celebration, which was hosted by her mother. Each of her uncles and aunts attended the party, but  NCJEY’s generation of family did not attend. She speculated that perhaps they would visit friends instead, and ultimately, this change in family dynamics led to a sense of loneliness and isolation. NCLYS concurred with NCJEY’s assessment. NCLYS shared that her parents’ family was very large. Both her mother and father had three siblings. Like NCJEY’s parents, NCLYS’s uncles and aunts gathered together during festivals and celebrated Chinese New Year together. However, NCLYS is an “only child,” and her generation of cousins was not particularly close. She agreed that her cousins lived separate lives, and without siblings her family life was secluded. NLH, an expectant mother from western China, shared that her extended family visited their siblings less than they saw their neighbors.

NCDLH mentioned a shift in generational preference for relocation. When his family moved from the countryside to a city, his grandmother chose to stay in her hometown instead of moving with the rest of the family. She preferred to stay in a closeknit environment with high levels of familiarity where various families frequently interacted with one other. DSL suggested that her grandmother’s preference was informed by the reality of city life in China where it was extremely difficult to build relationships with neighbors. NCKLL also observed this shift in culture, “In my parents’ generation everyone lived in the same province, but now people live everywhere.” NCJOZ had one son. In 2018 she had lived in the United States for less than a year while her husband resided and worked in China. She discussed the impact of education on the changing dynamics of family and how it had impacted economics and freedom in China. In the past, NCJOZ reminisced, China’s population was poorly educated and was generally reluctant to send children to school due to financial limitations. NCJOZ, who holds a Ph.D., said that in 2018 people were much better educated as young parents desired for their children to receive advantageous educations. There was an “underneath current,” according to NCJOZ, which ran through familial society and resulted in children receiving a better education that led to wider economic opportunities and greater freedom for their future.

Because of the change in family dynamics, Christians have the opportunity to live out their faith as they disciple their family. They are able to not only intentionally engage their own extended family, but they can also reach out to their neighbors who are experiencing loneliness as they live an increasingly isolated lifestyle. Through the church fellowship, they can meet material needs and develop rich community, particularly for those who have moved away from their families into urban environments. Christians can also develop strategic family ministries including private education options that minister to a variety of familial structural patterns. Through increased economic freedom, younger generations have the potential to live out their Christian faith among minority groups in remote geographic locations throughout China.

Christian Faith and Gender Equality

The majority of participants in this study agreed that considerations of gender equality have shifted over the years. Unlike secular society, Christians generally continued to choose to give birth to daughters and treated them with equal dignity and worth throughout the thirty-five years of the One-Child Policy.

Before Conversion  

NCTQQ became a Christian in the early 2000s due to the influence of a Christian professor in her life. One of six children, NCTQQ had three brothers and two sisters. She summarized her experience, “My mother did all of the cooking, and she was housewife. In her mind, it was the girl’s duty to take care of all the housework. If there was a girl at home, then the boys should not do any housework! And before I knew Jesus I treated my father like a god. We did not believe in the existence of any god, but we trusted that my father always had the right answers. We gave him great respect.” NCTQQ went on to receive the highest education of any of her siblings—a Ph.D. in the United States. While her mother allowed her daughters to receive an education, which was unusual in her generation, NCTQQ’s mother still held to a hierarchy where boys possessed more value than girls, and this included her grandchildren. She loved her children and her grandchildren equally, according to NCTQQ, but treated her grandsons as more important than her granddaughters. 

NCJOZ shared her experience of gender privileges with education. She said that when she was a young girl all of her female friends wanted to attend school, but their parents prohibited education for girls. Consequently, they grew up hating their fathers because their prospects were limited. NCJOZ revealed that her neighbors laughed at her father for sending his daughters to school. 

NCLGG, age 65, and a Christian for eight years, shared an example of how his parents viewed gender in language. The Chinese word for grandchild is s?nzi. NCLGG’s mother had a total of six grandchildren—four boys and two girls. She referred to her grandchildren as y? s?nzi (1^st grandchild), èr s?nzi (2^nd grandchild), s?n s?nzi (3^rd grandchild), and sì s?nzi (4^th grandchild). According to NCLGG, she did not have a name for her granddaughters and told others that she only had four grandchildren. NCJOZ shared her experience with her grandparents, “My grandfather really loved boys and did not want any girls. Because of my sister and I, my Mother was not treated well by her parents.” NCJOZ struggled with malnutrition as an infant and toddler, which contributed to a frustrated family environment because she was not wanted due to her propensity for illness. She shared that a common perception in the rural area where she grew up was a sense of shame for those who could not give birth to a son. NCDLH also commented on gender regarding a sense of shame. He said, “There is a big difference in the way boys and girls are viewed by families. When I was born I was important because I was a boy. My grandmother only had one grandson—me! My mother said she felt like I had honored our family.” 

This value discrepancy was traced to customs surrounding the institution of marriage according to 60 percent of the participants. NCTQQ clarified, “When a girl is married, she becomes a part of another family.” NCLYS agreed that boys were seen as more important because when they married the wife came to live with the family, and any income she made came to her husband’s family. He stated, “When a daughter marries she joins a new household and her income contributes solely to her new family.”^[444] NCJEY shared her experience regarding family names. After her marriage she did not change her family name. Instead, she was known as Mrs. (husband’s family name). NCJEY said that this practice was quite common in China. Furthermore, NCJEY’s in-laws had a very popular surname and prepared male descendants’ names well ahead of time as the female’s name was immaterial.

Several participants pointed to the reality that in a traditional rural economy, it was necessary for families to have sons to work the fields. NCKLL, who had an older sister, shared that his parents paid a significant amount of money to the local family planning committee in order to have a second child. They were willing to pay the “social compensation fee” because of their strong desire for a son. NCJMZ added that the importance placed upon a son is because traditionally it is the male heir that inherited the business of the father.

NCJIY suggested that in modern families with high levels of education, there was a higher regard for gender equality. However, she also shared the experience of a good friend in an urban center. Her friend’s husband had two sisters and recently discovered that his parents desired to leave all inheritance to him, and leave nothing to his sisters.

His parents’ rationale was that his sisters would depart to become part of another family and be taken care of through a different family network. NCJIY noted that in urban families it was frequently the daughters, single or married, who bore the responsibility of caring for her aging parents. However, they were unable to claim any property rights or inheritance.  

NCMNN, a single female in the United States, emphatically denied that there had been significant change regarding gender equality. She exclaimed, “All of our leaders are men! If you are a woman you have to be beautiful and sacrifice yourself to older men in order to have any influence.”^[445] NCMNN’s experience in the entertainment industry was a constant struggle to maneuver through bureaucratic channels to accomplish her job. She claimed that she was consistently harassed and extorted by men looking for money or sexual favors. NCJMZ agreed with NCMNN’s assessment. He claimed that there were no women serving in the Politburo and blamed the communist political system.^[446] CTU also agreed. She shared that there were recent “high-profile murders” of young women at the hands of taxi and DiDi drivers.^[447] She referenced the occasional leaked footage of company holidays or promotional events during which women were made to kiss or withstand groping from their male superiors. 

NCJEY, who resides in the United States, mentioned the reactions of her friends 

to her living situation as a stay-at-home mother. “My friends say you are so lucky!” NCJEY shared. They said, “We have to work every day to make money, but you are able to stay home and raise your children.” NCJEY’s cousin gave birth to a son in 2018. After  the delivery she turned all responsibility for raising her child over to her mother. NCJEY observed, “Her mother takes care of everything! My children and I have a good relationship—we are closer than my cousin’s relationship with her son.”

After Conversion  

In the participant pool, 94 percent affirmed that male and female are equal in the sight of God and have the same dignity and worth. NCFDL stated that in his family, they did not see any difference between the sexes, and this belief came directly from their Christian faith. He stated, “I feel like life is from God and God created every human being in his image—male and female.” 

DLM, a school administrator with three brothers, agreed that life comes from God. Before she became a Christian she listened to her parents quarrel, and it filled her with despair. She considered taking her own life. Eventually her father committed suicide. DLM’s faith in Jesus changed her heart. She believed that God is the only one who can give or take life away.

NCASL described how her parents’ Christian faith influenced their views on gender equality. She grew up in extreme poverty where her family was unable to even celebrate birthdays, but her mother and father considered boys and girls as equals. NCASL had a similar experience with other female participants regarding educational opportunities. While her childhood girl friends were intelligent, and would have most likely done well in school, they were not allowed to attend. NCASL’s father gave her a chance to attend school. She attributed that to his Christian faith. 

YHM’s parents challenged the One-Child Policy. Her brother and sister were both raised by other family members as a consequence of her parents’ decision to have more children. YHM commented that her Christian mother vocally opposed the family planning policies of the government.

Based upon survey responses, Chinese Christians are in a unique position to allow their Christian faith to influence society with a Christian view on gender. A majority of the participants agreed that their faith allowed them to advocate for societal change where women also receive property and inheritance. They also choose to give birth to daughters and value them in the same way they would value a son. Their beliefs incorporate new customs into marriage conventions that equally value boys and girls. Christians are also able to advocate for the dignity and equality of women in the workplace.

A Christian Ethic of Life and Social Justice

NCTQQ shared her feelings concerning the One-Child Policy before she became a Christian. “When I was young,” she remembered, “I thought the One-Child policy was normal. I thought that it was acceptable to have one child and then to have an abortion. In fact, I had one abortion.” When she came to the United States as a university student, NCTQQ realized that her American classmates were interested in the topic of both coercive and elective birth control. NCTQQ recalled, “I told them that birth control was necessary to control the population.” One particular classmate asked NCTQQ if she believed abortion ended the life of a person. “At the time I did not think that,” NCTQQ said. “I did not think the fetus was a person.” NCTQQ did not come to believe that abortion was taking the life of a person until two years after she became a Christian. NCTQQ pointed out that as she grew up no one ever compared abortion to taking a life. It was an accepted reality of serving the nation.

            NCJEY also shared her experience with an abortion. At the time of her procedure, she felt no guilt. She never remembered having any kind of education that suggested the child growing inside her was a life. But everything changed when she became pregnant again years later with her daughter. She constantly wept as she remembered the child that she had aborted. As a trained nurse in China, she questioned herself. NCJEY recollected, “I was taught how to care for patients, but I never thought of them as human beings. I would consider them merely an object—not a person in real life. I was not a bad person before I became a Christian, but in my work when I saw that someone was terminally sick, or had poor quality of life, I would think to myself: You are not treatable and it is no use—you will not last long!” NCJEY shared a story of her time as a nurse, “One evening when I was on night shift an elderly lady knocked on my office door in the hospital at 2 A.M. She told me, ‘My husband urinated on the bed!’ I replied, ‘Go away! It is 2 A.M. Now, I cannot believe that I acted so unkindly. But in those days patients were almost seen as a nuisance.”

When NCJEY gave birth to her daughter in the United States, the nurses treated her like family. NCJEY was astounded that their attitude was so completely different than her own experience as a nurse. NCJEY continued, “I would talk to my friends in China who still worked as nurses in the hospital, and we reminisced over how our teachers

never told us to view patients like our own family. Most of my friends who work still do not see the patient as family. They think, ‘Go away! Don’t bother me!’” NCJEY suggested that the fundamental issue was that a culture without a Christian foundation did not see or treat patients as human beings—as people that were made in the image of God. As NCJEY reflected on these stories she commented that these experiences were what caused her heart to change and soften towards Jesus. 

NCTQQ shared one episode that took place in the United States before she became a follower of Jesus. She said, “One of my classmates in my university delivered a premature daughter with a hole in her heart. I could tell that this little girl was not normal. As she grew, she was physically weak, and mentally slow. One day I told my classmate that she was lucky. When she asked me to explain I informed her that if she lived in China her daughter would not be allowed to live.”  As NCTQQ reflected on this experience she shared, “I was a highly educated woman, and I still thought that if a child had a disability in the early stages of her life that she should be terminated. I had a totally different value system than I do now.”

NCTQQ’s classmate’s love for her daughter made a significant impact on her heart. She realized that many of her friends treasured life, and she wondered why. NCTQQ shared that in her formative years in China there were no facilities for the disabled. It was even considered acceptable to make fun of those who were handicapped. Each Chinese New Year featured sketches on television where it was commonplace to mock those with special needs. 

YHM believed that Christians were uniquely qualified to speak for life and to understand the complex issues surrounding the topic of social justice. She said, “Before I became a believer, I was aware of injustice affecting those around me, but I always thought that to advocate for the defenseless would be too difficult for me.” YHM knew that she was responsible to speak for those who were unable to speak for themselves.

NCTQQ never was acquainted with any Christians during her childhood. The first time she heard of Christianity was from one of her classmates who had returned to China from the United States. NCTQQ recalled that her classmate excitedly told her, “Lei Feng is alive in the United States!”^[448] One of Lei Feng’s most admired character traits was that he always took the opportunity to help people. During the Cultural Revolution people ceased to come to each other’s aid.^[449] No one helped another person for the sake of being kind. Consequently, when NCTQQ heard that Lei Feng was alive in the United States she was instantly curious. Her classmate continued, “They are called Christians! They will help you—even at great cost to themselves.” This was the first time NCTQQ was exposed to a concept of Christianity and it was why, many years later, an old Bible on her professor’s shelf fascinated her. She continued, “I asked him if I could look at it, and he gave it as a gift. I struggled reading it for quite a while. It was so difficult! But every

Friday evening his wife would pick me up and bring me to a Bible study.”

NCTQQ shared that even after becoming a Christian, God had progressively changed her deepest affections. Concerning the sanctity of human life and other social justice issues, she had experienced a “gradual change of faith in her heart” to where she came to see all life as precious in the sight of Jesus.

In contrast to NCTQQ, NCNLH was exposed to the gospel as a young girl when missionaries visited her town. Her aunt subsequently converted and faithfully  discipled NCNLH until her niece became a Christian. NLH described how her Christian faith has influenced her view of life and the responsibility of Christians in advocating for social justice. She mentioned that since she became a follower of Jesus eight years ago she felt the love and care of God in tangible ways. The church as the body of Christ had consistently poured out love in her life and provided her help through many transitions and difficult circumstances. Before she became a Christian, NCNLH shared how she participated in constant gossip with her friends. She constantly judged others, but after conversion she knew that God was the only one who judges. Not only did she recognize God as the only just judge, but Jesus also changed the way that she viewed people. Her Christian faith led her to believe that all of humanity was created in the image of God, and they were equal in the sight of God. Consequently, there was never any justification for the termination of life and no individual had more value than another. 

CTU, a stay-at-home mother in eastern China, shared that Psalm 139 spoke to the mystery of humans in the image of God. “For you formed my inward parts,” she recited, “you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made” (Ps 139:13–14a). Abortion, in CTU’s mind, was the taking of a human life which was given by God. WIX shared her story of becoming pregnant out of wedlock. Although she was a Christian, she considered having the baby aborted. Her parents begged her not to give birth since she was not married. She shared, “It was a hard struggle for me! But then I went to my pastor and his wife. They opened the Bible and reminded me of the biblical view of life and I decided to keep my baby.” WIX looked back on that time and realized that even if the government had ordered her to have an abortion she would have refused because life is precious to God.

While three of the participants acknowledged that on occasion the death penalty might be warranted, NCJMZ admitted to having second thoughts on this issue. He had witnessed too many incidents where the government had mistakenly executed an innocent man. With that one possibly exception, NCJMZ believed there was never a reason to take a human life. Consequently, his ethic of life had transformed since he became a Christian. His philosophy was “to do no evil,” and treat others in the same way that the Heavenly Father had treated him. NCJMZ argued that the difference between Christianity and all other religions is that Christians went the extra mile to serve their enemies as well as their friends. NCNLH was of the same mind and added that she believed Christians should be involved in social justice issues and in playing a role in restoring peace to a nation. She stated, “We are blessed so that we can bless others.” NCJIY observed that before she became a follower of Christ, she was only concerned with issues that impacted her family. She did not care how people experienced injustice in society. However, NCJIY’s Christian faith had changed her perspective and she believed that Christianity was crucial in addressing systemic injustice.

CTU referenced the admonition in James 1:27 to care for the orphans and widows in their affliction. She spoke of the pattern of God’s faithfulness throughout the Bible to care for the oppressed. She said, “Christians at all levels of society must be primarily concerned with bringing glory to God by keeping his commands to love him with all of our heart and soul and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.” CTU believed that Christians must be willing to involve themselves when “injustice is rewarded and righteousness is punished.” Followers of Jesus should be known as the most faithful servants and workers in society.

NCMNN shared how her faith impacted her view concerning the marginalized and the oppressed in society. In China, she was never exposed to people with disabilities. They were usually hidden away because society provided no considerations for those with handicaps. After she became a Christian and moved to the United States, she was awakened to the distorted reality in which she grew up—namely, that in a society without a concept of the image of God, those who were deemed “unproductive” or “disabled” were not given the same value as those who were “normal.” NCMNN recognized that the marginalized and oppressed were precious to God, and that Christians should be the first to care for those whom society rejected. 

NCASL also decried the injustice inherent in a culture that did not believe that humans were created in the image of God. Growing up in the 1960s and the 1970s, NCASL witnessed a total disregard for those born with special needs. Not only were baby girls left to die, but children with special needs were also exposed. Before she became a Christian in 2009, NCASL never thought much about these practices, but then her faith in Jesus opened her eyes. She learned to respect all people, and her small group at church adopted several handicapped children. NCASL lamented that those with special needs in China continued to be considered the “bottom of society.” 

NCLGG shared that before he became a Christian at fifty-seven, he did not care about the oppressed. He felt that it was the government’s responsibility to take care of the poor and provide justice for the marginalized. But over the previous five years God changed his heart. NCLGG quoted Matt 25:40, “And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’”

NCLGG desired to view people the way that God saw them—with love and compassion. NCJDE also affirmed the obligation of Christians to care for the oppressed. He stated that Christians were the means in this present age by which God brings justice to the earth. 

NCMLL stated, “I think we should always do something when we or others face injustice. The image of God requires justice for everyone. If a Christian witnesses a situation in which an individual or group is being treated unjustly they should help. Helping others should not be a matter of law or obligation, but rather an overflow of love, which God has poured out in the lives of his followers.” Because everyone was made in the image of God, NCMLL believed, there was never a justification to end someone’s life. Every person had the right to live. NCKLL concurred, “The image of God in men and women concerns justice for all.” For NCKLL, his relationship with Jesus influenced all of his decisions, actions, and motivations. He said that he always strived to live in a manner worthy of the Gospel. This included the core conviction that it is never permissible to terminate life. NCKLL believed that the first priority of a man is to lead

his family in following Jesus. This priority was an overflow of love poured out in a person’s life.

NCLYS applied this overflow of God’s love to how parents view children.

Christian parents have the privilege to take care of their children and lead them to God. NCLYS stated, “Children are a gift from God.” It was the responsibility of mothers and fathers to love their children well. NCLYS acknowledged that miscarriages occurred frequently in pregnancies, but her Christian faith had helped her to see that it was never acceptable to end a child’s life intentionally.

NCJOZ shared how her Christian faith changed the way she viewed life and her responsibility to speak for the exploited. Ten years ago, a friend invited NCJOZ to join her on a spiritual retreat. NCJOZ did not know what a “retreat” was, but she attended nonetheless. The camp pastor shared the good news of Jesus, and NCJOZ responded in faith and repentance. She began attending a local church, but struggled because it was difficult for her to understand the teachings. Eventually, her husband became a believer as well. NCJOZ shared, “I am so blessed. God has changed my heart. When I lived in

China I loved to read novels and so I would encounter the name of Jesus in my books.

But they were just a few words and never revealed much about him. After I became a Christian and began to attend church, my pastor would share from the Bible on the topic of the sanctity of human life.” NCJOZ related that as she began to grow in her faith, her new Christian friends consistently demonstrated the love of Jesus and treated her as “a precious child of God.” NCJOZ revealed how this love changed everything for her, “It was the first time in my life that I felt loved by someone that I did not know. Growing up, I thought that my parents loved me, but not anyone else. I was just a normal person— there was nothing special about me.” NCJOZ shared that she realized every life was precious to God, and that he unconditionally loved women and men. Before conversion,

NCJOZ used to rely on self-confidence to carry her through life, but then she realized that “Jesus treasures everyone and every person should be treated with the same unconditional love from the day that they are born until the day that they die.”

It was the Christ-like love of her community that also changed the lives of NCJOZ’s family. NCJOZ, who grew up in the countryside, remembered how her mother and father worshiped a local god. In the village there were many temples and an assortment of “fake gods.” NCJOZ stated, “My parents and the other villagers wanted god, but they did not know who a real God was. There were gods in charge of all aspects of life—the kitchen, money, health, and many more. In our village everyone believed that ghosts walked the streets. We did not know at that time that there was only one true

God.”

NCJOZ related how years later her parents visited when her son was born in the United States. When she shared with her father that she had become a Christian, he laughed at her and was incredulous. “I even took him to church once,” she said, “but he told me that I had come to the United States to attain an advanced education, not to be indoctrinated by a western religion.” Then her parents began to meet other Christians and listened to the teaching of the Bible. “And their minds began to change dramatically,” NCJOZ laughed. All her parents had ever known was the hopeless lie that they were on their own and had to fight for their survival. NCJOZ acknowledged, “This was what I was told as I grew up. But I knew God could change their hearts! My parents saw how my friends loved on my family when my son was born. They could not believe that these strangers would care about our family in such a profound way. One day my parents watched The Jesus Film, and they confessed Jesus as Lord and Savior! They were baptized soon after. My mother decided that she wanted to give up the false gods that our family had worshiped for so many years. But we had so many of them! We did not know what to do with all of the idols? When my parents returned to China my mother gathered all of the handmade idols in a large rice sack and threw them in the dump!” 

NCJOZ shared that her mother and father had to pay a substantial fine when they gave birth to her younger brother, but she believed that every child is worth the money and that there was never cause to abort a child. She recounted the story of her aunt, her mother’s younger sister, who became pregnant out of quota. The baby was virtually full term, and her aunt was taken in a truck along with every other pregnant woman in the village to the hospital. There was no place to hide and no way to refuse. NCJOZ’s cousin was aborted, and she remembered those days as terrible and cruel.

By 2018, NCJOZ’s family found a family church to attend. Her father had retired from work and was studying music so that he could help lead the church in worship. NCJOZ concluded the story of her parents, “God saved my family! We were always optimistic about life even in all of its hardships, but now we have confidence in Jesus.”

NCMNN shared her story of life before she became a follower of Jesus. Upon graduation from college at the age of twenty-three she worked for the government. It was a job arranged for her by family, and they were proud of her accomplishments. She was employed by the local family planning committee, and it seemed like the perfect career.

The pay was remarkable, but most of the money “came under the table.” In her new role NCMNN wielded considerable power throughout the city. For example, if an individual serving in the local municipal government had out of quota children, NCMNN would remove the leader from office. She was able to influence people’s careers. Because of this control, NCMNN and her department were consistently showered with “gifts.” 

NCMNN related, “We were able to do many different things, and I never had to pay. I would even give all of my salary back to my mother because the government paid for everything—my housing, clothes, and vacations. They even hired a gourmet chef to come and cook meals for us each day. I never had to eat regular food while I worked this job.” 

Despite the financial and social privileges, NCMNN submitted her resignation after one year of work. NCMNN said, “I saw terrible things so I had to quit. I was only twenty-three years old, and even though I was not yet a Christian I felt like my soul was innocent. Though at first my work seemed like a dream, I realized that it was bad for me.” 

Several times a week, NCMNN and her colleagues traveled to various hospitals in the city to check on birth quotas. Mothers who desired multiple children would go into hiding after becoming pregnant. NCMNN’s team hired men “like the mafia” whose job was to locate these expectant mothers. Even if the “mafia” was unable to track down the mothers, NCMNN still had other options. She would go to the family and make threats.

NCMNN recalled, “We would tell parents that if they did not divulge where their daughters were hiding we would destroy their house or sometimes kill their cows. Many of these people were poor and only had a few cows for their livelihood. Most of the time families would protect their children and we would carry out our threats.” NCMNN’s team even had a professional car that everyone in the city recognized. If they found women violating family planning policy, then would take the women away in the car and “destroy” the children. Sometimes the mothers also died as a consequence of late term abortions.

When NCMNN quit her job her parents were devastated. They had exercised an enormous amount of guanxi and paid a large sum of money for NCMNN to secure a lucrative career.^[450] NCMNN shared with her parents what she had experienced, but they either did not believe her or just did not care. NCMNN concluded, “Even today, sometimes when I sleep I still dream of the women weeping for their children. They are hopeless, and I am responsible. I still can see their houses being destroyed. I saw many terrible things that year. My colleagues were so kind to one another and to me. But they were like devils to the poor and to anyone who dared to oppose them.”

NCDLH disclosed that for many years Chinese families would use ultrasound technology for sex screening. It was not until 1995, fifteen years after the official commencement of the One-Child Policy, that China’s government banned the use of ultrasounds in prenatal care.^[451] Before he became a Christian, NCDLH shared that his self-image and self-esteem was extremely poor. He was in a particularly competitive class in middle school and felt like he could never adequately perform. His value was found solely in his schoolwork, and consequently he felt worthless. After he became a follower of Jesus in 2009, he discovered that his worth was not measured in his performance, but in his identity as a son of God. 

Regarding social justice NCDLH believed that Christian faith should always impact society in ways that point to the goodness of God. He quoted Matt 5:13–14, “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.” Christian behavior was characterized by care for those who cannot speak for themselves, and there was never justification for taking the life of the unborn. The mandate given to Christians by Jesus was to live as salt and light in society.

NCFDL affirmed that life is a gift from God and that God created every human being in his image, thereby declaring each life as sacred. While NCFDL agreed that the Bible taught that Christians have the responsibility to help the poor and oppressed, he suggested that compassion should be a choice—an overflow of the heart—and not an act legislated by government. In his opinion, legislated social justice was equivalent to communism, which forced individuals to act in a certain way. Instead, NCFDL suggested, Christians are to live with a different ethic. They were to serve others unconditionally, even at great cost to themselves, because this was the grace that had been extended to them through Jesus.

According to the surveys, the participants in the study overwhelmingly agreed that Christian faith causes believers to live out a different value system than the rest of Chinese society. Christians are to advocate for an ethic of life in which every human being is treated with dignity and significance. This includes the unborn as Christians refuse to abort their children and are able to educate others that life begins at conception. Christians can also show compassion to those who are sick and to those with special needs and take part in the transformation of patient care in the medical industry. Christian parents have the privilege and responsibility to disciple their children who have been fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God.

The Relationship between Religion and Government

According to NCTQQ, Christians cannot separate their faith from social issues. She realized that this is a sensitive topic, and that some people in the church consistently voted in one manner and did not think through the consequences. “How can we say that we are against abortion,” NCTQQ asked, “but on the other hand we do not consider the issue of abortion when we vote?”

            MLP, an environmental scientist, suggested that the government was fearful of Christians because it believed Christians had the power to enact change. It was because of this concern that the government actively sought to suppress Christianity. MLP gave an example of government control, and what she believed could be an effective way for Christians to engage with political leaders. MLP recollected, “After the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan many Christian organizations came together to offer humanitarian aid to the families of the deceased, the injured, and the families of the missing. They generously provided medical care, food, and clothing. The government, though, feared that the Christians were proselytizing so they enforced strict controls that limited the help that was being given to the people.”^[452] MLP believed that if Chinese Christians could continue to help those in need and sacrificially gave to those who suffered, it would allow the government to see how beneficial Christianity could be for the nation. 

Concerning the rights that citizens have in relating to local municipal leaders, NCTQQ did not believe that people have any way to relate to leaders. They simply have to obey as there was no election system. Instead, local leaders were assigned from the highest levels of government down to the village level. NCJEY agreed and added that Chinese leaders considered themselves as belonging to the upper echelon of society. Just like the Pharisees, they would not talk to “normal people” who were not like them and would only socialize with others in government. NCJEY thought that this social discrepancy explained why many Chinese came to the west. She stated, “In China people are not able to have their own life, but when they come to the west they can. For example, if the mayor of a city in China had a son who decided he wanted to marry a particular girl, and the girl refused his advances, then the girl would be in serious  trouble!” NCJEY believed that the elite could take advantage of others indiscriminately.

She shared an example of her brother-in-law who was a government employee. Similar to NCMNN’s story, almost all of his needs were taken care of by his place of work. Even his mother was looked after and received boxes of fruit and produce every week. While “normal people” had to pay when they visited restaurants, her sister’s family only had to sign their name. The same was true when they went on vacation or visited spas and resorts.

NCMLL suggested that only higher party officials had the right to remove leaders from municipal positions. He gave an example from his hometown. The mayor received bribes and did a poor job of covering up his crimes. His actions tainted other leaders, and they rallied to remove him from his position. They had no desire to be associated with him because he had been caught. NCMLL suggested that they too were guilty of the same corruption. 

NCJEY shared the example of how her uncle, a CEO for a local business, was able to meet the mayor of their city, but only when he appeared on the same television show. She said, “They never had any personal meetings. And the mayor never asked my uncle personal questions about our family. It was all set up for TV.” NCJEY asserted that in order to be involved with the government an individual must belong to the Chinese Communist Party. Only then could an individual be nominated for a position of leadership.

NCTQQ proposed that local leaders could be removed from their position. She stated, “If a leader does not belong to the right group then they will rid themselves of that leader. For example, when Xi came to power he said he was going to stop rampant corruption throughout all levels of government. And he did send many people to prison. But in reality, he was ridding himself of leaders who opposed him!” NCLYS added that in the large city where she grew up it was possible for changes to take place in leadership because of scandal or corruption, but many times the higher authorities would simply find a different geographic locale to which the disgraced leader could be transferred and retain the same powers. NCLGG described local municipal leaders, particularly in rural areas, as “little emperors” who held tremendous power over the population. 

NCJEY advocated for Christians to be involved in local government. When Christians were involved, there was the opportunity for “much good to be done.” NCFDL agreed, “We should participate in the political system because we live in this world.”

NCFDL pointed out that the political sphere overlaps the Kingdom of God, and therefore Christians should be re-directing it toward its true purpose—servants who provided the people with justice. CTU added that Christians must be respectful in their interactions with leaders. She referenced Titus 3:1–2, “Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.”

NCJIY had a different opinion regarding Christian involvement and believed that Christians should not be engaged in the government. Her reasoning was that involvement led to compromise with Christian faith. She insisted that Christianity should influence the way people behave and the way they view others, but that this was almost impossible to accomplish in a government position. NCJIY gave the example of the complicated

history of the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) in China.^[453] The RCC was under the control of the CCP and not Rome. NCJIY explained, “Catholics are required to function in obedience to the Communist Party. The government tells us that we have freedom of religion, but if you associate yourself with a particular religion you are required to register with the government. Everyone must obey the rules of the Communist Party.” SHT, an attorney in northern China, disagreed. He thought that as a Christian he was more obedient to the government than before he became a believer. However, he also felt a greater desire to inform the government of any immoral action taken against the people. The Bible was the only source of authority, SHT affirmed. YHM’s story was similar to SHT in that she felt that before she became a Christian she was more apt to rebel against the government. Now she sensed an obligation to respect, honor and obey her leaders unless they were in direct conflict with the Bible. 

LHQ referenced the story of Jesus’ encounter with the Pharisees in the Gospel of

Matthew, “Then Jesus said to them, ‘Whose likeness and inscription is this?’ They said, ‘Caesar’s.’ Then he said to them, ‘Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s’” (Matt 22:15–22). Christian faith could play a significant role in an individual’s relationship with the government, but believers must be careful to never equate political power with favor from God.

NCTQQ described China’s political system as a complicated network of guanxi.

She commented, “Very few people understand the concept of ‘citizen.’ They don’t know  their rights! I did not know about this until living in the United States for many years.” NCLYS concurred, “Growing up in school we knew that we had some rights, but whatever these rights were, we were never clear. I think women have the right to apply for the same job as a man, and we have a right to speak up to the government, but of course no one does that.” 

NCTQQ believed that most Chinese Christians were not aware of the responsibilities of citizens because they were raised in a context where the government was like the emperor. She pointed out that many Chinese people thought that if President Xi Jinping died, then his children should inherit his position. NCTQQ remembered that when Mao passed away in 1976, she despaired because he did not have a son, and she thought the world would end. She was young and inexperienced and believed that many Chinese were still naïve when it came to politics. 

            NCNLH shared her experience with the complex relationship of government and religion. Many parents in the Boomer generation did not care about religion in China, she suggested. Instead they advised their children to only believe in themselves. For example, her grandparents were only concerned with having their identity in the Chinese Communist Party. NCNLH’s hometown in western China was a particularly “sensitive” area. Foreigners were not allowed in the village and no more than 15–20 people were ever allowed to gather in one place. She remembered one family church that gathered each Sunday at a different location and at a different time to avoid the police. In 2018, NCNLH believed that the government still placed pressure on Christians. NCMNN agreed, “Our lives are controlled by the government, so at times I felt very afraid. It is impossible for a normal person to have a relationship with leaders. If the government treats you unfairly you may not speak out because if you criticize then it means the leader is not doing good work. You can only say that everything is perfect. If I talk negatively then I will disappear.”

            NCJOZ shared her involvement working in the local government. She remembered, “Every year we would receive a note from our department, and it would ask one question: ‘Are you a Christian? If not, what is your religion?’ If you answered in the affirmative, then the note would go into your personnel file.” NCJOZ’s husband counseled her to leave the survey blank, but NCJOZ was not so sure. Several friends who worked as journalists agreed with NCJOZ’s husband and told her that it would be acceptable to not answer the question. As a Christian, however, she desired to live boldly for her faith and had confidence in God. She knew that if she marked “Yes,” there could be trouble and her social credit could suffer, but that her future was in God’s hands and that he was capable of working all things together for her good. NCASL also worked for the government and confirmed that it was dangerous to confess faith in Jesus in a political setting as China’s leaders were particularly wary of “western influence,” including Christianity.

            NCJMZ spoke of the prevalence of “social credit reviews” in society. If an individual had spoken out against the government or had fallen out of favor with local leaders, then he or she received “bad social credit.” The consequences were severe: an inability to purchase airplane or train tickets, leave China, or for children to attend certain schools. NCJMZ pointed out that many times an individual’s social credit stemmed from what they posted on social media like WeChat.^[454] 

NCFDL admitted that the question of how an individual responded to government policies with which he disagreed had been a struggle for many Chinese Christians. On the one hand, he read the Bible and knew that he should live out his faith in certain ways. On the other hand, he recognized that in order to survive socially, he had to make hard choices. CTU counseled that in response to unjust policies Christians should respond with honesty and humility. Followers of Jesus should speak the truth plainly, gently and respectfully without stirring up unnecessary division or hostility.

According to NCTQQ, it was very difficult for Christians to openly oppose policies. She gave the example of posting on WeChat. If someone uploaded a post criticizing the government, censors immediately deleted the content.^[455] Group moderators on WeChat were held responsible for what members of the group posted. NCTQQ mentioned a university classmate who secured a government post. This friend warned her family that they had to be cautious about what they posted online, and that they also needed to pass this warning on to their friends. If any posts crossed the line, NCTQQ shared that the local police would summon the offender to the station to “have tea.” 

NLH agreed and stated that individuals are not that important in society. Her family never had any relationship with government leaders. NCNLH believed that many Chinese were tempted, because of their mild manner, to respond to laws with which they disagree with passive resistance. She disagreed with NCTQQ, however, regarding the inefficacy of posting on WeChat. NCNHL suggested that people would publish dissenting opinions despite knowing that such posts would be quickly removed. Social solidarity placed pressure on the government. She believed that even Christians had the ability to oppose unbiblical policies. NCNHL summarized, “Christians know that even if the government acts against them, their brothers and sisters in Christ will support them and meet their needs. As Christians we must be brave because we know that God goes before us. Christians should change society. Society should never change Christians.”

NCJIY also affirmed the positive pressure Christians could exert on the government through information technology. She stated, “These days, we can write and publish pieces online. Through social media citizens can express their opinions. We do not write formal papers and hand them to the authorities, but we are able to publish our own work.” NCJIY gave an example of the power of social media, “Yesterday, a man refused to give up his seat on a high speed train to a woman who had purchased a ticket for that seat. The woman tried to reason with him, but he gave many excuses. Even the conductor and security guards came and asked him to vacate the seat, but he still refused. He told them that he was ill and could not move. Well, someone recorded the entire episode and published it to WeChat. Now, the entire nation is aware of this man’s rude behavior, and many people began to investigate this man’s background. They discovered that he had participated in many bad behaviors in the past, and published all of these indiscretions for people to see. In one day, this man’s reputation was ruined!” NCJIY suggested that this episode was just a small example of how people were able to express their opinion and how quickly information could be spread. Every individual had the means to make their voice known.  

NCMLL agreed with passive resistance as a realistic tactic. If the government issued an edict he would outwardly obey to protect himself and family and friends, but he would look for ways to subtly subvert the law. When a hospital employed him in southern China his supervisor frequently issued instructions with which NCMLL disagreed. While realizing that he would likely lose his job if he did not comply, NCMLL consistently worked to make conscientious compromises in how he carried out the policies. NCJOZ shared that she knows many mothers who went into hiding when they conceived an illegal child. She compared their plight to that of Exodus 2 when Moses’ mother placed him in a basket in the reeds by the riverbank to escape Pharaoh’s edict.

            EJ, a married teacher in northern China, disclosed that despite the shift from a  One-Child Policy to a Two-Child Policy, there was still significant government control and pressure in matters relating to family planning. EJ shared, “Recently my wife went for a prenatal checkup, and the doctor asked her if she wanted to have an amniocentesis to screen for any developmental abnormalities in the baby. The hospital wanted to do this procedure so that we could choose to abort our child if any defects were found. My wife at first politely declined, but the doctor strongly encouraged her to allow the test and told her that it was free—it was financed by our local government!” EJ’s wife refused the amniocentesis and courteously informed the doctor that she believed God was in control. EJ commented that doctors in China were ordered by family planning offices to strongly encourage these procedures so that they could abort the infant in cases of suspected birth defects. 

NCFDL suggested that sometimes Christians resigned themselves to the belief that they were thinking too idealistically, but at other times they disagreed with policies “in a hidden way.” NCFDL stated, “Some Christians begin with a veneer of compliance, but then they gradually increase their disobedience as they feel out the situation.” NCFDL insisted that China was very similar to the United States—some Christians lived according to a biblical standard while others decided to live their own way.

Several of the participants mentioned that the generally mild personality of the Chinese people contributed to the complexity of disobeying government policy. NCLYS attributed this to group think, summed up by the Chinese proverb, “The fewer should follow the many.” She stated that many non-Christians would follow others’ opinions, particularly if they were generated from a position of power because citizens were not confident in their own beliefs. 

The majority of participants in the study agreed that the political situation in

China in 2018 was more tightly controlled than any period in the past thirty years.

NCTQQ commented, “Everyone believes that we are not too far from another Chinese Cultural Revolution.” NCJOZ agreed, “In previous years we were able to buy Bibles online, but now we are unable to do so.” NCDLH observed, “These days the government has more control over religion than when I was growing up. Under the current leadership, policy is changed frequently. The government is fearful of having too many people meet together in one place.” EJ remarked that the government is confiscating more property and houses than ever before.

NCLGG lamented the limited options of Chinese Christians to influence policy decisions. He referenced President Xi Jinping’s reversal of Chinese law in March 2018 to provide unlimited terms for Chinese presidents.^[456] LGG exclaimed, “What can people do about this? They cannot do anything!” While decrying the power of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), NCLGG referenced Rom 13:1, “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” He acknowledged that all those in authority make  mistakes, but NCLGG also asserted that Christians should not obey any laws that violate

Christian ethics. 

NCJMZ suggested that Christians could be “wise as serpents and innocent as doves” (Matt 10:16) as they sought for ways to affect change from within without criticizing the CCP openly. NCJEY remarked that Chinese Christians were extremely shrewd when it came to figuring out how to maneuver around policies with which they disagree. NCJMZ also referenced the control that the Religious Affairs Bureau had over TSPM churches. He stated, “At church services government monitors will write down your name if you attend—or if you say anything deemed out of line.” 

JDE took a more proactive stance regarding passive resistance. “Chinese

Christians are free!” he insisted. Christians can be involved with the government and even communicate with the government, but they should always do so respectfully, in a manner that is “low key.” Of course, they should never claim that they desire to overthrow the government. NCJDE said, “Christians should be nameless preachers.” JDE believed in the necessity of a separation between church and state, and that the state should not require everyone to convert to Christianity; rather, the state should seek justice  for all of its citizens. NCFDL also affirmed the separation of church and state. He suggested that in China the church and the state are unified as the official religion of the state is atheism. 

NCJOZ also spoke on monitors present in TSPM services. For many years she attended a TSPM church in a large city in northern China. While the congregation was quite large, they were aware that government employees recorded their words. She shared a report that she received from her family, “Just yesterday I heard from my brother about a church that was closed by the authorities and the cross on the building was removed. They were told that they had too many people and had to cease meeting.” 

NCDLH expressed how both family churches and TSPM churches pray for the government. They both recognized that God has given authority to the government to serve the citizens. DLH’s issue with the TSPM was that like many other participants in the study, he did not believe that government should either limit the church or limit what an individual could believe about God. While he recognized that the Bible admonishes Christians to respect authority, the actions of China’s leaders often made that very difficult for him.

While the question of engagement with government policy is a complex issue for Chinese Christians, it is reasonable to conclude from the interviews that the participants in the study consider the Bible as their ultimate authority and are willing to comply with public policy only as far as it aligns with Christian values. A majority of participants (65 percent) specifically mentioned that even in disagreement they should be respectful when addressing their leaders following Paul’s admonition to Titus. Additionally, 57 percent of participants affirmed that Christians can be involved in local government when given the opportunity, but should be careful not to compromise their faith.

Conclusion

This study examined how the Christian faith of Chinese men and women impacts the ways in which they view family, gender equality, social justice and their responsibility vis-à-vis the government. The four themes demonstrated that the human ethic of life valued by these Chinese Christians is derived from their Christianity and that this ethic can have an effect on the growth of Christianity in a totalitarian society regarding

fertility.

The research findings in this study suggested that Chinese Christians have unique opportunities to live out their faith as they disciple their families. Taking advantage of the rapid change in family dynamics Christians in urban centers can be intentional in ministering to their neighbors who are experiencing social isolation as a consequence of coercive family planning. Husband and wives could demonstrate the gospel as they mutually make decisions for the family in submission to one another and to the authority of the Bible.

The study also illuminated the difference that Christian ethics can make in regard to gender equality.^[457] Christians were able to advocate for the worth of both men and women, and affirmed that women were made in the image of God and received their identity and dignity in him. Unlike other Chinese, Christians continued to choose to give birth to daughters and provided them with the same opportunities that were available to their sons. Christians could promote the equality of women throughout society including the workplace and the home.

Chinese Christians actively displayed an ethic of life through their moral choices in which every human being was treated as a unique creation. This included the unborn as Christians refused to abort their children. Rather than viewing their children as assets they were able to see them as gifts from God. Christians could show kindness to the marginalized and oppressed to restore a culture of life and peace in China. Chinese Christians were in a distinctive position to meet the needs of those who were suffering or were experiencing injustice.

Finally, this study showed that Chinese Christians considered the Bible as their ultimate authority and were unwilling to comply with immoral public policy. Christianity was not merely what Christians believe but governed their choices. By remaining faithful to the truth of the gospel, Christians were able to persevere in obedience and simultaneously, albeit slowly, affect change.

CHAPTER 5

A CHRISTIAN RESPONSE AND PERSPECTIVE

The thesis of this dissertation was that the Early Church’s response to abortion and gendercide and the Chinese Christian family unit’s response to abortion and gendercide in the context of the One-Child Policy had similarities, and perhaps far reaching implications and lessons for the church today, particularly in its ministry to families. The research question that this dissertation addressed is what effect a Christian ethic of life has on the growth of Christianity in a totalitarian society.

Implications and Conclusions

This study attempted to connect the importance of sociological issues with the growth of

Christianity in a particular culture. Chapters Two and Four detailed how Chinese Christians have been forced to respond to social engineering in the form of a family planning policy that has resulted in the destruction of millions of lives, despite its stated intent to foster economic and social stability.^[458] Christians who have opposed coercive birth control have faced shame, ostracism, loss of employment, and sometimes death. 

Analogous to the circumstances of the first three centuries of Christian growth, the Christian population has significantly increased in a relatively short period of time while the overall birth rate in China has declined.^[459] While the current Christian population is disputed, the numbers of Chinese converting to Christianity is substantial. Government reports tend to miscalculate total numbers due to ignoring members of unregistered house churches, and external Christian organizations tend to overstate numbers due to imprecise reporting. Official Chinese estimates record between 23 million and 40 million Christians.³ A conservative estimate of Christian expansion from an external source is an annual growth rate of 7 percent that saw the Christian population grow from ten million in 1980 to sixty million in 2007.^[460] 

In 2010, Pew Research Center estimated 58 million Protestants and 9 million

Catholics.^[461] However, Fenggang Yang, Professor of Sociology at Purdue University and Director of the Center on Religious and Chinese Society, suggests that Christians have grown by an annual average of 10 percent since 1980 (The One-Child Policy took effect on September 25, 1980).^[462] He estimates that with current trends there will be approximately 250 million Christians in China by 2030, making China’s Christian population the largest in the world. Yang compares the current growth rate in China to the rate of growth seen in the Roman Empire before the conversion of Constantine.^[463] He summarizes,

Protestant Christianity has been the fastest growing religion in China. When the

CCP took power in the mainland (excluding Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau) in 1949, there were no more than one million Protestant Christians. Following decades of suppression and eradication, the CCP admitted in an official document released in 1982 that there were about three million Protestant Christians. Since then, estimates have varied. The Party-State has insisted on some very low-end estimates, suggesting about 23 million Protestant Christians in 2010; others— including missionary organizations outside China but also a reported internal document of the CCP—have made higher estimates, suggesting as many as 100 to 130 million in 2010.^[464]

If Yang’s estimates prove accurate, Christians will constitute 16.1 percent of the Chinese population, based on a cautious approximation by 2040.^[465] If annual growth continues at its current rate, Christians could be 32.5 percent of the Chinese population by 2040 and 66.7 percent by 2050.^[466]  

In Chapter Three, this study proposed that the social and political costs of conversion to Christianity in the Greco-Roman period were significant. Disgrace, ostracism, defamation, and even death were all distinct possibilities for Christians in the first three centuries of Christianity. Despite the risks associated with conversion, and in spite of the Roman Empire experiencing a decrease in population overall, a conservative estimate of Christian growth estimates that the Christian population increased from 40,000 in A.D. 100 to 1.17 million in A.D. 250.^[467] Chapter Three presented evidence that it is quite reasonable to assume that a “nontrivial” portion of early Christian growth was due to a Christian ethic of human life and family and the subsequent superior fertility among Christians. Christian families valued the lives of their children, regardless of gender, in a manner that the pagan world could not, and their faith fostered healthy marriages. They generally refused to abort or to expose their children.

Chapter Four demonstrated how the study’s Chinese participants found their own system of beliefs regarding abortion, social justice, and other human rights issues changed after conversion to Christianity. This new ethic of human life was informed by their Biblical worldview, which values the lives of children, regardless of gender, and views a God-honoring marriage relationship as foundational to society. Chinese Christians could be equipped to lead the way in advocating for and participating in a reversal of the damage done to Chinese society over the course of the past four decades of family planning policies. It was worth noting that non-Christian Chinese were also involved in righting societal wrongs, but their involvement was primarily from a pragmatic and economic perspective. The response of Chinese Christians in this study served to demonstrate that they possessed a different foundation for moral decisions as compared to their non-Christian neighbors.

Similarities between the Early Church and Chinese Christian Context

Stark, in The Rise of Christianity, makes the following claim concerning the Roman

Empire, which is apropos considering the current demographic crisis facing China,

In the final analysis, a population’s capacity to reproduce is a function of the proportion of that population consisting of women in their childbearing years, and the Greco-Roman world had an acute shortage of women. Moreover, many pagan women still in their childbearing years had been rendered infertile by damage to their reproductive systems from abortions or from contraceptive devices and medicines. In this manner was the decline of the Roman Empire’s population ensured.^[468]

Norman Cheng, demographer and professor in China, sees a strong similarity between the Greco-Roman world and China. He states, “A population’s capacity to reproduce is not only the function of the proportion of women in their childbearing years, but also the desire to have more children.”^[469] Cheng notes that the two causes of population decline in the Roman Empire were an acute shortage of women, as well as abortion and contraceptives—the latter factor due to their “subjective desire” to stop having more children.

Similarly, in China the proportion of childbearing women has steadily decreased since family planning policies began in the early 1970s. Cheng states that the total fertility rate declined from 5.4 in 1970 to 2.2 in 1980 to 1.18 in 2010.^[470] One significant difference from the circumstances of the Greco-Roman period is that in China a central governing authority enforced abortion and the use of contraceptives. While there was certainly social pressure in the Greco-Roman world, there was an absence of coercive government force in the area of childbirth. Cheng concludes, “Even though the results of fertility decline between the ancient Greco-Roman world and China are similar, the causes are totally different.”¹⁵

In The Rise of Christianity, Stark also makes the case that the church grew into the dominant influence in Western culture because, among other factors, pagans practiced infanticide while Christians valued the lives of their children. In addition, Christians built strong families while pagans did not. Similarly, Chinese Christian families have applied an ethic of human life grounded in the Bible to impact population growth. This study has explored several accounts of Christians who are being obedient to God’s command to love and care for their children and has connected the obedience of Christians with the growth and health of their families.¹⁶ The overflow of religious belief into an ethic of human life and family is unique in Christian faith. New Testament scholar, Larry

Hurtado, explains,

The early Christian emphasis on, and teaching about, everyday behavior as central to Christian commitment is yet another distinctive feature that has had a profound subsequent impact. In the ancient Roman period and down through human history, what we call “religion” tended to focus more on honoring, appeasing, and

seeking the goodwill of deities through such actions as sacrifices and the

regions.” While it seems doubtful that accurate demographic information was obtained in China, higher fertility rates for Christians around the world could be translated as a possibility in China as well. See

“Christians,” Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project, 2 April 2015, http://www.pewforum.org/2015/04/02/christians/.

1. See author’s interview with Norman Cheng from April 4, 2017 in Appendix 1.
2. See Chapter Four.

performance of related rituals. “Religion” did not typically have much to say about we call “ethics,” how to behave toward others, how to conduct family or business, and the formation of character.¹⁷

For Chinese Christians, their faith is not merely an intellectual exercise, but is an essential system of morality governing behavior grounded in a transcendental source. This study’s participants affirmed that a Christian system of morality is not viewed as law, but rather as an overflow of obedience established in grace given by God.

Implications

Chinese Christian leaders are cognizant of the breakdown of the nuclear family in China over the past four decades, and that one of the church’s roles and opportunities is to champion healthy marriages and the sanctity of human life. The implications for influence and change in Chinese society as Christians continue to live in obedience to God’s Word are extraordinary due in part to the spiritual vacuum left behind by the failed socialist policies of Mao and his successors, which is made manifest through widespread corruption, public health disasters, and “environmental degradation.”¹⁸

MLP, the study participant who referenced the compassion shown by Christian organizations in the aftermath of the Sichuan earthquake, evaluated the concept of compassion in traditional Chinese society. She stated that compassion focused on receiving recognition or acclaim is ultimately self-serving and hollow. In contrast,

^`17 Larry W. Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods: Early Christian Distinctiveness in the Roman World, Reprint edition (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2017), 188.

¹⁸ Gerda Wielander, “Beyond Repression and Resistance–Christian Love and China’s Harmonious Society,” China Journal.65 (2011): 122.

Christian agap?^[471] is transformative to the lives of generations raised in Confucian values, including “hierarchical love” where love is conditional based on the relative social value of a relationship.^[472] The idea of agap? is a universal love without discrepancy— demonstrated by Christians after the earthquake as they cared for those in need regardless of class, race and social boundaries. The anecdotal confirmation provided by the study’s participants indicated disinclination towards moral principles from the general population and a singular motivation of consumerism and attaining wealth. This materialistic ethos is manifest throughout rural and urban contexts. In contrast, the Chinese church offers the hope of transformation from selfishness to selfless. Gerda Wielander comments,

While the common Chinese understanding of love is based on human relationships and is therefore conditional, Christian love is unconditional…. Based on Jesus Christ’s self-sacrifice, this love is interpreted in terms of selfsacrifice and service to the people and has led Chinese Christians to promote social service and to share their social concerns and social responsibility in China.^[473]

Brent Fulton, President of ChinaSource, shares how the idea of unconditional love manifested itself in several Christian gatherings he attended in China during 2016–2017. One refrain repeatedly expressed by these predominantly first-generation urban believers is the importance of raising up gospel-centered families. These Christians are aware of the social breakdown of families over the past four decades, and their responsibility in bringing culture change. Li Ma writes, “The purpose of this law-gospel is to give life to mankind, not just so that people will live, reproduce and multiply, but more importantly, that their family ties will be living, healthy relationships that glorify God.”^[474] 

Another implication from the similarities between the Early Church and Chinese Christians relates to the significantly imbalanced sex ratio at birth in China. Considering the social reality of a proportionally larger number of female converts, many single

Chinese women are faced with the same dilemma that faced Christian women in the Roman Empire.^[475] Should single Chinese women remain single, or is better to marry a nonbeliever and seek to convert their spouse? Do they pursue the financial security of a marital relationship or risk the prospect of social marginalization? One resource that the Chinese church has offered to these women, especially as China has granted a limited amount of freedom online, is the existence of online dating sites. An example is “Jesus Free Wind.”^[476] The service is free and only for “true Christians.” The website also provides marriage counseling and referrals to other counseling resources. In China these sites have provided an opportunity for young Christian women to be obedient to Paul’s admonition to the church in Corinth, “Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?” (2 Cor 6:14)

Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, author and fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, acknowledges that Christianity might be the only hope for China’s demographic crisis. Gobry concludes,

Most Westerners see China as a strong rival, but China’s actual leaders see the country as always teetering on the brink of collapse, which is why their grip on power is so white-knuckled. More deeply, decades of Communism have stripped China of so much of its cultural heritage and left its society and culture aimless. Christianity’s enormous cultural and spiritual heritage, its emphasis on the rule of law, and its traditional focus on fertility are just what China may need to manage the next few decades without collapsing into civil war, revolution, or something equally terrible.^[477]

With a precarious gender imbalance and a rapidly aging population due to gendercide and coercive family planning combined with consumerism, corruption and discrimination, “the country is a powder keg.” Gobry suggests that Christianity could be China’s best chance at survival.^[478]

                                                    Civil Disobedience or Constructive Noncompliance?

If Chinese Christians hope to continue to increase as well as play a significant role in a needed fertility shift, they could persist in finding ways to respond to unjust government policies not merely with “passive resistance,” but also with respectful advocacy. American moral and political philosopher, John Rawls, defines civil disobedience as “a  public, nonviolent, conscientious yet political act contrary to law usually done with the aim of bringing about a change in the law or policies of the government.”^[479] Ethicist Nicholas Dixon further clarifies that a distinguishing mark of civil disobedience is the “willingness to openly accept punishment.”^[480][481] Chinese Christians have certainly participated in such actions in the past, but perhaps a better description of Christians’ response to social engineering is known as constructive noncompliance. In contrast with civil disobedience, constructive noncompliance is defined by Lily L. Tsai, Associate Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as noncooperation with “state policies and regulations that is justified by citizens as a way of communicating constructive criticism about policy performance and factual information about local conditions to decision-makers.”^[482] In authoritarian states such as China, constructive noncompliance is perhaps a more appropriate response.

The participants in this study agreed that any coercive family planning policy from the government is an immoral law, and the morality of constructive noncompliance is contingent upon the morality of the law. The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. states,

“There are two types of laws: there are just and there are unjust laws. I would agree with

Saint Augustine that ‘An unjust law is no law at all.’”^[483] 

Constructive noncompliance takes place on an individual basis and requires familiarity with the everyday realities of one’s community. Tsai comments,

Constructive noncompliers thus see themselves as efficacious and not completely incapable of affecting the macro political environment. They are aware that their political power as individuals may be limited and that their noncompliance may only change policies at higher levels if enough other people also engage in noncompliance, but they are explicit about their hope that their individual acts of noncompliance will bring them that much closer to the necessary threshold.^[484]

As seen in the study, China, which lacks formal channels for democratic participation, is an appropriate context that lends itself to constructive noncompliance. Participants in the study who were unaware or unable to verbalize rights possessed by individuals comprised 42 percent of the participant pool. This lack of “rights-consciousness” and “political know-how” was articulated by TPP, “Before I came to the United States I was uninformed that I possessed any rights as a citizen of the People’s Republic of China. I did not know what a ‘citizen’ was. I think this is common among most Chinese

Christians. We were raised that way.”^[485] 

Sociologists, Li Ma and Jin Li, conducted a three-year ethnographic study of unregistered evangelical groups in China, integrating sociological and oral history methods—a “thick description” of cultural factors.^[486] They discovered a “paradoxical reality” where Christian population has grown, but the perception of Christian presence is limited from the average citizens’ view. Nevertheless, they encountered practices best described as constructive noncompliance, which the Chinese authorities criticized.^[487] Ma  and Li observe, “From the organization of unregistered churches, they have moved on these other actions, such as quitting party membership as an open testimonial of conversion and breaking the one-child policy.”^[488] A 2014 report described a Christian official in an urban center who was told that her faith was not compatible with the party and she would have to “give it up.” This official informed her superiors that she would not comply, and that her freedom of belief was protected by the Chinese constitution. She was not terminated, but was sent to a “remedial course at a party school.”³⁶

Ma and Li describe a twenty-seven year old member of an urban house church, Yuan, who mentioned the one-child policy when asked to describe the impact of his conversion to Christianity. Yuan states, “[The one-child family planning policy] never occurred to me as definitely wrong, until I became a Christian…. Looking back, many things we took for granted are actually, by God’s standards, wrong…. My belief taught me to think things through.”³⁷ Dr. Zhao Xiao, an economist and former CCP member, agrees that Christians do not seek to gain power or even to challenge the Communist Party. However, he also sees clashes with public policies, including family planning policies, as inevitable and necessary.^[489] As Chinese Christians engage in constructive noncompliance they become dynamic agents in society, as opposed to being passively controlled by outside forces.^[490] Obedience to a Christian ethic of human life for the

Chinese Christian could accelerate a flourishing society in the future. 

The Future of the Church in Chinese Society

The church in China finds itself at a crossroads as church leaders recognize the central role that the Chinese church can play in affecting culture. In A Star in the East, Rodney Stark and Xiuhua Wang describe the rise of Christianity in China from a sociological perspective and pose the question: “If Christians become a major presence in China, what difference will it make?”^[491] While Stark and Wang are primarily concerned with the influence of Christianity on the first half of the 21^st century it is also possible to look at recent events to ascertain the impact of Christian faith upon the Chinese people.

Although proportionally Christians were a minority in 1980, there were still 10 million believers at the advent of the One-Child Policy, according to Stark and Wang’s research.^[492] While the number of Christians was relatively small, Christian dissident Yu Jie describes their opposition to government policies in the language of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “Waging war as an ant on an elephant.”^[493] Yu Jie continues, “Genuine grace empowers us to face our sin and fight against it. Or to recognize and combat society’s injustice.”^[494] Jie advocates that Christians act like leaven in society and concludes, “The

Chinese must undertake a profound spiritual transformation in order to restore the freedom and dignity God has bestowed on them when creating them in his image. The way forward requires a turn away from ourselves and toward the divine.”^[495] The correlation between the obedience of Christians in the face of coercive family planning policies and the growth and health of families in the future of the Chinese church is exemplified through the experiences of Chai Ling.

            Ling, one of the prominent female leaders of the student democracy movement at Tiananmen in 1989, became a follower of Jesus in 2009. She founded the faith-based organization All Girls Allowed in 2011 and has sought to restore God-given life, dignity and value to women by seeking societal transformation.^[496] Ling traces her spiritual story back to Tiananmen, and during an interview with Timothy C. Morgan she describes the transformation of the evil perpetuated on June 4, 1989 as a significant turning point in the history of China’s church. Ling elaborates,

Before, when I was walking in darkness, I didn’t understand the meaning. All I saw was the triumph of evil forces and injustice—China killing so many people and still getting away with it. But now I’m seeing a different side of it. I see the country being transformed into a new nation. God used the massacre to pronounce the death of communism. We thought we were a political movement. What was really happening was a spiritual movement. God used the massacre to wake people up and prepare hearts and minds for a new spiritual awakening. Tiananmen will be a part of the history of China’s church. Many church leaders say it was a major turning point in how the churches evolved from rural to urban and became able to have a profound impact on China’s society. It feels like Acts 29. The church in China is a very strong body of Christ that’s growing.^[497]

The ripple effects of Tiananmen were felt throughout Chinese society as a third of the Tiananmen generation became Christian, a third went into business, and a third are still searching.^[498] This defining moment has affected the Chinese church’s willingness to response to policies antithetical to the Christian faith.^[499] 

            Ling explains the opposition of the Chinese church to the One-Child Policy and the high priority of advocating for the lives of children, writing,   

It’s urgent when every single day there are 35,000 lives lost. That’s what gets me up and running every day. No second should be wasted. Five hundred Chinese women commit suicide every day. Women are so traumatized. Only God can heal these people. It’s very hard for humans to try to heal them. This one issue influences every single Chinese family—it’s one way the Chinese government controls people’s fundamental freedoms.^[500]

Ling describes the response of the Chinese church in the city of Putian where there are at least 100,000 trafficked child brides in a city of 3 million residents. The local church is working to save lives both physically and spiritually and reunite trafficked children with their families.^[501] 

Since China began enforcing the One-Child Policy in 1980, over 37 million girls have disappeared due to unreported births, and over 336 million forced and coerced abortions have occurred.^[502] In 2012, 86 percent of all Chinese women had at least one abortion in their lifetime, and 52 percent had two or more in their lifetime.^[503] The Chinese  church is focused on rescuing “born and unborn girls,” supporting abandoned girls, and supporting victimized women.^[504] While the Communist Party has established a culture that devalues life, the church could be a contrast community that affirms the dignity of every human.

The Chinese church has been active on International Children’s Day (celebrated on June 1) in strategically encouraging couples to not abort. Gospel Times reports, “On May 27, 2013 a 13 second public service announcement also appeared on Sina Video which said ‘What is the weight of life? What do you think about the fact that there are 13 million abortions in China each year? Follow @Don’tAbortOnChildrensDay on Sina Weibo.”^[505] The public service announcement not only appeared on Sina Video, but was also broadcasted on Chengdu Bus-TV.^[506] Additionally, Christians living in Chengdu, located in Sichuan province, lived out Yu Jie’s admonition to be active agents in society when they visited well-known abortion clinics in Chengdu and distributed anti-abortion leaflets.⁵⁶

Marriage as a Reflection of the Gospel

In addition, the Chinese church has affirmed the value and institution of marriage as a reflection of the gospel. Urban churches have responded to oppressive government policies and to cultural trends of a declining sense of moral responsibility with initiatives to strengthen the marriages of their members. Zhou Ming, a member of the Olive Tree Church in Beijing, writes, “The true meaning and significance of marriage must be taught in the churches: one husband and one wife, one man and one woman, for your whole life. There are all kinds of problems in society, but whatever kind of social problem there is, you need stable marriages to be the foundation.”^[507] 

Christian families acknowledge their responsibility for their behavior and character and this has influenced their response to China’s family planning policies over the decades. Fulton comments, “According to one educator who has worked extensively with families in China, the greatest difference between Christian and non-Christian couples is the faith that difficulties in marriage can be worked out, and that they can personally change to become better spouses and parents.”^[508] The traditional concept of fate in Chinese society is an obstacle for Christian spouses who deal with issues such as infidelity. A Christian perspective on relationships serves to admonish husbands and wives to personally take responsibility for actions, while acknowledging that through the Gospel there is hope for change.^[509]

Parenting as a Reflection of the Gospel

Columnist Li Jin traces the factors leading to the pressures that Christian husbands and wives face,

Since the 1980s, families have gradually broken away from the slowly collapsing, workplace system and become independent societal and economical units. Family planning policy defined family as a household of three. Due to materialistic education over a long period of time and the wave of commercialization that followed, an economic foundation was often treated as the condition for marriage…. All these continue to buffet Chinese families.^[510]

Chinese Christians with young families were living in a culture with a myriad of social challenges. Accelerated pace of life, escalating work demands, rising costs of living, and a multitude of entertainment choices in a progressively urban context proved difficult dilemmas for families desiring to raise their children according to Christian values. Parents “lived in the tension” of recognizing that the family unit is the fundamental context where Christian faith was imparted to their children, while navigating complex societal issues of economically driven cultural norms.^[511] Questions regarding moral choices, relational conflict resolution, and evaluating priorities found their beginning in the home.^[512] 

One of the consequences of an altered family structure in society due to the OneChild Policy was that all the expectations of several generations of a family were placed on one child. These children faced varied circumstances—some were send back to rural hometowns to be raised by grandparents (“left behind children”); some were neglected by parents because of their work demands, and most were profoundly burdened with familial pressure as they received inordinate amounts of material possessions and high-priced supplementary tutoring.^[513] The Chinese church in the future can continue to help parents navigate the balance between abdicating parental responsibility and over-parenting as they endeavor to live out Eph 6:4, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” 

Li Jin, columnist for Caixin.com and co-founder of Four Seasons Book Review,  applies Dutch Reformed theologian Herman Bavinck’s reflections on the doctrine of the Trinity to the tension felt by Christian families in China. Jin suggests that a foundation where human relationships are based on the relationship between the three persons of the Trinity provides the opportunity to respond to cultural challenges. Concerning the doctrine of the Trinity as the foundation of all relationships, Bavinck writes, “The unity among the world, humanity, ethics, justice and beauty all depend upon the unity of the Triune God. If there is any denial to the three-in-oneness or ignorance in acknowledging such truth, cultures will open their door to polytheism.”^[514] Christian Chinese families could therefore seek to reflect three-in-oneness to a hierarchical Chinese culture in order that God’s authority is evident in family life. Jin concludes,

The traditional order of a Chinese family is based on the authority of the father. After this was demolished in the socialist movement, the workplace system caused people to treat families as part of the economic society. However, if we stand on the foundation of the doctrine of the Trinity, the characteristic of love within the family and orderly fellowship will be renewed. Both will benefit the church and provide Christian ethics—a desperately needed resource so that Christian ethics will replace socialistic value ideology.^[515]

The Chinese church can continue to help families foster the most intimate of relationships that find their foundation in the Trinity. 

Zhou Ming recognizes the importance of family ministry in Chinese society,

The church needs to increase the level of importance it places on guarding marriages. The true meaning and significance of marriage must be taught in the churches: one husband and one wife, one man and one woman, for your whole life. There are all kinds of problems in society, but whatever kind of social problem there is, you need stable marriages to be the foundation.^[516]

Mary Li Ma, author and Research Fellow at the Henry Institute of Christianity and Public Life at Calvin College, offers the following principles for strong foundations in family life that combat the spiritual vacuum in Chinese culture characterized by “crumbling relationships, feelings, morals, and values.”^[517] Li Ma advocates: 1) The relationship between a husband and wife that reflects the sacrificial love of the Gospel is the foundation of the family. This relationship functions as a model for the children in a family and their own future marital relationships; 2) Parents are the primary disciple makers of their children. While the church plays a vital role as a partner, parents are ultimately responsible for the spiritual discipleship of their children; 3) Raising children includes imparting to them a devotion to the Bible and a love for the Gospel. Children should understand that the Gospel affects every aspect of life and that every sphere of human existence is to be re-directed to bring glory to God; and 4) Investing in children’s hobbies and making time for family entertainment, as appropriate, serves to foster a healthy familial atmosphere.^[518] Though the family unit has traditionally served as the nucleus of society in China, its structure and function has been significantly altered through social engineering and family planning. The church has sought to maintain healthy family values through marriage retreats and increased focus on ministry to children and students.^[519]

The China Gospel Research Alliance conducted a survey of Chinese Christian leaders from September 2015 to May 2016 containing 1,200 written surveys and 432 face-to-face interviews concerning the state of the church in China.^[520] Respondents  identified the discipleship of the next generation as a major priority and suggested that young urban Christian families are “increasingly looking for alternatives to the state-run education system which is largely built around preparation for test-taking, culminating in the nationwide university entrance exam, and which is overtly atheistic.”^[521] The research findings in this study suggested that Chinese Christians have unique opportunities to live out their faith. Sociologists, Li Ma and Jin Li, comment on how China’s urban Christians are actively involved in remaking society, “What we have found is that the religious activities undertaken and values transmitted by Christian individuals, congregations, and faith-based associations have reshaped the local civic space in significant ways.”^[522] Currently, Christians are registering NGOs, providing family services, running short-term mission trips, caring for the marginalized, looking for ways to provide social services, and providing Christian educational alternatives for families.^[523]

The Chinese church also has the opportunity to engage culture in strategically contesting social engineering consequences. Preschool care for families with young children and demanding jobs was an opportunity for Chinese Christians to meet practical needs. Journalist Joyce Cheng writes, “Otherwise there will be one less incentive for people to raise children, as it may mean a cut in income. Any new family policy should be geared toward addressing the needs of smaller families, from housing, medical care, career and education, to social security.”^[524] In addition, the aging population and declining TFR necessitated support and care for the elderly. Younger family members will not be able to arrange for adequate financial resources, which in previous generations large extended families could provide. Churches are able to fill in that gap. Yang Mingdao, from China Partnership, concludes, “We have to let the gospel control the discourse, control the narrative, interpreting our life and driving our ministry. The gospel always subverts and changes us and that is the passion of the gospel-movement in China.”^[525]  

Suggestions for Further Research

The author has attempted in this study to address the research question and investigated possible similarities related to the thesis. Based upon this research there are further areas of study the author has identified that were beyond the scope of this dissertation. These four areas of study could further develop a comprehensive interpretation of the relationship between Christian faith and the growth of Christianity in unjust contexts. The first area of study addresses the cultural similarities between 1^st century Greco-Roman culture and contemporary Chinese culture. Specifically, further research regarding the importance of honor/shame and collective community identities in the Greco-Roman world and how these identities are also related to similar features in modern Asian cultures would serve to advance the discussion.⁷⁶

The second area concerns a comparison between the fertility rates of Chinese Christian families compared to the fertility rate of the general population. While the fertility rate of the general population is easily obtained, 1.624 in 2016, a comparison between the two population pools could strengthen the case of similarities between the Early Church period and Communist China. Likewise, research conducted in Chinese churches could serve to compare birth rates as well as family size.^[526]

Considering that religion plays a crucial role in constructing identity among Chinese, further research on the relationship between Christianity and Chinese traditional culture could also enhance the understanding of Christian life in China. In particular, will a new version of Confucianism synthesize with the Christian understanding of agap?? In a relationship-oriented value system it seems that there are possibilities for Chinese theologians to explore connections and possible bridges to Christian faith. Samuel Ling, author and President of China Horizon asks, “What ideas will truly guide the search for modern China? What is the place of the Christian gospel, the worldview based on the Old and New Testaments, in China’s search for an all-comprehensive national ideology?”^[527] If Yang’s projections on the growth of Christianity prove true, how will China fit in the world order as a global superpower in the coming decades? How will its foreign policy, particularly in Asia, be affected by a Christian ethic and will it be a responsible and just society? Philip Jenkins has explored this topic to some extent, but an in depth analysis of how a Christianized China will exist in relation to other nations is needed.^[528] Further study is needed on the intersection of traditional Chinese philosophies and Christianity as it relates to a contextual Christianity in China faithful to the Scripture. 

A third area of possible research concerns the topic of secondary conversions discussed in Chapter Three. Rodney Stark, albeit not a theologian, suggests that early Christians were able to tolerate, at least to some extent, exogenous marriage.^[529] Church leaders were able to recognize the numerical and moral advantage of children being raised in the faith. Michael Walsh agrees with Starks interpretation and shares the example of Ignatius of Antioch’s decision that Christians could marry only with the permission of the local bishop.^[530] This acceptance of mixed marriage certainly seems to indicate a pragmatic response from the church in relation to population issues rather than a biblical position.

            Historian Alan Kreider examines the question of how was a young Christian woman to live when married to a pagan? He writes, “A mixed marriage was a sign that something unusual had happened: either a woman had committed the surprising and unsettling act of becoming a Christian, or a Christian woman … had married a pagan.”^[531] Conversely, there is evidence from the writings of Tertullian that marrying pagans was a grave mistake.⁸³ An in depth study into the writings of the Early Church regarding the topic of exogenous marriage would serve to illuminate the discussion.

Conclusion

This study began by examining if a Christian ethic of life had any effect on the 

growth of Christi^[532]anity in a totalitarian society. Specifically, were there similarities between the Early Church’s response to Greco-Roman cultural norms of abortion and gendercide and a Chinese Christian response to similar cultural norms in the context of the One-Child Policy? The author believed that this study provided some corroboration presented in the ethnographic surveys that, in comparison to the general population, Christians in China possessed a higher view of family, marriage and life. While there are similarities between the Early Church response and the Chinese Christian response, there are not as many as the author first anticipated when this study began in 2013.^[533]           This dissertation has been particularly thought-provoking because of the shifting nature of family planning policy in China. When the author first entered the Ph.D.

program at SEBTS in 2011, the One-Child Policy was stringently enforced with only a few exceptions. In 2013, when the author first began to study this topic, China began to reduce one-child family restrictions and permitted spouses to have two children if one of the spouses was a “single child.” By 2015 the policy had changed again and the Communist Party officially announced that all married couples were allowed to have two children. In late August 2018 while the author was finalizing the study, family-planning related clauses were dropped from a draft of an updated marriage section of the civil code.^[534] While the National People’s Congress in Beijing has been hesitant to speculate on what form future family planning will take, it does seem likely that the policy in its current iteration will be lifted in the foreseeable future.^[535] 

            While this study began with the assumption that the One-Child Policy would continue indefinitely policy change has had some impact on the conclusions. However, the author sought in this dissertation to compare two distinct periods—the first three centuries of the Early Church with the thirty-five years of the One-Child Policy. Subsequent modifications to family planning in China after 2015 have not affected the  comparison of Christian response during these two historical eras, and the basic thesis that Christian response during this thirty-five year period had similarities to the Early  Church response was still valid.

            From the Early Church’s emphasis on the affective impact of a Christian ethic of human life grounded in a theology of God in Chapter Three, to the Christian Chinese survey participants’ validation in Chapter Four of the Bible as the authority for all individual and political action, the author believed that this study highlighted the influence Christians could have in the face of injustice or immoral government policy. It was the author’s hope that this dissertation served as a stimulus to further develop research concerning a Christian response to family planning policies in oppressive regimes.

APPENDIX 1

NORMAN CHENG INTERVIEW

A: I’ve recently read a book by Rodney Stark (sociologist at Baylor University) and this is one of his claims: “In the final analysis, a population’s capacity to reproduce is a function of the proportion of that population consisting of women in their childbearing years, and the Greco-Roman world had an acute shortage of women. Moreover, many pagan women still in their childbearing years had been rendered infertile by damage to their reproductive systems from abortions or from contraceptive devices and medicines. In this manner was the decline of the Roman Empire’s population ensured.” Do you see any correlation between the ancient Greco-Roman world and China today?

N: A population’s capacity to reproduce is not only the function of the proportion of women in their childbearing years but also the desire of them to have more number of children. The two causes of the decline of population of Roman Empire were acute shortage of women and abortion, contraception and medicines, the latter is due to their subjective desire to stop having more number of children. 

In regard to China, the proportion of childbearing women is decreasing now since China started the family planning program since the early of 1970s. Since then the total fertility rate declined from 5.4 in 1970 to 2.2 in 1980. The big difference from Greco-Roman is that the action of abortion and contraception in China were enforced by the government, rather than by the women themselves. Even though the results of fertility decline between the ancient Greco-Roman world and current China are similar, the causes are totally different. 

A: Less than 40% of the population (in 2007) is restricted by the family planning policy to having one child (actual number of families affected is 35.9%).

(http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-07/11/content_5432238.htm) To your knowledge was that number accurate? 

N: The number is closed. Below is the result I used at my class, that is, 35.4%. This result is only dealing with the policy from 1986 to 2013. As the policy changed since the late of 2013, the situation is different. 

A: The same article also claims 52.9% of the population could have a second child if the first was a girl in 2007. Is that accurate as well?

N: We called this as One-and-half-child policy. The result is like above.

A: What is the current birth rate in China?

Year             Birth rate(‰)      Death rate    Increase rate

• 11.9             7.11      4.79
• 11.93           7.14      4.79
• 12.1             7.15      4.95
• 12.08           7.16      4.92 2014         12.37    7.16      5.21 2015        12.07    7.11      4.96

         2016                         12.95                  7.09                 5.86

          1980                         18.21                  6.34               11.87

N: What was the birth rate in 1980? See above

A: Will families take advantage of being able to have two children? Is there any data over the past year that suggests an uptick in pregnancies/births?

N: Before the policy released (allowing to have the second child if one of couple comes from one-child family) at the end of 2013, the government was afraid of uptick of the fertility once the policy changed. However, the reality was just opposite. The expected number of the two-child increased was 11 million, the real result was just 1.5 million two-child births after 1.5 years of policy released, much less than the expected number. As the birth rate was still low, the government released the policy further, that is, any couple could have the second child, without any condition. 

A: I have heard from some friends that most Chinese people don’t want more than one child anyway. Is this true? Any data available to examine?

N: Even though the birth rate is still lower, it doesn’t mean that Chinese people don’t want to have more than one child. I think, most of couples want to have two children. Because the high pressure of their lives and almost no public policies for releasing the pressure of young people, they are unable to have more children. There are some data in the attached paper.

A: A follow up question: Is a Two-Child Policy enough to restore the gender imbalance?

N: The two-child policy could mediate the gender imbalance in the future, but it is not enough because the high sex ratio at birth was high in some countries without family planning program, such as South Korea and Taiwan. Changing the gender imbalance would depend on the change of culture and gender equality.

N: I’ve read a little bit of the New Population Theory put forward by Ma Yinchu where he argues a smaller population is always more beneficial to the nation’s prosperity, environmental protection and construction of a harmonious society. He said many of the world’s problems, such as deforestation, global warming, acid rain and the disappearance of glaciers, are all related to fast population growth.

Regarding what Ma Yinchu wrote, has the family planning policy helped (or not been a factor at all) to advance the tremendous economic growth in China over the past few decades?

N: Please refer to the paper attached. The ideas of Ma Yinchu was correct when China was under planed economy or shortage economy. When China changed to market economy since the middle of 1990, population control may not have positive effect on the economic development.

A: Related question: Would a greater population drive up unemployment and poverty?

N: No exactly. The unemployment and poverty highly depends on the economic development, rather than the greater population. 

A: I’ve read some research that has suggested a relationship between the One-Child Policy and higher Sex Ratio at Birth, suggesting that stricter fertility control and higher fines lead to higher ratios of males to females. In your opinion, would you say that is accurate or there is no correlation?

N: Yes, even though the high sex ratio at birth happened to some countries where no enforced family planning, the stricter birth control must cause the much higher sex ratio at birth. There is no country in the world where their sex ratio at birth is higher than that of China. 

A: What is the average population replacement rate today in China?

N: The replacement rate now is 2.1 (TFR)

A: What is the estimated gender imbalance? (what is the surplus of males? I’ve heard these males are called “bare branches”) What do you do with all these males? Are there any ideas in how to remedy it?

N: The current SRB is around 113. The peak was more than 120 in 2008. It has been decreased since then. 

A: Was the original implementation of the One-Child Policy in 1980 the result of scientific research about over population?

N: The research done dealing with one child policy at that time could not be called scientific research, as it was conducted by some cybernetic researchers, who knew nothing about population studies. As there was almost no demographer in China at that time, the research quality was quite poor. 

A: Are there any other nations that have a One-Child policy today? Any other examples in history that you know of?

N: No, no country in the world has one-child policy, and no country for implementing family planning through such strict administrative enforcement. Some countries wanted to do like this, such as India and South Korea, but they are failed finally.  

APPENDIX 2

AGREEMENT TO PARTICIPATE FORM

The research in which you are about to participate is designed to explore the Christian response to abortion and gendercide in China in the context of the One Child Policy. The author for purposes of dissertation research is conducting this research. In this research, you will answer questions in three categories—family structure, social structure, and religious structure. Any information you provide will be held strictly confidential, and at no time will your name be reported, or your name identified with your responses.

Agreement to Participate

The research in which you are about to participate is designed to explore the Christian response to abortion and gendercide in China in the context of the One Child Policy. This research is being conducted by Nathan Stam for purposes of dissertation research. In this research, you will answer questions in three categories—family structure, social structure, and religious structure. Any information you provide will be held strictly confidential, and at no time will your name be reported, or your name identified with your responses. Participation in this study is totally voluntary and you are free to withdraw from the study at any time.

By your completion of this ethnographic interview, you are giving informed consent for the use of your responses in this research.

           Name               ___________________________ 

           Signature         ___________________________ 

           Date                 ____________

APPENDIX 3

ETHNOGRAPHIC SURVEY

Marriage Status:

Children:

Occupation:

Age:

Level of Education:

Church Association:

Christian History:

Family Structure ????

• What are the authority lines in your family? Who makes decisions—how, when and why? ??????????????????——?????????????????????????
• What are the child-rearing practices and traditions in your family? ???????????????????????????????????????
• How are boys and girls viewed differently by families, if at all? ?????????

?????????????

• How are the dynamics of the family changing in China? ???????????

????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????   

Religious Structure ????

??????????????????????????????????????????????  

• What are your basic beliefs: about God, about good, evil, life, mankind, view of

women, view of children? ????????????????????????????????????????????????

• What are your beliefs concerning image of God, sanctity of human life? ??????

?????????????????

• How does religion inform social justice issues? Does religion play a role in restoring

peace (shalom) to a nation? ??????????????????????????

????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

• How does religion influence an individual’s relationship with the government? ???

????????????

• How does religion regard the family unit? ???????????????????????????????

Social Structure ????  

• How do people relate to local municipal leaders? ???????????????
• What are the basic values within society that give it cohesion and security? ???????????????????????????
• Are there ever justifications for the termination of life? If so, what? ???????

?????????????

• How are women valued, in contrast to men, in society? ????????????

??????

• What rights do individuals have? Men and women? Children? Families? ???????????????????????????????????
• How do individuals respond to policies with which they disagree based on conviction?

?????????????????????

?????????????????????You can choose to answer questions below or not:

• What are the responsibilities and rights of local municipal leaders? ????????

????????

• How do local municipal leaders lose the right to lead? ????????????????

APPENDIX 4

SURVEY DATA SAMPLES

Survey #6 (YHM)

Brief stats

1. Name:  Yi Hong Mei    USE  PSUEDONYM  “YHM”
2. Age: 47
3. Female 
4. Christian
5. Married (to a previously divorce man)

i. One step son

• 4 people in family:  Husband, wife, step son, father in law
• Education:   Master’s degree
• Income:  less than 2000 yuan per month

2. Survey PART 1: FAMILY STRUCTURE

1. Q1 – 
   1. In her immediate family: the husband has authority, so the family is patriarchal.
   1. In her parent’s family: the structure was matriarchal.  Her mother had desire to control all things pertaining to the family.  Her mother held the view that she was better able to take care of the family.  Her mother felt that the husband did not have the best ability to lead and provide for the family.  Her father was accepting of this family structure. Participant commented she was aware that he father loved her (YHM) a lot.  There were times the father disagreed with the mother, but he did not challenge established authority lines.
2. Q2-
   1. Immediate family:  Husband has authority and generally makes decisions.  Participant commented this makes it (life) easier for her.  Participant commented that husband had knowledge and responsibility to make important family decisions and economic decisions for family.  Participant shared that that was a division of responsibility in some decisions.  She made decisions concerning daily household issues such as: what to eat, what food to buy, buying clothes, purchasing household necessities, etc.,  Her husband, as a pastor decide biblical issues, church issues, son’s education.   Why this structure:

Bible says   

1. Parents family:   Mother has authority. She will make decisions. Mother wanted to make all decisions and saw this as an expression of love and concern for family. Participant commented that at times she did like the control her mother exerted and at times would rebel. 
2. Q3 (this question essentially divided heritage into two parts physical (property) and ideology / traditions
   1. Immediate family:  Participant did not comment because her husband also did survey and she commented her answers would be the same as his. (see survey

#1 SHT)

1. Parents family:  Participant initially said this situation different because this involved not only her parents but her each set of grandparents were directly involved in the family.  This was hard for participant to limit answer because each (parents and both sets of grandparents) had different ideas and ways  
   1. YHM’s family was father, mother, oldest sister, older brother and YHM.  Her parents were influenced by changes in China in 1949 (People’s Republic of China, “New China”) where participant commented men and women were seen more as equals. Both of her parents worked. In discussing the heritage of physical assets her mother left all physical resources to the oldest sister because she was the oldest child.  The older brother did not get along well with parents.  When father died he left his physical assets to his second wife. He remarried after YHM’s mother died.  YHM said children did not know why he did this.   iv. Ideology – 
   1. YHM’s mother’s family– YHM’s grandfather was very traditional.  He had a Buddhist background.  He influenced the family with a strong belief in valuing and helping others and with encouraging family to become educated. YHM commented her grandfather was poor in his old age because he gave away all his money to help the poor.  YHM commented giving to the poor was not a normal practice at that time.  YHM’s mother strongly encouraged YHM to have the same ideas: to help the poor and to study hard and get as much education as possible. YHM’s mother highly respected her father and encouraged YHM to be like her grandfather.  YHM commented she felt that the idea of helping others to the same extent as her grandfather was too difficult.  YHM’s grandfather and mother both valued the Communist Party and her mother encouraged YHM to become a party member. YHM was persuaded by her mother and joined the Communist Party.
   1. YHM’s father’s family was very traditional also.  YHM commented that there was a strong emphasis on studying hard and getting a good education.  A good education would mean a better job.  Her father did not verbally pass heritage but modeled his ideals such as education by reading many books and writing poetry.
2. Q4
   1. Parents family- Her mother was the primary care giver.  YHM and her mother spend a lot of time together.  Her mother often took YHM to work with her.  YHM’s older sister and older brother were not raised in the by immediate family.  Essentially, they were raised by other family members.  This was a  consequence of the violation of the one child policy and YHM commented because her mother was very vocal against the government.  (ME- yet she wanted YHM to join Communist Party).  So YHM, was the only one of the three children who was actually raised by her mother and father.  YHM commented she felt like she was the favored child and her mother did a lot of things for her such as:  took her to movies, encouraged her to draw and paint pictures, and taught her Chinese calligraphy.  YHM commented her mother had great influence on her.  YHM commented that her father gave her the majority of her emotional comfort.  When she cried or was upset her father was the main one who comforted her. ii. Immediate family:  Grace is involved in step-sons daily life concerns.   She is not he one who generally tells the son what to do.  The father/ husband is the authority figure.  Both parent’s help in education (son is home-schooled).  YHM commented she tries to focus on loving the son.  Both parents teach the son about the Bible.  She commented they have a very good family relationship.e. Q5

i. Parent’s family–  on the surface boys and girls are equal, but felt mother was very strict with her brother and this revealed son / boys maybe viewed as more important.  Father, likewise, on surface boys and girls are equal, but YHM commented that when she was born father commented to wife, “you are so old and yet you have a daughter!”  YHM suggested that this revealed son may have been more important to her father.  YHM commented that her father always loved her and never verbally expressed boys are better than girls, so she really had no negative impressions about any differences. ii. Immediate family:  They only have a son, so he is important.  She commented if they had a daughter they would (the whole family, not YHM necessarily) think boys are more important.  YHM commented she also might like boys too.  She said, “I haven’t had a child, but I thought if I had a child I would like to have a boy.” 

• Q6
  • In her current family, only the husband works.  This is different from her parent’s family where both parents worked.  YHM commented that she feels that now men do more house hold activities such as: household chores, cooking, buying groceries, etc.,
  • YET, I asked about a more general societal view, she commented that she thinks in most families both parents work (so for her personal experience this is not a change).  
  • YHM said now families generally want only one child and some families are ok if they do not have any children.  This is a difference. YHM told story that when her mother become pregnant with YHM (3^rd child) she wanted to have an abortion, but her doctor told her she should not have an abortion. That because of her age this might be her last chance to have a baby.  YHM said she is a survivor of the early ‘one child policy!’ she commented that if the doctor had not suggested this here mother would probably have aborted YHM.
  • YHM commented that there is a shift in older family members living separately from children as opposed to living in same house with children.  YHM commented this may be due to younger generation having increased ability and desire to travel, attain jobs in other places, and live in other places.
  • YHM commented that in Christian families, the wife is less likely to work

(outside home/ have job)

• Q7
  • Her family lives in Beijing, but they have good relationship and visit as much as able.  Husband’s family lives in same city and have good relationship.  They visit the husband’s family very often.  YHM commented that when she became a Christian this strengthened her relationship and her love for her family in

Beijing and Wuhan ii. I asked a follow-up question.  How much influence does husband’s family have on their immediate family?  Initially, the extended family tried to have some influence when YHM and husband were first married, but now that they have been married for about three years they, (husband’s family)  give less advice.  (Example:  no pets in the house, YHM should dye her hair so YHM’s hair is not grey)

iii. 2^nd follow-up question, does YHM’s immediate family have influence on husband’s family?  They always try to share about Christianity.  So, other family members begin to avoid them a little bit.  YHM suggested they not put such a strong emphasis on verbally sharing but by just loving them.  Overall, their relationship with other family members is good.

3. Part II  Religious Structure

a. Q1

i. YHM – there are two main religious systems       (note:  definition of religion as: any set of beliefs that are recognized as a source of truth and authority that a person places faith in and lives by the concepts of that ideological system.  Nathan, I broadened this definition a bit because in one interview we were asked to specifically define.  My intent was to use a bigger umbrella to include philosophical systems, secular systems as well as religious systems)    

1. 1) “Lu jia”  (Chinese philosopher) very important as the founder of ancient Chinese governmental system.  YHM stated current government still based on “Lujia” system. YHM also stated that “Lu Jia” system is better known among more educated people.  The less educated may not be familiar with this system.
2. 2) Communist Party, YHM said she thinks that the CP was losing some influence at present time.  Yet, the Communist Party has some general appeal for the people of China.
3. YHM’s faith is Christian –  she did not say this but I know this is her faith b. Q2

i. Lu Jia – a series of books “Lun Yu”  written by Confucius and others  (The

Analects of Confucius) ii. Communist Pary – “dangzhang” the Communist Party Constitution

• Q3
  • About God – (He) is truth, light, justice, all good
  • About good – the expression of God
  • About evil – ‘all’ from Satan  (Satan author of) iv. About life – given by God, a beautiful thing, declared good by God
  • About mankind – initially good, but now fallen
  • About women – image of women is from God, so very beautiful, an expression of God’s glory.  God designed to be helper for man. Being a woman is a good thing because God gift the woman to do some special things.  Women need love from God and man.
  • About children – are the most beautiful things in the world. YHM commented children sometimes look like angels and sometimes look a little evil (Me– she is commenting on the idea of innocence yet having a sin disposition).  Children are the hope of mankind.  Parents are commanded by God to care for the children. Teaching children requires patience
• Q4
  • About the image of God – YHM pictures God in a similar to the way she sees universe; vast, mysterious, and beautiful.  God is powerful and just. ii. Sanctity of life – the value of human life is found / determined by living for God. If a person does not live for God, His honor,  they will not have / experience their true value.  (NOTE: sanctity was a word that was not easily translated into Chinese.  Two words were used 1) shèngjié —holy and pure 2) z?nyán – dignity; honor.  Initially survey used shèngjié, but decision was made that z?nyán best defined ‘sanctity.’   The impression of the interviewer is that the concept of ‘sanctity’ was not easily understood by the participants) e. Q5
  • As a Christian, Christians are uniquely qualified to understand, consider, and participate in social justice issues.  YHM explained that in her personal experience that when not a Christian, without God, she may consider issues of social justice, but to effect change was considered to be too costly for her personally. After she became a Christian she was willing to help.
  • Buddhists in some ways inform or help with social justice. iii. Other systems may make small contributions to social justice. “Lu Jia” encourages beneficial acts.  The Communist Party on surface seems to support social justice by helping the poor. The CP policy mandates helping poor.  iv. Restoring peace –  Christianity uniquely qualified, Christians are able to have the greatest effect for peace. Other religions can have some small effect. YHM commented that countries that are not Christian (less Christian) always seem to have war.

v. (Note:  this question required some explanation because the term ‘social justice’ was not easily understood by participants.  YHM’s responses focused primarily are the issue of being ‘poor.’)

• Q6
  • As a Christian, YHM felt there was an obligation to respect, honor, and obey the 
  • government unless in direct conflict with Bible.  YHM commented before becoming a Christian she was more apt to rebel against government.  If government acts in harmful ways towards the people YHM will seek ways to help oppressed people and voice concern to government.  In times when in conflict with government the YHM would seek ways to use legal means to voice belief and seek resolution. 
• Q7
  • As Christian family is very important. So important, that without family you cannot do anything. 
  • “Lu Jia”  family important, but family is a tool to help government.
  • Buddhist not sure about, but maybe Buddhist not want family.
• Q8
• As a Christian, in the church the pastor is the leader.  The pastor is chosen by the members of the church.  The members like the person and recognize the person’s ability to teach the Bible.  If the pastor has a family that is good.  The wife can help the pastor to serve the church.  The pastor is recognized by the members and they vote to make the person their pastor.

i. Q9

i. As a Christian the authority is the Bible.  A Christian should read and study to Bible.  Jesus and God are the authorities, but the Bible is the way to learn about God and Jesus. YHM also learns from listening to her pastor / husband. j. Q10

i. In society,  Qu Yan is an ancient Chinese teacher who is a model person.  He sacrificed his life in service to the King.  His trait was “loyalty”  to the king / empire. ii. Léi F?ng – a famous soldier who modeled “self sacrifice” or “being a servant” to people. He was put forward by the Communist Party as a model of ‘altruism’ and ‘dedication’

4. Part III Social Structure

1. Q1
   1. YHM generally there is very limited direct or active relationship with municipal leaders.  She stated that generally there is limited interaction between people and municipal leaders unless some specific issue or business or unless there is some personal connection such as being classmate, family member, or neighbor.  YHM commented the relationship is neither good nor bad. YHM also commented that where there is more interaction between municipal leaders and others it is sometimes based on corruption and bribery. 
2. Q2 
   1. Lu Jia, a philosophical system is recognized as a valuable moral guide for society. A guide for how people relate to family, others, and government. c. Q3

i. YHM gave four specific taboos

1. One must not disrespect the deceased / ancestors.  No negative comments towards or actions that can be perceived as dishonoring the dead.
   1. No public criticism against government officials.
   1. No negative public comments against the nation of China.  “You cannot say you do not love this country.”  That is not good!
   1. No public comment concerning the desire to have freedom or liberty.  “That is not good.”

d. Q4

1. Society –  Abortion is accepted.  Corporal punishment is acceptable. YHM also commented that people are willing to accept someone being killed if there is a perception that the person was bad.  (I took to mean the idea corporal punishment or in some cases “justified” homicide)
2. YHM – there is no justification for the termination of life.  God created life.   e. Q5

i. Traditionally women are limited to activities within the role of family. Now, there have been gains in equality between men and women.  YHM are now able to work in many jobs and China so they are seen to have more value.  YHM still sees limits in women having positions of authority (government and business).  YHM commented that this progress in equality has actually increased the responsibility of women.  Now they are to a degree expected to work outside the home and still take care of the home.  YHM commented, “it is very tiring to be a modern woman in China.” 

• Q6
  • Law states people have rights, but YHM feels in many instances this is not necessarily true!

1. Children have a right to a free education, but a “hukou” is mandatory without this education is not free (can be very expensive or even impossible).   There are quite a few children who do not have a hukou due to one child policy or because where the parents chose to live.

1. Men and women
   1. Society – Law says same rights,  but leadership still limited primarily for men
   1. Grace – right to marry, to buy house (unless no hukou then not able to buy house or car)
   1. Right to live in any city as long as you have enough money
   1. Right to justice in the legal system – BUT YHM says this may not be true.

a. Judges can be influenced in many ways.

1. Children 
   1. Before number of children limited by government to one child
   1. Now government is actually encouraging people to have more children but YHM commented people do not want to have more children. 
2. Q7
   1. Before YHM was a Christian felt she can complain some, obey, or immigrate to another country.
   1. Now as a Christian,  YHM will first say something or voice opinion. If the issue is not related to God YHM will obey.  If deals with a matter pertaining to belief and activity for God YHM will seek God to determine if should obey or rebel.  If related to church, specifically family churches, together they will make decision.  YHM gave an example that in Beijing house churches are now being required to register with government.  YHM commented that so far 28 hc’s have decided to register (to obey).  This is being done on a church by church decision.  YHM commented that in this instances God must direct and help. h. Q8

i. Local leaders are chosen by upper leaders in the area. ii. National leaders chosen by the Communist Party, the 7 member leadership group.  The top 7 leaders are chosen by 100-member voting block

1. Eligibility – only eligible if high ranking within the party already or from a very powerful famous family.  A person cannot just choose to seek a leadership position. 
   1. Leaders chosen every 4 years
2. Q9
   1. Term limit is 8 years.  (unless law changed)
   1. National leaders only replaced at the end of the term.
3. Q10
   1. YHM not aware of specific responsibilities or rights or leaders.  If a specific leader is viewed as doing well or able to show tangible benefits for his constituents that leader is often promoted.
4. Q11
   1. There is a certain amount of tension with the national government.  There are essentially 3 sections in the government and there can be tension and competition among the parties.  In some instances, one party may have an advantage and can have leader of another party removed.  If a specific leader is viewed as underperforming they can lose their position.  The most common cause for removal from office is when a leader is found to be involved in corruption.

Survey #8 (EJ)

1. Brief Stats
   1. Name:  Yao Yi Jie  USE PSUEDONYM “EJ”
   1. Age: 33
   1. Male
   1. Religion: Christian
   1. Married
   1. Family:  3 people in immediate family:  Husband (EJ), wife, son
   1. Education: Bachelor’s degree
   1. Type of Job:  teacher
   1. Income: 2,000 – 4,000 yuan per month

• Survey Part I: FAMILY STRUCTURE
  • Q1
    • The family is patriarchal
  • Q2
    • In EJ’s family the husband has the line of authority
    • EJ also commented that the ultimate authority in the family is God
    • This is because God is the Lord and we are to obey God.
  • Q4
    • The mother is the primary care giver.
      • EJ’s mother raised him and worked
      • Father’s generally limited participation in raising child because they work.
    • Children before the age of three are only taught the basics are life: how to eat, communicate, etc.,
    • After three years old children can attend preschool.
      • EJ commented at this point (children begin some level of school) parents give the country authority to teach the child.
    • Traditions
      • EJ’s family  tradition is to teach the children the Christian faith:  God created the world and the Gospel
      • The importance of family
    • (Me – I asked about discipline issues: who, how, when?)
      • Both parents discipline, wife maybe more so than EJ because she is around the child most of the time.
      • Discipline method: 
        • Stop child when doing wrong
        • Instruct the right way
        • On second or third offenses may raise voice and possible physical correction
        • EJ commented he is more strict than most Chinese parents

• Q5
  • Societal:  boys are more important than girls
  • EJ himself feels boys are slightly more important
    • EJ gave this reason.  Girls will marry and become part of another family
  • Q6
    • In the past women’s primary responsibility was to manage and care for the household: clean, cook, buy household necessities, sew clothes, etc.,
      • NOW,  That has changed because more economic prosperity, the desire to make money and greater accessibility to the necessities of the household.
    • NOW, generally families want fewer children
      • More children create more responsibility and greater financial cost
    • NOW,  EJ commented that societally families have lowered their moral standards
      • EJ sees more divorce, adultery, sexually immorality etc.,

• Survey Part II RELIGIOUS STRUCTURE 
  • Q3
    • About God:  God is the creator,  eternal, righteous, awe inspiring
    • About good: thoughts and acts as determined as ‘good’ by God’s word 
    • About evil: thoughts and acts as determined as ‘evil’ according to God’s word.
    • About life:  it is a test to evaluate people’s faith
    • About mankind: important to God.  God loves people.  In a pitiful state because ignorant about God
    • About women: important, great help for men
    • About children:  born with a sin nature.  They need Jesus and the Gospel.  Most important need of children is to know Jesus and the Gospel.
  • Q4
    • EJ understand the image of God as holy, powerful, radiant, glorious, God’s face is serious yet God is gracious. ii. EJ believes the sanctity of life involves knowing that God as creator made man to reflect God’s character.  Man should realize their true identity as God’s creation.
  • Q6
    • EJ stated the Chinese government believes there is no god, so they are somewhat resistant / in opposition to the Christian faith. ii. There can be an adversarial relationship between the government and

Christians iii. The Bible tells Christians to obey the government.

iv. In times when there is conflict Christians are called to obey God.

• Q7

1. EJ’s faith holds that the family is very important to God.  The family is God’s idea / symbol to reveal His (God’s) love for people.
   1. God’s love causes (exhorts) the need to care for the family .
   1. Q9
      1. God is the authority,  the Bible is the guide,  a person is live without fear of the world, to live in the recognition of God’s sovereignty, and in obedience. f. Q10

i. Societally, Lei Feng (Chinese soldier who is held up as a model of

“altruism” and ‘self sacrifice.”) ii. Jesus is EJ’s model

1. Jesus models how to love God!
   1. Jesus models the importance of sharing the Gospel.

• Survey Part III SOCIAL STRUCTURE
  • Q1 people relate to local leaders
    • Generally people obey, but there is a lot of verbal complaining about local leadership.
  • Q2 values that give society cohesion and security
    • EJ listed two basic values
      • Confucian teaching that still has influence on society.
      • A general fear (not necessarily as in respect) of the government and its power.
  • Q3 basic taboos
    • To violate traditional Confucian culture / ideas
      • (Me- the general principle is “don’t do to others what you don’t want them to do to you.  I find this very interesting like the

‘golden rule’ from a negative action perspective)

• EJ commented that money (making money) is the primary motivating factor for Chinese people in general now.

a. Within that perspective EJ tried to explain that any negative moral judgment against a person doing what they can to make money is seen as a taboo.

i. His example: in the past prostitution was definitely deemed an immoral act.  NOW generally people are no longer critical of prostitution.  It is viewed as an acceptable way to make money, succeed, and even prosper.

b. This was a little difficult to see as a taboo in society, but this is his comment.

• Q4 termination of life
  • EJ in his belief system there is none.
  • Chinese society allows for termination of life
    • He gave  the following example

a. His wife went for prenatal check and the doctor asked the wife is she wanted to have and amniocentesis to determine any birth defects in the baby so they could chose to abort if there the baby had defects.  The doctor strongly encouraged her to do the test telling her it is free, paid by the government. EJ commented that doctors are ordered  by the government to push hard for this test so as to abort in case of suspected birth defects.  His wife denied the test and told the doctor God is in control.

iii. EJ did have a struggle with the issue of doctor assisted suicide in the case painful terminal illnesses or irrecoverable injuries or illnesses.  He expressed compassion for the pain of the patient, the emotional hardship and the medical costs for the family.

e. Q5 how women are valued

1. EJ commented that he feels women have more power (value) in society than men.
   1. EJ attributed this to the one child policy and the gender imbalance, more boys than girls, that resulted from the one child policy.  Marriageable women are more scarce and now there is great pressure on men to have an acceptable level of financial success in order to attract a marriage partner.  Women have become very selective.
2. EJ said that from a governmental perspective (not including political positions) women and men are equal.
   1. There is now an official saying posted in hospitals and other prominent areas that says

a. “zh? sh?ng y? ge h?o nán n? d?u y?yàng”

b. Only birth one baby good, boy or girl both the same.” f. Q6 rights

1. EJ said generally people have no real rights.  
2. Government determines what “rights” people have 
3. EJ commented that he feels government is taking away more rights or adding more limits on what people can and can’t do.

1. EJ explained that the confiscation of property land and houses by the government is increasing in China.

i. People are generally compensated for their property but there is no guarantee and there is no recourse if the government’s pledge is not honored.

1. Children have a right to education and generally to protection and basic well-being. 
2. Q7  individuals in conflict with policies

1. EJ said in instances where there is conflict he will do what he believes is right.
   1. He also he would make an effort to explain why he has conflict and why he believes the policy is wrong
   1. If the situation was serious he would consider possible legal acion.
2. Q8  leaders chosen
3. Leaders chosen
   1. People can vote for local leaders
   1. People cannot vote for national leaders
   1. Eligibility
      1. Must be a party member
   1. When eligible
      1. Local – EJ did not know
      1. National – leader must be at least 45 years old

i. Q9 leaders changed

i. EJ said that in the past leaders serve 4 year terms. ii. That can serve a maximum of 3 consecutive terms

1. Xi Jin Ping has changed the rules so that he can serve until he doesn’t want to anymore

1. EJ commented Xi Jin Ping is very smart!  Many leaders have tried to change the policy, but only XJP has been able to do it.

1. EJ said leaders can be changed when they do wrong things.
2. They can be changed if the President develops a different standard  1. (ME – no sure if EJ meant different ideologies / agendas or if he meant leadership regulations such as: term limits, age, party affiliations, experience etc.,  There was no follow-up for clarification)

NC Survey 5 (JEY)

Marriage Status: Yes

Children: 2 children (17 and 13)

Occupation: Nurse (now stay at home mother)

Age: 45

Level of Education: Da Lian College for Nursing Church Association: Raleigh Chinese Christian Church Christian History: 

I have been in the U.S. 1998. My husband came here as a student. After a year I came as well. My husband designs computer chip. Both of my children were born here.

When I was present with my son—my friends shared Jesus with me.

Hometown is DaLian

My sister and family think one child is good enough now. They are busy with work and it so expensive to raise a child! They are concerned with food, preschool, daycare. If they want to go to a preschool there is a 2-4 year wait list and you have to pay a lot of money.

They may let you in.

People don’t want a second child in the rural side, they just want a boy!

My in laws first child was a daughter. They want a grandson and not a grand daughter!!!

Family Structure ????

• What are the authority lines in your family? Who makes decisions—how, when

and why? ??????????????????——?????????????????????????

My mom always made decisions in my family. Almost every family the Mom makes decisions in China. (my husband is not a Christian) My kids ask me for things, not my husband. My husband makes big decisions.

• What are the child-rearing practices and traditions in your family? ???????????????????????????????????????

No traditions. I have a sister. Only the young gerneation does the 100 day party!!!! They have 1 child only so they have parties for them with 4 garndparents. 

• How are boys and girls viewed differently by families, if at all? ???????

???????????????

The boy has the family name. I didn’t change my family name after I was married. In China, they would always call you Mrs. (last name of husband) not your real name! My in laws they have a big family name. They have the sons names ready way ahead of time—they have the middle and family name already. Girls are not included in this at all. ?4?How are the dynamics of the family changing in China? ??????????

?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????  

For my Mom, I called my Mom this morning. She has 5 siblings and they get together every week and play cards and eat. My generation doesn’t do that—we are busy with our kids! When I travel back to China I hardly ever see my own generation, my own cousins are too busy. My mother is the oldest so the first day of the New Year all of my aunts and uncles will come to my Mom’s house. But my generation will not come. They will visit friends. For my generation it is kind of lonely.

Religious Structure ????

?????????????????????????????????????????????? 

?1?What are your beliefs concerning image of God, sanctity of human life? ????

???????????????????

I had lunch with my friend yesterday and she told me our church last week said they would excommunicate two members. For me, everyone is a sinner and makes mistakes. For U.S. Chinese people they have high education—they are top students or top workers. That’s why they came here. They are proud of themselves. They think they are the best so there is a lack of humility. They cannot see people who disagree with them. There is always fighting in the church here! Pastor had to leave as well.

?2?How does religion inform social justice issues? Does religion play a role in

restoring peace (shalom) to a nation? ??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Before I became a Christian I would wonder if people were Christians. She is a Christian, but she doesn’t act like it. After I became a Christian I see the best part, not the worst parts. I tell my children you learn from the good parts, but don’t learn from the bad examples.

Before I came here they say Americans pay lots of taxes to support the poor. When I became a Christian we are not rich, but we always participate in Christmas that we have so much that these others might need something so we should give to them. 

I just think we should help them!

?3?How does religion influence an individual’s relationship with the government? ?

??????????????

Of course we should be involved in government. If we are involved then there can be good done.

Social Structure ???? 

• How do people relate to local municipal leaders? ???????????????

There is no way they can approach local leaders. In China, if you are in government you are a highter level of people and don’t talk to normal people. They only socialize with others in government or with people that have in common. 

My uncle is CEO. They mayor met him several times, but only on the television. But no personal meetings. They don’t ask personal questions about your family, it is set up only for TV.

You can only be in the CCP and then you can work hard at government and then they will nominate you for a position.

• What are the basic values within society that give it cohesion and security? ???

????????????????????????

This is a big problem in China. That’s why a lot of top people came to the U.S. They don’t think its fair. They cant have their own life, but when they come here they can. For example, if the mayor’s son found some girl and the girl didn’t want to date the son the girl will be in big trouble. The government or rich people can do everything. The normal people think that’s not fair or safe. Top government can have many mistresses! That’s why we are thinking we don’t want to stay there. 

Even if you work for a good company they will give you a bonus every holiday. My sister’s husband works for the government and they get lots of things! Even my Mom can benefit. She gets lots of boxes of good food. There are many other perks!!! They don’t have to pay to go to restaurants—they just have to sign. Normal people have to pay.

They can go to the spa or resort and don’t have to pay. They have the power.

?3?Are there ever justifications for the termination of life? If so, what? ????????????????????

For me, I had an abortion in China. At that time I didn’t feel guilty. But when I was pregnant with my daughter I cried a lot.

We don’t have that education to think that’s a life. 

I always ask this question. I was a nurse in China. I was told how to take care of patients, but I never think about them as a person. I think of them as a patient—not real life person. I wasn’t a bad person, but I see people that are really sick, then I think you are not treatable then it is no use—you can’t last long. When I was on my night shift an old lady knocked on my door at 2 AM. My husband peed on the bed and I said go AWAY it is 2 AM. Now, I can’t believe I acted like that. Back then, no one think about it this way.

When I gave birth to my daughter the nurse treated me like family! Their attitude was so different than mine! I talked to my frinds in China who work in the hospital and said our teacher never told us to view patients like our own family. Most of my friends who work still don’t see the patient as family. They think, go away, don’t bother me! They don’t see that this is a LIFE. IMAGO DEI. This is what makes the change in my heart! I treat them differently as a nurse.

If you are sick and on life support maybe this is ok?

• How are women valued, in contrast to men, in society? ???????????

???????

In my Mom’s generation I feel like they are the same. My friends in China say oh you are lucky you don’t have to work! We have to work everyday in China to make money. In China, the woman always has to work. My Mom said you raise your child by yourself! For my cousin, they are pregnant and then deliver the baby and that’s it. Her Mom takes care of everything else!

My kids and I have a good relationship. We are closer than my cousin’s relationship with her children. She maybe will have one day with her children.

• How do individuals respond to policies with which they disagree based on

conviction? ?????????????????????

For normal peole in China the rule is the rule for the normal people. They just follow— they have nothing to do. Here, in the U.S., you can sign a petition or something. In China you are not allowed to gather together. Normal people, they can complain about it, or nothing more. This is true today! 

It also depends on where you live. City people will follow the rules. Some other people can have more kids. Celebrities can have other kids. They send their wives to other  places. The policy is only for the normal people. The Chinese people are very smart in figuring out how to get around the policy.

In California, they had hospitals to help with this—having more children! Fly into California and we will take care of you. San Francisco.

?????????????????????You can choose to answer questions below or not:

?6?How do local municipal leaders lose the right to lead? ???????????

?????

Yes. The top branches, if they fall down, then all the other branches will go down!!! Normal people can’t vote.

APPENDIX 5

SOUTH KOREA CASE STUDY

Is the research in this study transferable to other settings? South Korea, like China, has experienced tremendous growth in its Christian population over the past four decades. Unlike China, South Korea has simultaneously been able to reverse a dangerously low birth replacement rate in recent years, which correlates with the growth of Christianity in its population. It is perhaps the only nation in modern times that has been able to successfully reverse population trajectory to such a significant degree.^[536] By 2007 South Korea’s SRB was again at a healthy level of 105:100 after peaking at 117:100 in the early 1990s. 

Gendercide

As is true in China, gendercide in South Korea was widespread throughout the last two decades of the 20^th Century. The advent of ultrasound technology in the 1980s resulted in sex-selective prenatal screening and contributed to the high abortion rate. The gender imbalance threatened to irrevocably harm the nation’s future. The dominant preference for sons was a result of the desire for an heir that would provide for the family and carry on the family name. While infanticide and abortion had traditionally been used as means  to eliminate unwanted children in Korea, abortion became the principal means of terminating life.^[537] In 1977, “doctors in Seoul were performing 2.75 abortions for every birth—the highest documented rate of abortion in human history.”^[538] By 1992, “the male to female ratio for the birth of a first child was 117.9:100, a clear indication that parents were using prenatal technologies to ascertain the sex of their child—and in many cases to abort their girls.”^[539] However, in less than twenty years, South Korea’s SRB dramatically shifted to fall within normal ratios.

Theories

The literature containing theories for South Korea’s reversal is extensive, and several demographers affirm parts of a variety of theories, including low fertility rates, to explain such a sudden turnaround. For example, law enforcement and public awareness campaigns played a vital role, but so did increased participation by women in the workplace.^[540] The availability of higher education for women certainly contributed to the shift as did legal reform, in particular the Gender Equality Employment Act.^[541]

    While each of the aforementioned theories have merit, the shift from a Confucian based patriarchal family structure, which placed restrictions on women’s conduct and reinforced women’s inferior worth to a man, to a Christian perspective on family helps to  make sense of such a dramatic reversal in Korean society. Kelly H. Chong writes, “One of the first attractions and roles of evangelical faith for Korean women is as a means of coping with and seeking relief from domestic problems, especially by way of healing and empowerment provided through spirituality and institutional participation.”^[542]

Summary: A Mother of Two Daughters is the Envy of Every Woman Two new Asian proverbs help to illuminate the shift in Korean society: 1) “To have two daughters wins you a gold medal”; and 2) “A mother of two daughters or more is the envy of every woman.” Is the Korean shift applicable to China?  For the purpose of this study it is important to note that Christians comprise approximately 29 percent of South Korea’s population.^[543] The majority of these Christians are Protestant and according to an article from Pew Research, “Religious restrictions in South Korea are lower than in the U.S., and significantly lower than the median level of religious restrictions in the Asia-Pacific region.”^[544] The shift from a traditional philosophy of family to a Christian value system has coincided with the growth of Christianity in South Korea. Mothers no longer find their identity in the success of their children, but in their relationship with God. Parents consider themselves as stewards of their children— entrusted with them for a time in order to pass on the deposit of faith. A Christian ethic of life and family has impacted Korean society in such a way that it has played a significant role in a demographic shift. Families traded their traditional values for a value system that valued all life and considered males and females equal in the sight of God.

---

[1] See David Aikman, Jesus in Beijing: How Christianity is Transforming China and Changing the Global Balance of Power (Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2003).

[2] Rodney Stark and Xiuhua Wang, A Star in the East: The Rise of Christianity in China (West Conshohocken: Templeton Press, 2015).

[3] For more on these factors see Stark and Wang, A Star in the East. Rodney Stark also describes a sociological description of the growth of early Christianity, “The projections reveal that Christianity could easily have reached half the population by the middle of the fourth century without miracles or conversion en masse.” Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), 14. While Stark’s conclusions regarding early Christian growth have been met with a mixture of acceptance and skepticism from both sociology and biblical scholarship, his conclusions regarding the reality of abortion and infanticide in the Greco-Roman world is generally accepted. See Larry W. Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries? (Milwaukee: Market

University Press, 2016); Jan Bremmer, The Rise of Christianity through the Eyes of Gibbon, Harnack, and Rodney Stark, (Groningen: Barkhuis, 2010); and E. R. Dodds, Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety, Reprint edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991).

[4] Secondary conversion is a religious conversion that results directly from a relationship with another convert. In this case, Stark refers to conversions resulting from the marriage of Christian women to non-Christian men. See Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 111.

[5] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 113.

[6] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 117. 

[7] For example, Zhang Yimou, the celebrated film director and producer of the 2008 Summer Olympics Opening Ceremony in Beijing. Zhang, who has fathered seven children with four different women, received a “social support fee” of 7.48 million yuan. See Ma Jian, “Opinion | China’s Brutal OneChild Policy,” The New York Times, 21 May 2013, sec. Opinion, https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/22/opinion/chinas-brutal-one-child-policy.html.

[8] The BBC reported via the official Xinhua News Agency the official statement from the Communist Party’s Central Committee. According to the report, the alteration of the policy was “to improve the balanced development of population.” “China to End One-Child Policy,” BBC News, 29 October 2015, sec. China, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-34665539.

[9] See Josh Chin, “Chinese Scholars Call for Revision of One-Child Policy,” Wall Street Journal, 6 July 2012, sec. World News, https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303962304577509062660508548.

[10] “One-Child Policy Abolished: Today Is the Day the Lord Has Made! | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/news/one-child-policy-abolished-today-day-lord-has-made.

[11] This, despite the state media reporting a baby boom in Beijing, with long lines reserving beds at hospitals and maternity wards booked months in advance. See “Second Child Policy Fuels Hospital

Bottlenecks|Society|chinadaily.Com.Cn,” n.d., http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2016-

[12] /30/content_26639808.htm. “But those accounts were misrepresenting the facts,” said Wang Feng, of the University of California at Irvine. The Washington Post reports, “The lines at the capital’s top hospitals are a function of bottlenecks in China’s overstretched health system: many of the women who have elected to give birth this year are older than average, and they have been encouraged to head for Grade A hospitals in case of complications.” “China Drops One-Child Policy, but ‘Exhausted’ Tiger Moms Say One Is Plenty,” Washington Post, n.d., https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/china-drops-one-child-policybut-exhausted-tiger-moms-say-one-is-plenty/2016/10/14/336f1890-8ae7-11e6-8a68b4ce96c78e04_story.html.

[13] Stuart Gietel-Basten, “Why Scrapping the One-Child Policy Will Do Little to Change China’s Population,” The Conversation, n.d., http://theconversation.com/why-scrapping-the-one-child-policy-willdo-little-to-change-chinas-population-49982.

[14] Howard W. French, “China’s Twilight Years,” The Atlantic, 11 May 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/06/chinas-twilight-years/480768/.

[15] Ethnographic interviews are a category of qualitative research that combines one-on-one interviews with immersive observation. The approach and method for this study’s ethnographic interviews is based in part on Chapter 9, “Qualitative Research Methods,” in Paul Leedy, Practical Research: Planning and Design (London: Pearson, 2012) and on Herbert J. Rubin, Qualitative Interviewing: The Art of Hearing Data (Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, 2011). 

[16] The Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) is the Chinese state-sanctioned body for the organization of all Protestant churches.

[17] The networks in Hebei province have been chosen due to availability of contacts and personal references known to the author. Due to security concerns, two participants were chosen in Shanghai.

[18] Some examples of church association will be in country, out of country, house church, cell church, underground church, and TSPM.

[19] This information is based upon ethnographic interview content presented in THE9930 Anthropology and the Social Sciences by Dr. Al James in Winter Term 2013 at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C.

[20] Ma Yinchu, Song Jian, and Zhou Enlai

[21] See Alan Kreider, The Patient Ferment of the Early Church?: The Improbable Rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2016).

[22] See Justin A. Smith, “Ethical Value of Pagan Religions,” Old Testament Studies (1886): 17–21.

[23] See John Bryan Starr, Understanding China: A Guide to China’s Economy, History and Political Structure (New York: Hill and Wang, 1997), 191.

[24] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 97.

[25] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 118. Mary Ann Warren, who originally coined the term defines gendercide as “those wrongful forms of sexual discrimination which reduce the relative number of females or males, whether through direct killing or in more indirect ways.” Mary Anne Warren, Gendercide, UK ed. edition. (Totowa, N.J: Rowman & Allanfield Publishers, 1985), 1.

[26] See “World Health Organization, Sex Ratio,” SEARO, n.d., http://www.searo.who.int/health_situation_trends/data/chi/sex-ratio/en/.

[27] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 100.

[28] See Howard Clark Kee, Miracle in the Early Christian World: A Study in Sociohistoric Method (New York: Yale University Press, 1983).

[29] Jonathan D. Spence, The Search for Modern China, 1st Paperback edition (New York: W. W.

Norton & Company, 1991), 683

[30] Spence notes, “According to Thomas Malthus the population of a given country was doomed to be checked by famine, disease, war, or other catastrophes when it pushed too hard against the limits of available resources.” Spence, The Search for Modern China, 683.

[31] Avraham Ebenstein, “The ‘Missing Girls’ of China and the Unintended Consequences of the

One Child Policy,” Journal of Human Resources 45.1 (2010): 89 ⁴ Spence, The Search for Modern China,685.

[32] John King Fairbank and Merle Goldman, China: A New History, Second Enlarged Edition, 2nd

Revised & enlarged edition (Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press: An Imprint of Harvard University Press, 2006), 368–370. The massive famine did indeed materialize. Fairbank writes concerning the greatest famine recorded in human history, “In 1958–1960 some 20 to 30 million people lost their lives through malnutrition and famine because of the polices imposed upon them by the Chinese Communist Party. Measured by the statistics showing an increase of mortality, this was one of the greatest of human disasters.” Fairbank records the factors leading to this disaster: 1. “State authorities had unquestioned control over the populace in the villagers…. The bifurcation of society into rulers and ruled, the managers and producers, could now be used by the CCP leaders more intensively than ever before.” 2. “The docility of the Chinese peasantry, who were remarkably enured to following the dictates of authority because it represented the peace and order on which their livelihood depended.” 3. “The CCP’s shocking recognition in late 1957 that the Stalinist model of industrial growth was not suited to Chinese conditions.” 4. “Urbanization, having outstripped industrialization, produced urban unemployment, which was added to the underemployment in the populous countryside.” 5. “The central statistical bureau was broken up and localized together with functions of economic planning. This was the context in which the overambitious targets of the Great Leap were formulated in each locality, not by economists but by cadres inspired by emulation who were contemptuous of experts but intensely loyal to the cause.” 

[33] Frank Dikötter, “Looking Back on the Great Leap Forward,” History Today 66.8 (2016): 23–24.

[34] Wang Feng, Martin King Whyte, and Yong Cai, “Challenging Myths About China’s One-Child Policy,” China Journal 74.1 (2015): 147.

[35] Wang Feng, King Whyte, and Yong Cai, “Challenging Myths About China’s One-Child Policy,” 147.

[36] Wang Feng, King Whyte, and Yong Cai, “Challenging Myths About China’s One-Child Policy,” 147.

[37] It was Mao’s opinion that a large population was an asset. Every person added to the labor force, which would in turn contribute to national defense and economic development. See John Bryan Starr, Understanding China: A Guide to China’s Economy, History, and Political Culture, 3^rd edition (New York: Hill and Wang, 2010), 194.

[38] See the author’s interview with Norman Cheng on April 4, 2017 in Appendix 1. Norman Cheng is a pseudonym for security purposes. See also Ma Yinchu, A New Theory of Population, (London: Palgrave MacMillan, 1989).

[39] For more on Mao’s motivation, see Jung Chang’s revealing narrative of Mao’s hold on the Chinese populace. Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, Mao: The Unknown Story (New York: Anchor, 2006).

[40] “History of the One-Child Policy | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/onechild-policy.

[41] “History of the One-Child Policy | All Girls Allowed.”

[42] “Can China Afford to Continue Its One-Child Policy?,” East-West Center | www.Eastwestcenter.Org, 23 March 2005, https://www.eastwestcenter.org/publications/can-china-affordcontinue-its-one-child-policy. Entitled An Open Letter to Members of the Chinese Communist Party and Chinese Communist Youth League on Controlling Population Growth, the letter was published by the Central Committee. It made the following points concerning the disaster of rapid population growth: 1) increased consumption and reduced capital accumulation and investment; 2) rapid growth made it difficult to increase the standard of living for the population; 3) even smaller per capita arable land and reduced food supply; 4) an overuse of natural resources including energy, water, and forests; and 5) aggravated environmental pollution and decreased production.

[43] Karin Evans, The Lost Daughters of China: Adopted Girls, Their Journey to America, and the Search Fora Missing Past, Revised, Updated edition (New York: TarcherPerigee, 2008), 98.

[44] The UNFPA is formally known as the United Nations Population Fund and is the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency. The author recognizes that the acronym does not match the title of the agency.

[45] See testimony in “Human Rights in China: Improving or Deteriorating Conditions?,” n.d., http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/intlrel/hfa27067.000/hfa27067_0f.htm.

[46] Steven W. Mosher, “China’s One-Child Policy: Twenty-Five Years Later,” The Human Life Review 32.1 (2006): 82.

[47] Continued support by the UN for population control policies in China resulted in the NPR reporting on April 4, 2017 that the Trump Administration was cutting funding to the UNFPA over this issue. Journalist Nurith Aizenman writes, “The Trump Administration will withhold $32.5 million in funding that had been earmarked this fiscal year for the United Nations’ lead agency on family planning and maternal health…. The administration says it’s doing so because it has determined that UNFPA helps to support a Chinese government family planning program that forces people to get abortions and sterilizations.” “Citing Abortions In China, Trump Cuts Funds For U.N. Family Planning Agency,” NPR.Org, n.d., https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/04/04/522040557/citing-abortions-inchina-trump-cuts-funds-for-u-n-family-planning-agency.

[48] “Human Rights in China: Improving or Deteriorating Conditions?” ²² Mosher, “China’s One-Child Policy,” 83.

[49] “Human Rights in China: Improving or Deteriorating Conditions?”

[50] “Human Rights in China: Improving or Deteriorating Conditions?”

[51] Richard L. Jackson, “Ma Yinchu: From Yale to Architect of Chinese Population Policy,” American Journal of Chinese Studies.1 (2012): 51.

[52] Richard L. Jackson, “Ma Yinchu,” 51.

[53] “The Ghost Children: In the Wake of China’s One-Child Policy, a Generation Is Lost,” n.d., https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/the-ghost-children-in-the-wake-of-chinas-one-child-policya-generation-is-lost/article23454402/.

[54] Richard L. Jackson, “Ma Yinchu,” 52.

[55] See Richard L. Jackson, “Ma Yinchu,” 52. Ma was completely vindicated in 1979 by Deng

Xiaoping and was recognized for his contributions to “Chinese development and population policy.”

[56] “Song Jian: A Leading Scientist,” n.d., http://cpcchina.chinadaily.com.cn/201101/25/content_13916846.htm. Cf. The author’s interview with Norman Cheng. Cheng argues that the research conducted before the implementation of the One-Child Policy could not be called scientific research as it was conducted by cybernetic researchers who knew nothing about population studies. There were almost no demographers in China at the time and, consequently, the research quality was poor.

[57] “The Equation That Inspired the One-Child Policy – Kinea,” n.d., http://kinea.media/en/sciencetechnology/song-jian-equation-one-child-policy.

[58] “The Equation That Inspired the One-Child Policy – Kinea.”

[59] “The Equation That Inspired the One-Child Policy – Kinea.”

[60] “The Equation That Inspired the One-Child Policy – Kinea.”

[61] Susan Greenhalgh, Governing China’s Population: From Leninist to Neoliberal Biopolitics (Stanford University Press, 2005) 93.

[62] Wenqian Gao, Lawrence R. Sullivan, and Peter Rand, Zhou Enlai?: The Last Perfect Revolutionary: A Biography (New York: PublicAffairs, 2007), 88.

[63] Harold C. Hinton, “The Eighth Congress of the Chinese Communist Party,” Far Eastern Survey

[64] .1 (1957): 1–8.

[65] Ebenstein, “The ‘Missing Girls’ of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy,” 87.

[66] The Two-Child Policy will be discussed later in the chapter.

[67] “The Ghost Children.”

[68] Starr, Understanding China, 187.

[69] Kristof writes, “By the early 1970s China had adopted a highly successful voluntary family planning program called “Later, Longer, Fewer.” Its slogan was “One child isn’t too few, two are just fine, three are too many.” And within about a decade it managed without coercion to reduce the average number of births per woman from six to three, a remarkable achievement. It’s rarely acknowledged that the biggest drop in Chinese fertility came not from the one-child policy, but earlier during this voluntary birth control campaign.” Kristof, “‘China’s Worst Policy Mistake’?” 

[70] Spence, The Search for Modern China, 687.

[71] Starr. Understanding China, 194.

[72] Stuart Gietel-Basten, “Why Scrapping the One-Child Policy Will Do Little to Change China’s Population,” The Conversation, n.d., http://theconversation.com/why-scrapping-the-one-child-policy-willdo-little-to-change-chinas-population-49982.

[73] Alarmingly, for the central government, in 1.7 million families with five or more children, a new baby was born in the past year. Spence, The Search for Modern China, 686. 

[74] Spence, The Search for Modern China, 686.

[75] Spence. The Search for Modern China, 686.

[76] Ebenstein, “The ‘Missing Girls’ of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy,” 89.

[77] Starr. Understanding China,189.

[78] Ebenstein, The “Missing Girls” of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy,” 101.

[79] “2011 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” n.d., https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2011-annual-report. 113. For example, in March 2011, the Maojing township government in Qingyang city, Gansu province, issued a report on the ‘‘outstanding results’’ of the government’s ‘‘rectification activities.’’ The report calls for officials to ‘‘spare no efforts’’ in implementing population policies and notes that village cadres face a penalty of 1,500 yuan (US$230)

[80] “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” n.d., https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2009-annual-report. Consider an example of abortion quotas: In 2009, Yunnan officials developed a implementation plan that outlined abortion targets for specific groups: The Commission notes, “Strictly prohibit the birth of multiple children; for women who have multiple out-of-plan children and become pregnant again, the abortion rate must reach 100 percent; for women who have two out-of-plan children and become pregnant again, the abortion rate must exceed 90 percent; for women who have one out-of-plan child and become pregnant again, the abortion rate must exceed 85 percent.”

[81] “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.”

[82] Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising

Power, Vintage Books edition (New York: Vintage, 1995) 238–239. Kristof, the former bureau chief of the New York Times in Beijing, details the account of Li Qiuliang in 1992: “Family planning officials showed up at her home when she was seven months pregnant and frail. Li had permission for her pregnancy and had done nothing wrong. But officials had birth slots for 1992 that would go unused, and they feared that they might have excess births in 1993. Since they would be punished with salary cuts or demotions if births exceeded the quota in 1993, they formed an ‘early birth shock brigade’ to round up very pregnant women and induce the births before the new year. ‘My daughter-in-law’s health isn’t good, and she may not be able to get pregnant again,’ Li Qiuliang’s mother-in-law pleaded. ‘Let her have one baby, someone to look after her and my son when they grow old. It doesn’t matter if it’s a boy or a girl. After it’s born, she’ll go get sterilized.’ The officials paid no attention. They took Li to a clinic and ordered a doctor to induce labor. The doctor protested that Li was too weak, but the officials ordered him to proceed. Li hemorrhaged, fell unconscious, and almost died; her life was saved in a hospital, but she was left crippled. The baby died after nine hours.”

[83] “2008 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” n.d., https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2008-annual-report.

[84] Starr, Understanding China, 183–184.

[85] “2012 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” n.d., https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2012-annual-report. 92–93, states, “In accordance with national measures, local governments direct officials to punish non-compliance with heavy fines, termed ‘‘social support fees’’ (shehui fuyang fei), which force many couples to choose between undergoing an unwanted abortion and incurring a fine much greater than the average annual income.”

[86] Pastor Max Wong is critical of these fines. The penalties, he believes, are a convenient way for officials to supplement their income. For him, that helps explain why the policy has been so persistent. “That money becomes grey income for the local government,” he says. Furthermore, The Globe and Mail contacted the Health and Family Planning Commission regarding this “grey money.” The Commission replied that “local officials must make public their rules about one-child-policy fines, as well as information about how much money they collect. The law requires local officials to submit those fines – which China calls a “social maintenance fee”–to the national treasury, although they are then returned to local budgets.” Vanderklippe comments, “As a result, there remains an incentive for neighbourhood officials to use second children as a revenue source. It’s not small change: In 2012, a report that tallied such fees in two-thirds of China’s provinces found that they had brought in $2.6 billion in fines from violators of the policy.” “The Ghost Children.” 

[87] Spence, The Search for Modern China. 693.

[88] “2012 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” 90–91. Mandatory abortion, which is often referred to as “remedial measures” (bujiu cuoshi) in government reports, is endorsed explicitly as an official policy instrument in the regulations of 18 of China’s 31 provincial-level jurisdictions.

[89] Starr, Understanding China,190.

[90] Elizabeth L. Gerhardt, The Cross and Gendercide: A Theological Response to Global Violence Against Women and Girls (Downers Grove, Illinois: IVP Academic, 2014), 44.

[91] “2008 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.”

[92] Nicholas N. Eberstadt, “A Global War against Baby Girls: Sex-Selective Abortion Becomes a Worldwide Practice,” Handbook of Clinical Gender Medicine (2012): 18–36.

[93] “2010 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” n.d., https://www.cecc.gov/publications/annual-reports/2010-annual-report.

[94] “2011 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.” 113.

[95] “‘Better to Be a Criminal in China than a Pregnant Mother,’” PRI, 15 April 2014, https://www.pop.org/better-to-be-a-criminal-in-china-than-a-pregnant-mother/.

[96] “Constitution Of The People’s Republic Of China, 1982 | US-China Institute,” n.d., https://china.usc.edu/constitution-peoples-republic-china-1982.

[97] “Better to Be a Criminal in China than a Pregnant Mother.”

[98] Ma Jian, “Opinion | China’s Brutal One-Child Policy,” The New York Times, 21 May 2013, sec.

Opinion, https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/22/opinion/chinas-brutal-one-child-policy.html. ⁷² Jian, “Opinion | China’s Brutal One-Child Policy.”

[99] “China (Includes Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau),” U.S. Department of State, n.d., http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2010/eap/154382.htm.

[100] “Encountering China’s Trafficked Daughters | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://allgirlsallowed.org/blog/posts/encountering-chinas-trafficked-daughters. By comparison, the abortion rate in the United States in 2014 was 12.1 percent with the 20–29 year old demographic accounting for 59 percent of all abortions. The abortion rate in the United Kingdom was 20.21 percent. See “Abortion Rates in US Hit Historic Low, CDC Report Finds,” Text Article, Fox News, 23 November 2017, http://www.foxnews.com/health/2017/11/23/abortion-rates-in-us-hit-historic-low-cdc-report-finds.html.

[101] “Audio: Family Confirms Death of Mother After Forced Abortion | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://allgirlsallowed.org/news/audio-family-confirms-death-mother-after-forced-abortion.

[102] “God Is Ending Forced Abortion in China | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/blog/posts/god-ending-forced-abortion-china.

[103] “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.” In 2008, Chongqing out-of-quota residents were imposed fines of between 5,000 yuan ($731) and 10,000 yuan ($1,464) if they refused to perform an abortion, in addition to the ordinary social compensation fee of 2,000 yuan ($293) to 5,000 yuan ($731).

[104] See Starr, Understanding China, 189–190. Starr points out that even these fines were not generally sufficient since the family security a son provides his family over his lifetime is worth the short term financial loss. In 2008, Shanxi couples were assessed a social compensation fee equal to 20 percent of a couple’s combined income once each year for seven years; for a third child, the fine rose to 40 percent of combined income for 14 years. See “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.”

[105] Jian, “Opinion | China’s Brutal One-Child Policy,” notes, “Zhang Yimou, the celebrated film director and arranger of the 2008 Summer Olympics’ opening ceremony in Beijing, was accused last week

[106] Mosher, “China’s One-Child Policy,” 80.

[107] “The Worldwide War on Baby Girls,” Economist 394.8672 (2010): 77–80.

[108] “The Worldwide War on Baby Girls,” Economist 394.8672 (2010): 77–80.

[109] “2012 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China,” 92–93.

[110] Wang Feng, “Can China Afford to Continue Its One-Child Policy?” (n.d.): 12. 12.

[111] “China (Includes Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau).”

[112] “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.”

[113] “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.”

[114] “Forced Abortion Statistics | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/forcedabortion-statistics.

[115] “Data Reveal Scale of China Abortions,” Financial Times, 15 March 2013, https://www.ft.com/content/6724580a-8d64-11e2-82d2-00144feabdc0.

[116] “Data Reveal Scale of China Abortions.”

[117] “China to End One-Child Policy,” BBC News, 29 October 2015, sec. China, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-34665539. The BBC reported via the official Xinhua News Agency the official statement from the Communist Party’s Central Committee. According to the report, the alteration of the policy was “to improve the balanced development of population.”

[118] “One-Child Policy Abolished: Today Is the Day the Lord Has Made! | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/news/one-child-policy-abolished-today-day-lord-has-made.

[119] “China’s Two-Child Policy Is Having Unintended Consequences,” The Economist, 26 July 2018, https://www.economist.com/china/2018/07/26/chinas-two-child-policy-is-having-unintendedconsequences.

[120] According to the advocacy group, Human Rights Watch, “While the women’s labor for participation was 83% in 2007, it had dropped to 81% of the male rate by 2017.” James Griffiths and Serenitie Wang CNN, “Faced with Falling Birth Rates, China Urges Citizens to Have More Babies,” CNN, n.d., https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/08/health/china-one-child-intl/index.html.

[121] “But those accounts were misrepresenting the facts,” claims Wang Feng of the University of California at Irvine. “The lines at the capital’s top hospitals are a function of bottlenecks in China’s overstretched health system: Many of the women who have elected to give birth this year are older than average, and have been encouraged to head for Grade A hospitals in case of complications.” “China Drops One-Child Policy, but ‘Exhausted’ Tiger Moms Say One Is Plenty,” Washington Post, n.d., https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/china-drops-one-child-policy-but-exhausted-tigermoms-say-one-is-plenty/2016/10/14/336f1890-8ae7-11e6-8a68-b4ce96c78e04_story.html. 

[122] Gietel-Basten, “Why Scrapping the One-Child Policy Will Do Little to Change China’s Population.”

[123] Howard W. French, “China’s Twilight Years,” The Atlantic, 11 May 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/06/chinas-twilight-years/480768/.

[124] Gietel-Basten, “Why Scrapping the One-Child Policy Will Do Little to Change China’s

Population.”

[125] See W. S. J. Staff, “Chinese Balk at Child-Rearing Costs,” WSJ, 16 November 2013, https://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2013/11/16/chinese-balk-at-child-rearing-costs/.

[126] “China Drops One-Child Policy, but ‘Exhausted’ Tiger Moms Say One Is Plenty.”

[127] From 18.46 million births in 2016 to 17.23 million births in 2017. “China Drops One-Child

Policy, but ‘Exhausted’ Tiger Moms Say One Is Plenty.”

[128] Benjamin Haas, “China’s Birth Rate Rises but Falls Short of Government Estimates,” The Guardian, 23 January 2017, sec. World news, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/23/chinasbirth-rate-soars-after-relaxation-of-one-child-policy.

[129] Staff, “Chinese Balk at Child-Rearing Costs.” This was a non-scientific study conducted on Sina Weibo, a popular Chinese microblogging and social media site.

[130] Josh Chin, “Xi Jinping Gets Mocked Going After New Zealand on Food Safety,” WSJ, 7 October 2013, https://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2013/10/07/xi-jinping-gets-mocked-going-after-newzealand-on-food-safety/.

[131] Starr. Understanding China, 187.

[132] See Gietel-Basten, “Why Scrapping the One-Child Policy Will Do Little to Change China’s Population.”

[133] W. S. J. Staff, “In Two-Child China, a New Dilemma,” WSJ, 26 February 2014, https://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2014/02/26/in-two-child-china-a-new-dilemma/. From 2013 through 2014 the government gradually eased restrictions on births until officially enacting the Two-Child Policy in 2015. Speelman interviewed a national who was affected by these early shifts in policy.

[134] The hukou is a resident permit that grants access to better health care and other social services. Nathan Vanderklippe explains, “The foundation of Chinese civic life is the hukou, a maroon-and-gold household-registration document. It is a form of identity used to control people’s movements inside the country, set up by the Communist regime, and similar to systems used in Soviet Russia and imperial China. With it, a person can secure a national-identification card, attend school, access basic medical services, find a place to live, board a bus or train, open a bank account, get a job, and secure a passport.” “The Ghost Children.” 

[135] Staff, “In Two-Child China, a New Dilemma.”

[136] “Many Not Satisfied with China’s New ‘Two-Child Policy’ | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/blog/posts/many-not-satisfied-chinas-new-two-child-policy.

[137] CNN, “Faced with Falling Birth Rates, China Urges Citizens to Have More Babies.”

[138] “China Considers Ending Birth Limits as Soon as This Year,” Bloomberg.Com, 21 May 2018, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-21/china-said-to-consider-ending-birth-limits-as-soonas-this-year.

[139] “China Drops One-Child Policy, but ‘Exhausted’ Tiger Moms Say One Is Plenty.”

[140] “China Drops One-Child Policy, but ‘Exhausted’ Tiger Moms Say One Is Plenty.”

[141] See “China Moves to End Two-Child Limit, Finishing Decades of Family Planning-CNN,”

n.d., https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/28/asia/china-family-planning-one-child-intl/index.html.

[142] “Forced Abortion Still Mandated Under China’s ‘Planned Birth’ Laws,” PRI, 15 January 2018, https://www.pop.org/forced-abortion-still-mandated-chinas-planned-birth-laws/.

[143] “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2016,” n.d., https://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2016humanrightsreport/index.htm?year=2016&dlid=265328#wrapper.

[144] See Article Twenty-Five “Health and Family Planning Commission of Zhumadian,” n.d.

http://www.zmdwsj.gov.cn/pub/laws/2017/0803/317.html.

[145] “??????,” n.d. http://www.gzrd.gov.cn/cwhgb/dseg2016ndeh/20872.shtml.

[146] See “Forced Abortion Still Mandated Under China’s ‘Planned Birth’ Laws.”

[147] Spence, The Search for Modern China. 683. The 1982 census was the first to be monitored with any precision (United Nations experts on populations lent their expertise) and the first census of any kind since 1964.

[148] Ebenstein notes, “Following a famine associated with Mao’s Great Leap Forward (1958–60), total fertility exceeded six births per mother throughout the 1960s. The rapid population growth alarmed Chinese officials, and the Communist Party subsequently enacted a series of fertility control policies.”

Ebenstein, “The ‘Missing Girls’ of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy.” Deng’s reforms were generally categorized into four modernizations: agriculture, industry, science and technology, and defense. Although the effects of the reforms were felt well into the 1990s, the era generally associated with these developments was 1978–1988. See Ezra F. Vogel, “Opinion | Deng’s China,” The New York Times, 7 November 2012, sec. Opinion, https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/08/opinion/chinachanges-leaders-deng-xiaopings-china.html.

[149] Michael Freeberne, “Birth Control in China,” Population Studies.1 (1964): 5.

[150] “PRI Review Podcast–Catholic Bishops Write Secretary of State; China IUD Uproar; Norway Funds International Abortions,” PRI, n.d., https://www.pop.org/podcast/pri-review-podcast-catholicbishops-write-secretary-of-state-china-iud-uproar-norway-funds-international-abortions/.

[151] “2009 Annual Report | Congressional-Executive Commission on China.”

[152] Between 1980 and 2012 local family planning offices inserted 308 million IUDs. See “China Offers Free IUD Removal to Cries of Outrage,” PRI, 28 February 2017, https://www.pop.org/china-offersfree-iud-removal-to-cries-of-outrage/.

[153] Ma Jian, “China’s Barbaric One-Child Policy,” The Guardian, 6 May 2013, sec. Books, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/06/chinas-barbaric-one-child-policy.

[154] “China Offers Free IUD Removal to Cries of Outrage,” 55.

[155] The China National Health and Family Planning Commission reported in 2016 that family planning officials carried out over 308 million IUD insertion procedures between 1980 and 2012. “China Offers Free IUD Removal to Cries of Outrage.”

[156] “China Offers Free IUD Removal to Cries of Outrage.”

[157] Sui-Lee Wee, “After One-Child Policy, Outrage at China’s Offer to Remove IUDs,” The New York Times, 7 August 2018, sec. World, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/07/world/asia/after-one-childpolicy-outrage-at-chinas-offer-to-remove-iuds.html.

[158] See “China Offers Free IUD Removal to Cries of Outrage.”

[159] John Gittings, “Ultrasound Ban to Tackle Boy Baby Bias,” The Guardian, 12 December 2000, sec. World news, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2000/dec/12/johngittings1.

[160] “Gendercide | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://allgirlsallowed.org/gendercide.

[161] Eberstadt, “A Global War against Baby Girls.”

[162] Ebenstein, “The ‘Missing Girls’ of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy,” 112.

[163] Ebenstein, “The ‘Missing Girls’ of China and the Unintended Consequences of the One Child Policy,” 93.

[164] Emiko Jozuka CNN, “Study Finds Millions of China’s ‘missing Girls’ Actually Exist,” CNN,

n.d., https://www.cnn.com/2016/12/01/asia/china-missing-girls/index.html.

[165] Emiko Jozuka, “Study Finds Millions of China’s ‘missing Girls’ Actually Exist.”

[166] “Encountering China’s Trafficked Daughters | All Girls Allowed.”

[167] “Trafficking in Persons Report 2013,” n.d., https://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2013/index.htm.

[168] “Trafficking in Persons Report 2013.”

[169] “Trafficking in Persons Report 2013.”

[170] That number is equivalent to the total population of men under 20 in the United States.

“Communiqué of the National Bureau of Statistics of People’s Republic of China on Major Figures of the

[171] Population Census[1] (No. 1),” n.d., http://www.stats.gov.cn/english/NewsEvents/201104/t20110428_26449.html. The number in 2010 was 34 million.

[172] “Old, Lonely, and Male: Unpacking China’s Demographics | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/blog/posts/old-lonely-and-male-unpacking-chinas-demographics.

[173] “The Security Risks of China’s Abnormal Demographics – The Washington Post,” n.d., https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2014/04/30/the-security-risks-of-chinasabnormal-demographics/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.eeb8afb68d82.

[174] “Old, Lonely, and Male: Unpacking China’s Demographics | All Girls Allowed.”

[175] Huang, “Don’t Expect a Baby Boom Just Because China Ends Its Two-Child Policy.” Also, see demographer Stuart Gietel-Basten from Oxford University. Gietel-Basten, “Why Scrapping the One-Child Policy Will Do Little to Change China’s Population.” Also, economists Chang Liu and Gareth Leather.

“China’s One-Child Policy Is over, but It Might Be Too Late to Fix What It Broke,” Public Radio International, n.d., https://www.pri.org/stories/2015-10-29/china-s-one-child-policy-over-it-might-be-toolate-fix-what-it-broke.

[176] “The Security Risks of China’s Abnormal Demographics–The Washington Post.”

[177] Nicholas Eberstadt, “The Demographic Future,” Foreign Affairs, 1 November 2010, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2010-11-01/demographic-future.

[178] To avoid prying questions from inquisitive parents, some are even resorting to hiring “fake” girlfriends to present to their parents using apps such as Hire Me Plz. Reports suggest hiring a girlfriend can cost up to 10,000 yuan ($1,450) a day. “BBC–Capital–Why Millions of Chinese Men Are Staying Single,” n.d., http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170213-why-millions-of-chinese-men-are-staying-single. 

[179] Alison Lynch, “Man Successfully Sues Dating Agency for Failing to Find Him a Wife,” Metro, 9 June 2015, https://metro.co.uk/2015/06/09/chinese-man-sues-dating-agency-for-failing-to-find-him-apure-sweet-wife-5237019/. Originally reported by the BBC.

[180] “Chinese Man Buys 99 IPhone 6s to Propose to Girlfriend on Single’s Day – Only to Be Rejected | The Independent,” n.d., https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/chinese-man-buys-99iphone-6s-to-propose-to-girlfriend-on-singles-day-only-to-be-rejected-9853953.html.

[181] “BBC-Capital-Why Millions of Chinese Men Are Staying Single.”

[182] Kristof, “‘China’s Worst Policy Mistake’?”

[183] “China’s 430 Million Families Shrink and Age-Bloomberg,” n.d., https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-05-23/chinas-430-million-families-shrink-and-age.

[184] “China’s 430 Million Families Shrink and Age-Bloomberg.” In comparison, the average family size in the United States has decreased from 3.33 in 1960 to 2.54 in 2017. See “Average Size of Households in the U.S. 1960-2017 | Statistic,” Statista, n.d., https://www.statista.com/statistics/183648/average-size-of-households-in-the-us/.

[185] “Population Aging in China: A Mixed Blessing | The Diplomat,” n.d., https://thediplomat.com/2013/11/population-aging-in-china-a-mixed-blessing/. In comparison, there were 47.8 million people in the United States 65 years or older in 2015, accounting for 14.9 percent of the total population. The United States Census Bureau projects that population to grow to 98.2 million by 2060. See US Census Bureau, “FFF: Older Americans Month: May 2017,” n.d., https://www.census.gov/newsroom/facts-for-features/2017/cb17-ff08.html.

[186] See “Senior Living Evolves in China,” n.d., https://www.mcknightsseniorliving.com/news/senior-living-evolves-in-china/article/745561/.

[187] “Chinese Family Unit Getting Smaller and Smaller – Tribunedigital-Chicagotribune,” n.d., http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2014-05-22/opinion/ct-china-family-smaller-perspec-052220140522_1_family-planning-commission-development-report-chinese.

[188] “Racing Towards the Precipice,” n.d., https://www.brookings.edu/articles/racing-towards-theprecipice/.

[189] “The Security Risks of China’s Abnormal Demographics-The Washington Post.” ¹⁶⁵ French, “China’s Twilight Years.”

[190] French, “China’s Twilight Years.”

[191] Synonyms for hidden children include “ghost children” and “black children.”

[192] “China’s ‘Black Children’ Will Come Out of the Shadows,” PRI, 22 December 2015, https://www.pop.org/chinas-black-children-will-come-out-of-the-shadows/.

[193] “China’s ‘Black Children’ Will Come Out of the Shadows.” ¹⁷⁰ “The Ghost Children.”

[194] “Children Denied an Identity under China’s One-Child Policy–BBC News,” n.d., https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-25772401.

[195] Kristof, “‘China’s Worst Policy Mistake’?”

[196] Mosher writes, “For millions more, the policy change comes too late to do them much good. Denied the opportunity to go to elementary school, much less middle school and high school, they are functionally illiterate. They work as manual laborers in dead-end jobs. Even with a hukou, there is no way for these young people, especially those in their late teens and twenties, to go back to school and make up their lost studies.” “China’s ‘Black Children’ Will Come Out of the Shadows.” 

[197] “Children Denied an Identity under China’s One-Child Policy–BBC News.” ¹⁷⁵ The author was unable to determine the resolution to this case.

[198] “16-Year-Old ‘Over-Quota’ Chinese Girl Drinks Fatal Poison | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/news/16-year-old-%E2%80%9Cover-quota%E2%80%9D-chinese-girldrinks-fatal-poison.

[199] “16-Year-Old ‘Over-Quota’ Chinese Girl Drinks Fatal Poison | All Girls Allowed.”

[200] “Racing Towards the Precipice.” Feng Wang writes, “Mitigating the negative impact of this will require reforming China’s hukou system, which links social security and public welfare entitlements to citizens’ place of registration. China’s “floating population” of rural migrants now stands in excess of 220m, but the hukou system remains a significant barrier to migration. If rural migrants were given access to urban education, health care and other welfare services, more rural residents would move to the cities on a permanent basis.”

[201] “16-Year-Old ‘Over-Quota’ Chinese Girl Drinks Fatal Poison | All Girls Allowed.”

[202] “The Ghost Children.”

[203] Starr, Understanding China,191–192.

[204] “Black children” is a synonym for “hidden children.” “China’s Hidden Children | The Diplomat,” n.d., https://thediplomat.com/2015/03/chinas-hidden-children/.

[205] Mosher, “China’s One-Child Policy,” 77–78. ¹⁸⁴ Mosher, “China’s One-Child Policy,” 78.

[206] “Data Reveal Scale of China Abortions.”

[207] “Data Reveal Scale of China Abortions.”

[208] “The Brutal Truth,” The Economist, 23 June 2012, https://www.economist.com/china/2012/06/23/the-brutal-truth. ($288 billion)

[209] Howard French details a few of these strides, “China has until very recently appeared to be a global juggernaut—hugely expanding its economic and political relations with Africa; building artificial islands in the South China Sea, an immense body of water that it now proclaims almost entirely its own; launching the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, with ambitions to rival the World Bank. The new bank is expected to support a Chinese initiative called One Belt, One Road, a collection of rail, road, and port projects designed to lash China to the rest of Asia and even Europe. Projects like these aim not only to boost China’s already formidable commercial power but also to restore the global centrality that Chinese consider their birthright.” French, “China’s Twilight Years.”  

[210] French, “China’s Twilight Years.”

[211] Wang Feng, King Whyte, and Yong Cai, “Challenging Myths About China’s One-Child Policy,” 156–158.

[212] The interview took place via email on April 17, 2017. It has been edited to enable the language to flow more efficiently. The interview is provided in Appendix 1.

[213] Wei Xing Zhu, Li Lu, and Therese Hesketh, “China’s Excess Males, Sex Selective Abortion, and One Child Policy: Analysis of Data from 2005 National Intercensus Survey,” BMJ 338 (2009): b1211.

[214] Cheng points out that no other nation has a One-Child Policy and no other nation implements family planning through “strict administrative enforcement.” There are nations that have attempted to do

[215] Fecundity refers to the ability to produce an abundance of offspring. “China’s Demographic Divisions Are Getting Deeper – The Balkanisation of the Bedroom,” n.d., https://www.economist.com/china/2017/09/21/chinas-demographic-divisions-are-getting-deeper.

[216] “China’s One-Child Policy Leaves Bereaved Parents in Despair,” South China Morning Post,

n.d., http://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2107155/chinas-one-child-policyhas-legacy-bereaved.

[217] Fan notes, “The government first raised the issue of subsidies for shidu parents in 2001, under the Population and Family Planning Law. Since 2007, the national minimum has been raised from 100 yuan per person per month to 340 yuan.” “China’s One-Child Policy Leaves Bereaved Parents in Despair.”

[218] See “China’s Family Planning Officials Feeling the Absence of ‘Social Support Fees’ From Defunct One Child Policy,” n.d., https://www.theepochtimes.com/chinas-family-planning-officials-feelingthe-absence-of-social-support-fees-from-defunct-one-child-policy_2081845.html.

[219] See Edward Gibbon, History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (6 vols., London: W.

Strahan and T. Cadell, 1776) and Adolf von Harnack, The Expansion of Christianity in the First Three

Centuries (London: Williams and Norgate, 1904–1905). Gibbon offers five causes for the success of Christianity: its organizational structures, its system of morality, its inflexibility, its miracles, and its focus on the resurrection. Harnack focuses on the external and internal conditions of the worldwide expansion of the Christian religion. External conditions include the Hellenization of the East and West, the world empire of Rome and its political unity, the security of international traffic, the decomposition of ancient society into a democracy, and the religious policy of Rome. Internal conditions for growth include the clash of Christianity with polytheism, morality vs. vice, and with syncretism that represented the final stages of Hellenism.

[220] Jan Bremmer makes this point. Brent Nongbri, review of Jan Bremmer, The Rise of Christianity through the Eyes of Gibbon, Harnack, and Rodney Stark, n.p. [cited 12 August 2018]. Online:

http://www.academia.edu/3880021/Review_of_Jan_Bremmer_The_Rise_of_Christianity_through_the_Eye s_of_Gibbon_Harnack_and_Rodney_Stark_2010_.

[221] Hurtado gives the examples of miracle working, close relationships, the care of widows and orphans and status inconsistency. Miracle working was not confined to Christianity alone. Miracles came from various sources, and there was no shortage of magicians and wonder-workers. Hurtado also contests

[222] Rodney Stark estimates that by A.D. 300 there were somewhere between 5 and 7 million Christians in the Greco-Roman world. Stark’s arithmetic begins with 1,000 Christians in A.D. 40 and proceeds as follows: “Suppose we assume that the Christian rate of growth during this period was similar to that of the Mormon rate of growth over the past century, which has been approximately 40 percent per decade. If the early Christians were able to match the Mormon growth rate, then their “miracle” is fully accomplished in the time history allows. That is, from a starting point of 1,000 Christians in the year 40, a growth rate of 40 percent per decade (or 3.4 percent per year) results in a total of 6,299,832 Christians in the year 300. Moreover, because compounded rates result in exponential growth, there is a huge numerical increase from slightly more than 1 million Christians in the year 250 to more than 6 million in 300. This gives further confidence in the projections since historians have long believed that a rapid increase in numerical growth occurred at this time.” Rodney Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity: The Role of Women,” Sociology of Religion 3 (1995): 229–244.

[223] Rodney Stark. The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries (Princeton: HarperOne, 1996), 127.

[224] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 115–116.

[225] Arthur E. R. Boak, Manpower Shortage and the Fall of the Roman Empire in the West, Reprint of the 1955 edition (Westport: Greenwood Pub Group, 1974), 18.

[226] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 116.

[227] See Boak, Manpower Shortage and the Fall of the Roman Empire in the West, 9–21.

[228] Rodney Stark, The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World’s Largest Religion, Reprint edition (New York: HarperOne, 2012), 43.

[229] Cherry’s paper seeks to explore the differences between traditional Christian bioethics and secular moral reflections. His description of secular morals as placing “persons, rather than God, in authority to define the right, the good, and the virtuous,” is characteristic of the pagan ethic prevalent in the Greco-Roman world. Cherry also directly traces secular morals to the practices of abortion and infanticide found in the Roman Empire and describes the consequences, “The perceived utility of abortion and infanticide, to get rid of less than physically perfect or otherwise unwanted children, together with the social devaluing of females led historically to a decrease in women and a generally low female-to-male ratio.” Mark J. Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide: The Gulf between the Secular and the Divine,” Christian Bioethics: Non-Ecumenical Studies in Medical Morality 17.1 (2011): 35.

[230] Not to be confused with “fecundity,” which refers to the ability to have children.

[231] “Cultural Indicators: The Fertility Rate,” The Gospel Coalition, n.d., https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/cultural-indicators-the-fertility-rate/.

[232] For example, this assumes that there are no major wars or diseases and that there is no net migration in a population.

[233] “Cultural Indicators.” Currently, the replacement rate in the United States is only 1.80, which means that the United States is only on track to replace eighty-seven percent of the population.

[234] “Cultural Indicators.”

[235] “Cultural Indicators.”

[236] Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 43.

[237] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 118.

[238] Tacitus is arguing that the Jewish command is revolting, not the killing of children. Tacitus also comments in the Germania that Germans also considered it immoral to kill their offspring. Ironically, Tacitus clearly contrasts the noble savagery of the Germans with the “civilized life” of the Romans. Lee M. Fratantuono, “A Most Dangerous Book: Tacitus’ “Germania” from the Roman Empire to the Third Reich,” The Historian 3 (2012): 618–620.

[239] Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Anger, Mercy, Revenge (trans. Robert A. Kaster and Matha C.

Nussbaum; University of Chicago Press, 2010), 1.15.

[240] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” JRS 84 (1994): 17.

[241] Although it is impossible to give exact numbers the consensus remains that the practice was prevalent. See Emma-Jayne Graham, “Wombs and Tombs in the Roman World,” Material Religion 12.2

(2016): 251–54; and Naglaa Abu-Mandil Hassan et al., “Ancient DNA Study of the Remains of Putative Infanticide Victims from the Yewden Roman Villa Site at Hambleden, England,” Journal of Archaeological Science 43.1 (2014): 192–97.

[242] See W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” JRS 84. (1994): 1–22; and W. V.

Harris, “The Theoretical Possibility of Extensive Infanticide in the Greco-Roman World,” CQ 1 (1982):

[243] –116.

[244] William V. Harris, “The Theoretical Possibility of Extensive Infanticide in the Greco-Roman World,” 114.

[245] Thomas W. Africa, The Immense Majesty: A History of Rome and the Roman Empire (Arlington Heights: Wiley-Blackwell, 1991), 5.

[246] Andrew Lintott, Violence in Republican Rome, Revised edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 3.

[247] Larry W. Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods: Early Christian Distinctiveness in the Roman World, Reprint edition (Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2017), 145.

[248] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 17.

[249] If infants did survive, slave traders generally collected them. W. V. Harris notes, “Even among those who saved the lives of abandoned infants, most were interested in exploitation more than in rescue, and most of the rescued children inconspicuously joined the population of slaves…. Exposure was well integrated into the Roman economy, for it contributed on a substantial scale to the supply of slaves. In the first century A.D. the demand for slaves was enormous, probably of the order of half a million or more, on average, every year. Other sources, principally slaves born to slaves, importation across the frontiers, and warfare, are unlikely to have met the demand adequately after Augustus’ time; yet there is no sign of a shortage. The deficit is likely to have been made up by enslaved foundlings” W. V.  Harris, “Child-

Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 3–4, 18. Regarding the economics of such a system it is worth noting that the general moral consensus of families was that the exposure of infants was less repugnant than selling the infant into slavery.

[250] Harris lists four groups of reasons for infant exposure: 1) The deformity or other physical inadequacy of the newborn infant; 2) its illegitimacy; 3) perceived economic need; and 4) evil omens and despair. W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 11–12.

[251] Ray Laurence, “Childhood in the Roman Empire,” HT 55.10 (2005): 22.

[252] See Margaret Atkins and Robin Osborne, eds., Poverty in the Roman World, 1^st edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); and Henry Hazlitt, Conquest of Poverty (Irvington-onHudson: Foundation for Economic Education, 1996).

[253] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 16–17.

[254] As cited by John Boswell, The Kindness of Strangers: The Abandonment of Children in Western Europe from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance (University of Chicago Press, 1998), 102. 

[255] See W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 3. See also Michael Obladen, “From Right to Sin: Laws on Infanticide in Antiquity,” Neonatology 109.1 (2016): 56–61; Walter Scheidel, Greco-Roman Sex Ratios and Femicide in Comparative Perspective, SSRN Scholarly Paper (Rochester:

Social Science Research Network, April 1, 2010); and Marina Faerman et al., “Determining the Sex of Infanticide Victims from the Late Roman Era through Ancient DNA Analysis,” Journal of Archaeological Science 25.9 (1998): 861–65.

[256] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 11. Cf. Donald Engels, “The Problem of Female Infanticide in the Greco-Roman World,” CP 75 (1980): 112–120. Engels argues that a high rate of female infanticide in antiquity was demographically impossible. He believed that the birthrate in the Roman Empire was in equilibrium with the non-infanticidal death rate and that any significant level of infanticide would have pushed the population into a demographic “contraction.” As Mark Golden points out, however, Engels assumes a slow rate of population growth for all societies in antiquity and ignores preventive checks on population growth such as polygamy, contraception, prolonged breast-feeding, concubinage, and more. William Harris comments on the quality of Engel’s proposal, “He [Engels] completely ignores the ancient texts concerning child exposure—a remarkable piece of scholarly bravura. He also ignores a great amount of comparative information that has been collected by anthropologists and historians. Instead the author relies on a demographic argument about what was ‘impossible’, an argument which is in fact fallacious.” William Harris, “The Theoretical Possibility of Extensive Infanticide in the Greco-Roman World,” CQ 32 (1982): 114.

[257] Mark Golden, “Demography and the Exposure of Girls at Athens,” Phoenix 4 (1981): 316. Golden’s article is in response to Donald Engels’ claims that there is no evidence for sex selective infanticide in the ancient world. See Donald Engels, “The Problem of Female Infanticide in the GrecoRoman World,” Classical Philology.2 (1980): 112–120. While Golden’s article specifically denotes an earlier time period in Athens his response to Engels generally addresses the situation found in the GrecoRoman period while using specific Greek examples and is, therefore, relevant to the current discussion.

[258] See John M. Riddle, Contraception and Abortion from the Ancient World to the Renaissance (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992).

[259] Etienne Van De Walle, “Contraception and Abortion From the Ancient World to the Renaissance,” Population & Development Review 20.1 (1994): 221–24.

[260] Cf. Etienne van de Walle writes, “The evidence on contraceptives and abortifacients that has come down from the past is tainted by the particular agenda of those who provided it. Physicians would present the therapeutic case for abortion, lawyers might be interested in defending the rights of a very untypical husband, and botanists were elucidating the properties of plants; clerics, of course, would have their own ax to grind. Inferring from this the existence of a female-centered popular culture is a difficult task. Riddle makes a very good try, but the main merit of his work is the painstaking presentation of the evidence; the demographic case remains unproven.” Etienne van de Walle, “Contraception and Abortion from the Ancient World to the Renaissance,” 224.

[261] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 13.

[262] On average, worldwide the SRB is 105:100. The best estimate is that there were 131 males per 100 females in Rome, rising to 140 males per 100 females in the rest of Italy, Asia Minor, and North Africa. Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 43.

[263] Birdsell posits that males would need to marry around the age of forty and females between the ages of 11 and 14. J. B. Birdsell, Human Evolution: An Introduction to the New Physical Anthropology (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1972), 354.

[264] Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 43.

[265] Harnack, The Expansion of Christianity, 161.

[266] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 236.

[267] M. K. Hopkins, “The Age of Roman Girls at Marriage,” Population Studies 3 (1965): 309.

[268] Hopkins, “The Age of Roman Girls at Marriage,” 309.

[269] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 237.

[270] Mark Golden, “Demography and the Exposure of Girls at Athens,” 325.

[271] Mark Golden, “Demography and the Exposure of Girls at Athens,” 325.

[272] Simon Mays, “Infanticide in Roman Britain,” Antiquity 67.257 (1993): 883.

[273] Mark Golden, “Did the Ancients Care When Their Children Died?,” GR 35.2 (1988): 154.

[274] Mark Golden, “Did the Ancients Care When Their Children Died?,” 154.

[275] Mark Golden, “Did the Ancients Care When Their Children Died?,” 154. See also Rodney

Stark, “Live Longer, Healthier, & Better?: The Untold Benefits of Becoming a Christian in the Ancient World,” Christian History Feb 1998 (1998). Stark suggests that mortality rates climbed as high as 30

[276] Marcus Tullius Cicero, Cicero: On the Commonwealth and On the Laws, trans. James E. G.

Zetzel, 2 edition. (Cambridge, United Kingdom?; New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 3.8.19., writes, “Then after it had been quickly killed, as the Twelve Tables direct that terribly deformed infants shall be killed.”

[277] Aristotle, Politics, trans. C. D. C. Reeve (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1998) Book 7, 133b.

[278] Aristotle, Politics, Book 7, 16, 20.

[279] Plato, Plato: Republic, Volume I: Books 1–5, trans. Christopher Emlyn-Jones and William

Preddy, Bilingual edition (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2013), Book 5, 460e461e. Limiting the population also included exposing newly born infants to death. Plato writes, “A woman is to bear children for the city from the age of twenty to the age of forty, a man from the time that he passes his peak as a runner until he reaches fifty-five. At any rate, that’s the physical and mental prime for both. Then, if a man who is younger or older than that engages in reproduction for the community, we’ll say that his offense is neither pious nor just, for the child he begets for the city, if it remains hidden, will be born in darkness, through a dangerous weakness of will, and without the benefit of the sacrifices and prayers offered at every marriage festival, in which the priests and priestesses, together with the entire city, ask that the children of good and beneficial parents may always prove themselves still better and more beneficial. That’s right. The same law will apply if a man still of begetting years has a child with a woman of childbearing without the sanction of the rulers. We’ll say that he brings to the city an illegitimate, unauthorized, and unhallowed child. That’s absolutely right. However, I think that when women and men have passed the age of having children, we’ll leave them free to have sex with whomever they wish, with these exceptions:

[280] See Lawrence Stager, “Eroticism and Infanticide at Ashkelon,” Biblical Archaeology Review 17 (1991): 34–53. 

[281] Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Dionysius of Halicarnassus: Roman Antiquities, Volume I, Books

[282] –2, trans. Earnest Cary (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1937) Book 2, 15, 1–2. 1–2, ⁷² W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 5.

[283] David P. Gushee, The Sacredness of Human Life: Why an Ancient Biblical Vision Is Key to the World’s Future (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2013), 125.

[284] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 3.

[285] As cited by Stark. Stark makes a special note here that soap had yet to be invented. Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 44.

[286] Aulus Cornelius Celsus, De Medicina (trans. Walter George Spencer: Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1979) 7.29.

[287] Celsus, De Medicina, 7.29.

[288] Elder Pliny, Pliny’s Natural History: In Thirty-Seven Books, Vol. 1 (Forgotten Books, 2012) Books 20, 25 and 28. Pliny also recorded that late term abortions were quite common up until the seventh month of gestation although these procedures nearly always resulted in the death of the mother.

[289] Various, Hippocratic Writings, ed. G. E. R. Lloyd, trans. J. Chadwick, Reprint edition.

(Harmondsworth: Penguin Classics, 1984), 325–326.

[290] See Steven H. Miles, The Hippocratic Oath and the Ethics of Medicine, 1^st edition (Oxford:

Oxford University Press, 2005).

[291] Various, Hippocratic Writings. 67.

[292] Soranus, Gynecology, trans. Dr. Oswei Temkin (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1956), 63.

[293] Soranus, Gynecology, Book 2 6.10. He writes, “In summary: the infant’s mother must have enjoyed good health during pregnancy, the birth must not be premature, the infant must cry vigorously, all its limbs and organs must be sound, its sense organs must work, its orifices must all open, the movements of each part of the body must be neither sluggish nor weak, and the articulation of the limbs must be correct.”

[294] Joan Booth, trans., Ovid: Amores: Book II, 1 edition (Oxford: Liverpool University Press, 1991) 14:25–31.

[295] Ovid, Anthony J. Boyle, and Roger D. Woodard, Fasti, Revised 2004 edition (New York:

Penguin Classics, 2000), 28.

[296] As cited by Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 119.

[297] Cf. Bruce Frier, “Natural Fertility and Family Limitations in Roman Marriage,” CP 89 (1994): 318–333. Frier argues that Roman fertility was not low based on the assumption that “no general population” has ever limited its fertility prior to modern times. Rodney Stark contests this claim, however, on the grounds that it conflicts with ample anthropological evidence of societies that have limited their fertility, and that Frier’s study was based on a questionable sample size: 172 women living in rural Egypt during the first three centuries A.D. See Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 44.

[298] Stark documents, “A frequent approach involved ingesting slightly less than fatal doses of poison in an effort to cause a miscarriage. But, of course, poisons are somewhat unpredictable and tolerance levels vary greatly; hence in many cases both the mother and the fetus were killed. Another method introduced poisons of various sorts into the uterus to kill the fetus. Unfortunately, in many cases the woman failed to expel the dead fetus and died unless she was treated almost immediately by mechanical methods of removal. But these methods, which were most often used as the initial mode of abortion as well, were also extremely dangerous, requiring great surgical skill as well as good luck in an age that was ignorant of bacteria.” Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 119.

[299] Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide,” 35.

[300] See Michael J. Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church: Christian, Jewish & Pagan Attitudes in the Greco-Roman World (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1982). Harris makes the same point while connecting this reality to the high rates of infanticide: “Abortions were notoriously dangerous (but normal childbirth was also, of course, very perilous by modern standards). No woman would have needed a text by Ovid or Plutarch to bring this fact home, abortions were naturally all the more dangerous if a woman

[301] Cicero, For Aulus Cluentius Habitus: Pro Cluentio, trans. C. D. Yonge (Independently published, 2017), 32.

[302] Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 27.

[303] Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 32.

[304] David P Gushee, “Sacredness and Christian Tradition,” Baptistic Theologies 8.1 (2016): 32.

[305] Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 30–31.

[306] As quoted in W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 6.

[307] Anton Cornelis van Geytenbeek, Musonius Rufus and Greek Diatribe, Revised edition (Van Gorcum, 1963), 86–87.

[308] Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?, 131.

[309] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 181.

[310] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 143.

[311] Hurtado writes, “So far as we know, the only wide-scale criticism of the practice, and the only collective refusal to engage in infant exposure in the first three centuries A.D., was among Jews and then also early Christians.” Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 148.

[312] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 124. W. V. Harris notes, “The opposition of first-century Judaism to child-exposure was transmitted to the Christians, and a legion of Christian texts can be cited in addition to those already mentioned. Presumably this teaching had some effects on behaviour within the limited circles that were receptive to Christian teaching, and exposing infants is not among the failings and deviations with which Christians reproach one another.” W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 17.

[313] Flavius Josephus, Complete Works (trans. William Whiston; Kregel Publications, 1960) Against Apion, Book 2, 25.

[314] Regarding the regularity of infanticide in the first three centuries Harris writes, “There is no theoretical obstacle to the following figures, which are given by way of example: average life expectation at birth < 25 years, birth and death rates 40 per 1,000 per annum. The latter figure results from imagining that an average of 10 per cent of all infants were fatally exposed or otherwise killed. It may well have happened that some regions of the Roman Empire witnessed rates of infanticide notably higher than this without suffering abrupt population decline.” W. V. Harris, “Theoretical Possibility,” 115.

[315] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 214–215.

[316] Gushee, “Sacredness and Christian Tradition,” 17.

[317] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 62–72.

[318] Gushee, “Sacredness and Christian Tradition,” 21.

[319] Gushee, “Sacredness and Christian Tradition,” 22.

[320] Hurtado notes, “The Greek term early Christians preferred, however, to depict their God’s love, and the love that they were to show as well for God and others, even their enemies, was agap? and its cognate verb agapa?. These words appear very infrequently in pagan texts of the time but copiously in early Christian texts. For example, in the New Testament, agap? appears some 143 times, and the verb agapa? 116 times. These words also appear prominently in some Jewish Greek texts. So the early Christian preference for agap? and the cognate verb agapa? may be another instance of the influence of the Jewish matrix of the early Christian movement.” Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 64–65. Regarding the use of philia and agap? see also Takaaki Haraguchi, “Philia as Agap? The Theme of Friendship in the Gospel of John,” Asia Journal of Theology 28.2 (2014): 250–62; Anders Nygren, “Augustine on Human Love for

God: Agape, Eros, or Philia?,” American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly: Journal of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 86.2 (2012): 203–222; and Haddon W. Robinson, “Two Traits of Agape Love,” Journal of the Evangelical Homiletics Society 15.2 (2015): 60–63.

[321] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 64.

[322] Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?, 125.

[323] Gushee, “Sacredness and Christian Tradition,” 29.

[324] Craig Bartholomew and Michael Goheen describe the mandate given to humanity in Gen 1:26,

“The passage that begins in Genesis 1:26 is often helpfully referred to as the ‘cultural or creation mandate.’ It enjoins us to bring every type of cultural activity within the service of God. Indeed, there is a dynamic element to ‘the image of God.’ God himself is revealed or ‘imaged’ in his creation precisely as we are busy within the creation, developing its hidden potentials in agriculture, art, music, commerce, politics, scholarship, family life, church, leisure, and so on, in ways that honor God.” Craig G. Bartholomew and

[325] Justin Martyr, The First Apology of Justin Martyr: An Early Christian Writing (trans. William S. Crockett Jr.; CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2017), 42.

[326] J. B. Lightfoot and J. R. Harmer, The Apostolic Fathers, ed. Michael W. Holmes (Grand Rapids: Baker Pub Group, 1989), 2:2. 

[327] Michael Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 37.

[328] Minucius Felix Marcus, The Octavius Of Minucius Felix (trans. John Henry Freese; Denver:

Sagwan Press, 2018), 33.

[329] Michael W. Holmes, ed., The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations, 3^rd ed.

(Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 686–719.

[330] Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers, 5.5.

[331] Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers, 5.6.

[332] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 154.

[333] After reflecting on the Apostle Paul’s exhortations to the church in Thessalonica, Hurtado adds, “Participation in Christian faith entails a significant commitment to the collective effort that is required of believers.” Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 160.

[334] Athenagoras of Athens, A Plea for the Christians (Beloved Publishing LLC, 2016), 35.

[335] C. Kavin Rose. World Upside Down: Reading Acts in the Greco-Roman Age (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 5.

[336] Rowe, World Upside Down, 50.

[337] Rowe, World Upside Down, 6–7.

[338] Rowe, World Upside Down, 51.

[339] Rowe, World Upside Down, 136.

[340] G. W. Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, New edition (New York, NY: Paulist Press, 1974), 3–12.

[341] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 65.

[342] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 220.

[343] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 107–108.

[344] G. W. Clarke suggests this section is an effective instance of the Roman practice in forensics, which Felix would have been well acquainted with due to his vocation, of using as many proofs as could be mastered in response to Caecilius’ claims. Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 332–333.

[345] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 108.

[346] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 108.

[347] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 108.

[348] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 109.

[349] Laurence, “Childhood in the Roman Empire,” 24.

[350] Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide,” 28.

[351] Geytenbeek, Musonius Rufus and Greek Diatribe, 3.

[352] Geytenbeek, Musonius Rufus and Greek Diatribe, 3.

[353] Geytenbeek, Musonius Rufus and Greek Diatribe, 60–61.

[354] Gorman, Abortion & the Early Church, 78–88.

[355] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 147.

[356] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 15.

[357] Geytenbeek, Musonius Rufus and Greek Diatribe, 86.

[358] Cynthia King and William B. Irvine, Musonius Rufus: Lectures and Sayings, Revised edition (S.l.: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2011).

[359] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 171.

[360] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 117.

[361] Rodney Stark makes the following “reasonable assumptions” on sex bias and conversions: “Let us begin with a Christian population with equal numbers of men and women. Let us assume a growth rate from conversion alone of 30 percent per decade. That is, for the moment we will ignore any natural increase and assume that births equal deaths. Let us also suppose that the sex ratio among converts is two women for every man. As noted above, this is entirely in line with recent experience. Given these reasonable assumptions, we can easily calculate that it will take only fifty years for this Christian population to be 62 percent female. Or if we assume a growth rate of 40 percent per decade, the Christian population will be 64 percent female in fifty years.” Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 101.

[362] Stark notes that the favorable status of women in Christian communities was demonstrated in those communities’ condemnation of incest, divorce, adultery and polygamy. Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 235.

[363] Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians, Book Club edition (Harper & Row, 1986), 308.

[364] Harnack, The Expansion of Christianity, 73.

[365] Josiah Cox Russell, Late Ancient and Medieval Population, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society: New Series, v. 48, Pt. 3 (Philadelphia?: American Philosophical Society, 1958), 14.

[366] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 232.

[367] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 116.

[368] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 117.

[369] Tertullian. A Treatise on the Soul. Translated by S. Thelwall. (Whitefish: Kessinger Publishing, 2010) 4.1.

[370] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 122.

[371] Cf. Elizabeth L. Gerhardt, The Cross and Gendercide: A Theological Response to Global Violence Against Women and Girls (Downer’s Grove: IVP Academic, 2014). Gerhardt presents several modern day case studies including that of Nakusa Ashmita in India. Gerhardt writes, “Families often go into debt arranging marriages and paying for dowries. The 2011 census revealed that the nation’s sex ratio had dropped over the past decade from 927 girls for every 1,000 boys under the age of six to 914 girls. Some districts report an even greater discrepancy. In the district of Satara, for example, it is even lower, at 881 to 1,000. Such ratios are the result of abortions of female fetuses or sheer neglect, resulting in a higher death rate among girls.” Elizabeth L. Gerhardt, The Cross and Gendercide, 22.  

[372] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 17–18.

[373] See Keith Hopkins, Death and Renewal: Volume 2: Sociological Studies in Roman History (Cambridge University Press, 1985), 69–116.

[374] It is important to note that there are many factors that determine population, and which determine fertility in a society. According to W. V. Harris these include “ … the age at which its female members begin to practice coitus, coital frequency, fecundity, the extent of use of effective contraception, and foetal mortality from voluntary and involuntary causes.” W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 14 –15. 

[375] As cited by Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 117.

[376] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 122.

[377] Concerning a general alternate ethic of Christianity C. Kavin Rowe writes, “The challenge posed by early Christianity to the cultural foundations of the pagan world is directly theological, which is to say that the possibility of cultural demise is rooted in a counter-cultural explication of the break between God and the world. To speak in this way is to affirm, with Luke as well as some more contemporary theorists, the constructive or ‘objective’ role of religion in the formation of a total culture. But it is also to say more: because ‘God’ in Luke’s sense corresponds not to a particular point within the widest of human horizons but to that which constitutes—makes possible and stands over against—the entirety of the human horizon, the call to (re)turn to God carries with it an entire pattern of life.” Rowe, World Upside Down, 142.

[378] John M. G. Barclay, “The Spread of Christianity in the First Four Centuries: Essays in Explanation,” The Journal of Roman Studies (2007): 372–373.

[379] As cited by Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide,” 35.

[380] See Larry W. Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries? (Milwaukee: Marquette Univ Pr, 2016), 124–126.   

[381] Clarke, The Octavius of Marcus Minucius Felix, 31.

[382] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 236.

[383] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 123.

[384] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 121.

[385] See John T. Noonan Jr., Contraception: A History of Its Treatment By the Theologians and Canonists, 1^st edition (Mentor-Omega, 1967), 7–8.

[386] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 121.

[387] Jack Lindsay, The Ancient World: Manners and Morals, 1^st edition (Putnam Pub Group, 1968), 250–251.

[388] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 126.

[389] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 122.

[390] Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 43.

[391] Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 150.

[392] Hurtado mentions the example of Paul in 1 Corinthians 8 and 10 as another complex cultural clash. Hurtado writes, “Recall that, on the one hand, Paul flatly opposed believers accepting any invitation to join in the open worship of the various pagan deities—for example, by taking part in meals held as part of a sacrificial rite in honor of a deity…. On the other hand, Paul permitted his converts to purchase and and eat whatever meat was available in the city market ‘without raising any question’ as to whether the meat might have originated from some animal sacrifice to a pagan deity (1 Cor 10:23–26)…. Paul’s summarizing statement with which he concludes the matter in 1 Corinthians shows the combination of religious commitment and a desire to avoid social conflict: ‘So, whether you eat of drink, or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God. Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God’ (1 Cor 10:31).” Hurtado, Destroyer of the Gods, 151–152.

[393] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 127–128.

[394] Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide,” 35.

[395] Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide,” 35.

[396] See Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 111.

[397] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 233.

[398] Hurtado, Why on Earth Did Anyone Become a Christian in the First Three Centuries?, 87.

[399] Exogenous marriage is marrying an individual outside of the community or network. Stark argues that a high rate of exogenous marriage was a necessary mechanism for growth in the Early Church. He writes, “As discussed earlier, conversion is a network phenomenon based on interpersonal attachments. People join movements to align their religious status with that of their friends and relatives who already belong. Hence, in order to offer plausible accounts of the rise of Christianity, we need to discover mechanisms by which Christians formed attachments with pagans. Put another way, we need to discover how Christians managed to remain an open network, able to keep building bonds with outsiders, rather than to have become a closed community of believers.” Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 242.

[400] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 241. Many biblical scholars, including this author, would disagree with any interpretation of 1 Pet 3 that would encourage exogenous marriage, but Stark and Hurtado’s description of an acceptance of exogenous marriage seems to indicate a pragmatic response from the church in relation to population issues, and not a biblical position. See Thomas R. Schreiner, The New American Commentary: 1, 2 Peter, Jude (Nashville: Holman Reference, 2003); and  Wayne A. Grudem, 1 Peter, Reprint edition (IVP Academic, 2009).

[401] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 241.

[402] Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 240.

[403] One example is Callistus, Bishop of Rome in A.D. 200. Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity,” 240.

[404] Michael Walsh, The Triumph of the Meek: Why Early Christianity Succeeded (San Francisco:

Harper and Row, 1986), 216.

[405] Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 44.

[406] See Walsh, The Triumph of the Meek, 216. Walsh’s research demonstrates that marriages between pagans and Christians were common. The church did not discourage the practice because of the potential for spouses converting as well as the potential for children to be raised in the faith. 

[407] Stark, The Triumph of Christianity, 42.

[408] Hans Zinsser and Gerald N. Grob, Rats, Lice and History, Revised edition (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2007), 135.

[409] As cited by W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 22.

[410] W. V. Harris, “Child-Exposure in the Roman Empire,” 22.

[411] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 117. 

[412] Cherry, “Sex, Abortion, and Infanticide,” 37.

[413] Yvonna S. Lincoln and Egon G. Guba, Naturalistic Inquiry, Eighth edition (Beverly Hills: Sage Publications, 1991), 91.

[414] See Lincoln and Guba, Naturalistic Inquiry, 91.

[415] See Anselm Strauss and Juliet M. Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research:  Grounded Theory Procedures and Techniques (Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, Inc, 1990).

[416] “Criterion sampling” is selecting participants who match the criteria of the study. See Kjell Erik Rudestam and Rae R. Newton, Surviving Your Dissertation: A Comprehensive Guide to Content and Process, Fourth edition (Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, Inc, 2014), 92.

[417] Each of these believers either live, or still has family residing, in China. Due to the restrictive nature of government control and sensitive nature of the surveys, a certain level of anonymity is required.

Each participant is identified with a pseudonym and exact locations have been generalized. For clarity,

Chinese Christians residing in North Carolina have pseudonyms beginning with “NC.”

[418] Rudestam, Professor of Psychology at Fielding Graduate University, and Newton, Professor of Sociology Emeritus at California State University, suggest 20 to 30 participants as a reasonable sample size for a qualitative study. See Rudestam and Newton, Surviving Your Dissertation, 93.

[419] The Three Self Patriotic Movement is the Chinese state-sanctioned body for the organization of all Protestant churches and is controlled by the Religious Affairs Bureau. See Khiok-Khng Yeo, “The Rise of Three Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM): Chinese Christianity in the Light of Communist Ideology in New China,” The Asia Journal of Theology 6.1 (1992): 1–9.

[420] The networks in Hebei province have been chosen due to availability of contacts and personal gatekeepers known to the author. Due to external factors outside of the author’s control in Hebei, two of these interviews were relocated to Shanghai. 

[421] Ten of these interviews were with Chinese Christians and have been included in the demographic data and survey results.

[422] The term “gatekeeper” refers to an individual with insider access to a social network.

[423] Rudestam and Newton write, “The sampling is done to ‘saturate’ a concept, to comprehensively explore it and its relationship to other concepts so that it becomes theoretically meaningful.” Rudestam and Newton, Surviving Your Dissertation, 93.

[424] Ethnographic interviews are a category of qualitative research that combines one-on-one interviews with immersive observation. The approach and method for this study’s ethnographic interviews is based in part on Chapter 9, “Qualitative Research Methods,” in Paul Leedy, Practical Research: Planning and Design (London: Pearson, 2012), and on Herbert J. Rubin, Qualitative Interviewing: The Art of Hearing Data (Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, 2011). 

[425] The opening statement and an example of the Agreement to Participate Form is included in Appendix 2. All Agreement to Participate Forms are in the author’s possession.

[426] Some examples of church association were in country, out of country, house church, cell church, underground church, and TSPM.

[427] This information is based upon ethnographic interview content presented in THE9930 Anthropology and the Social Sciences by Dr. Al James in Winter Term 2013 at SEBTS.

[428] As the ethnographic surveys were conducted it became apparent to the author and to the gatekeepers in country that several of the original questions in the survey were superfluous. For the sake of efficiency, there are twenty-five questions asked of participants, not including subsequent clarifying inquiries. The survey is a snapshot of Chinese Christians’ responses to worldview questions in August 2018. The ethnographic survey is included in Appendix 2.

[429] A standardized pen and paper test qualifies as high fidelity and high structure. See Rudestam and Newton, Surviving Your Dissertation, 97.

[430] See Strauss and Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research, 220–238.

[431] 1) The changing dynamics of Chinese families relating to economics and freedom; 2) Christian faith and gender equality; 3) A Christian ethic of life and social justice; and 4) The relationship between religion and government.

[432] A sample from the raw data is available from the surveys in Appendix 3. The author is in possession of the remainder of the data.

[433] See Rudestam and Newton, Surviving Your Dissertation, 98–99.

[434] See Rudestam and Newton, Surviving Your Dissertation, 99.

[435] See M. Q. Patton, “Enhancing the Quality and Credibility of Qualitative Analysis,” in BMC Health Serv Res (1999):1192–1193.

[436] Patton suggests qualitative inquiry include criteria for judging credibility. In discussing the issue of author credibility, he writes that credibility depends on “training, experience, track record, status, and presentation of self.” See M. Q. Patton, “Enhancing the Quality and Credibility of Qualitative Analysis,” in BMC Health Serv Res (1999): 1190.

[437] The current replacement rate in China is 1.624. In comparison, the replacement rate in the United States is 1.87. The level at which a generation can replace itself is generally considered to be 2.1.

See “NCHS Data Brief,” 25 July 2018, /nchs/products/databriefs.htm.

[438] Economic development refers to China’s economic growth rates averaging 10 percent over the past thirty years and its shift from a centrally planned to market based economy resulting in rapid urbanization. Social engineering, in this context, refers to coercive family planning policy. Cultural diffusion refers to the spread of western ideas, particularly democratic ideals, as China has opened its borders to some degree in the attempt to modernize.

[439] Based on other participants’ responses this claim seems to vary based on location and situation as 20 percent of participants claimed that their family was matriarchal.

[440] JIY, an expert in linguistics, noted that these children of rural migrant laborers were known as “left behind children.” She argues that this development had serious economic and familial consequences. The children grew up not knowing their parents, and were left unsupervised because their grandparents were too old to take of them. The New York Times reported 280 million Chinese had left villages over the past three decades to search for work in urban centers. Approximately 30 million children were living in the countryside without their parents in 2013 and in 2016 360,000 of those children were completely alone. See Lijia Zhang, “Opinion | The Orphans of China’s Economic Miracle,” The New York Times, 7 August 2018, sec. Opinion, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/27/opinion/china-left-behind-children.html.

[441] As referenced in Chapter 2, it is extremely rare for parents or grandparents to be sent to a retirement home or assisted living center. For a child to ask parents to move to such an institution is a significant loss of face, according to NCFDL.

[442] The “4–2–1 pattern” consists of three generations—four grandparents (maternal and fraternal), two parents, and one child.

[443] See “China’s ‘Little Emperors’ Lucky, Yet Lonely In Life,” NPR.Org, n.d., https://www.npr.org/2010/11/23/131539839/china-s-little-emperors-lucky-yet-lonely-in-life.

[444] John Bryan Starr comments, “The birth of a son is cause for celebration; the birth of a daughter is only a ‘small happiness.’ In part, this is simple gender bias: a son carries on the family line, a daughter does not. But in part, it is based on an economic reality: when a daughter is married, she leaves her parents’ home and becomes a member of her husband’s family, contributing to her in-law’s family exchequer, not to her parents’, while a son is responsible for his parents as they retire and age. In the absence of a public pension scheme, giving birth to a son means providing for one’s retirement security.” John Bryan Starr, Understanding China: A Guide to China’s Economy, History, and Political Culture, 3rd Revised edition (New York: Hill and Wang, 2010), 188.

[445] Despite NCMNN’s claim to the contrary, there is one woman among the top sixteen leaders in China under President Xi Jinping. Sun Chunlan is one of four Vice-Premiers. See The Straits Times, “China’s New Leadership: All President Xi’s Men … and Woman,” Text, The Straits Times, 26 March 2018, https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/all-the-presidents-men-0.

[446] See “How China Is Ruled: Politburo,” BBC News, 8 October 2012, sec. Asia-Pacific, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-13904441.

[447] “DiDi” provides transportation services and is similar to Uber or Lyft in the United States. 

[448] Lei Feng was a soldier in the People’s Liberation Army. He eventually became an icon in Chinese society because of his selfless devotion to the Communist Party and adoration of Mao. He is a legend in China—every child is familiar with his humility and good deeds. Feng desired to be “a rustless screw” in the “revolutionary cause.” See Evan Osnos, “Fact-Checking a Chinese Hero,” The New Yorker, 29 March 2013, https://www.newyorker.com/news/evan-osnos/fact-checking-a-chinese-hero.

[449] The Cultural Revolution is best described as a “spasm of terror” that lasted from 1966–1976. It was a decade of political chaos designed to expose Mao’s enemies. See Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, Mao: The Unknown Story (New York: Anchor, 2006).

[450] Guanxi refers to a fundamental network of mutually beneficial interpersonal relationships in Chinese society. See “The Most Misunderstood Business Concept In China – Business Insider,” n.d., https://www.businessinsider.com/the-most-misunderstood-business-concept-in-china-2011-2.

[451] The law permitted the exception of medical emergencies. See “New Chinese Law Prohibits SexScreening of Fetuses,” The New York Times, 15 November 1994, sec. World, https://www.nytimes.com/1994/11/15/world/new-chinese-law-prohibits-sex-screening-of-fetuses.html.

[452] The Sichuan earthquake resulted in 87,587 deaths, 374,643 injuries, and 18,392 missing. Alan Taylor, “10 Years Since the Devastating 2008 Sichuan Earthquake-The Atlantic,” n.d., https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2018/05/10-years-since-the-devastating-2008-sichuanearthquake/560066/.

[453] See William T. Liu and Beatrice Leung, The Chinese Catholic Church in Conflict: 1949–2001 (Boca Raton: Universal Publishers, 2004). 

[454] WeChat is a Chinese app utilized for gaming, messaging, posting on social media, and much more. It is comparable to Facebook.

[455] CNN issued a report in 2013 claiming that the Chinese government employed 2 million censors to monitor keywords and firewalls. See Katie Hunt and CY Xu, “China ‘Employs 2 Million to Police

Internet,’” CNN, n.d., https://www.cnn.com/2013/10/07/world/asia/china-internet-monitors/index.html.

[456] The National People’s Congress approved the constitutional change. Out of 2,964 votes, two voted against the change and three abstained. See “China Approves ‘president for Life’ Change,” BBC News, 11 March 2018, sec. China, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-43361276.

[457] See South Korea Case Study in Appendix 5.

[458] One difference in these two cases is that there was an absence of coercive social engineering in the Greco-Roman world. The outside pressure on families was generally economic and societal.

[459] See Bill Birtles, “China’s Birth Rate Drops despite End of One-Child Policy,” n.d., http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-01-19/chinas-birth-rate-drops-despite-end-of-one-child-policy/9344634. ³ These numbers are taken mainly from TSPM fellowships records. See “China Family Panel Studies,” n.d., http://www.isss.pku.edu.cn/cfps/en/.

[460] See “Why Is Christianity Growing so Quickly in Mainland China?,” n.d., https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/why-is-christianity-growing-so-quickly-in-mainland-china57545.

[461] Pew Research Center reports, “Many demographers accept that there are probably more

Christians than there are members of the Communist Party (87 million).” See Appendix C, “Global

Christianity–A Report on the Size and Distribution of the World’s Christian Population,” Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project, 19 December 2011, http://www.pewforum.org/2011/12/19/globalchristianity-exec/.

[462] See “China Will Have the World’s Largest Christian Population in 2030,” n.d., http://www.kukmindaily.co.kr/article/view.asp?page=&gCode=7111&arcid=0010724477&code=7111110.

[463] See “Cracks in the Atheist Edifice-Religion in China,” n.d., https://www.economist.com/briefing/2014/11/01/cracks-in-the-atheist-edifice.

[464] See “China Will Have the World’s Largest Christian Population in 2030.”

[465] Stark and Wang write, “Assuming a conservative estimate of growth to 60 million Christians in 2007, the growth rate over a twenty-seven year period would average 7 percent per year.” Stark and Wang, A Star in the East, 114.

[466] See Alana Yzola, “This Fascinating Map Shows the New Religious Breakdown in China,” Business Insider, n.d., https://www.businessinsider.com/new-religious-breakdown-in-china-14.

[467] Stark proposes that by A.D. 350, the Christian population could very well have exceeded 33 million. Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1997), 4.

[468] Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 122.

[469] See author’s interview with Norman Cheng on April 4, 2017 in Appendix 1.

[470] The current replacement rate (TFR) in China is 2.1. The author has been unable to determine any significance between the fertility of Chinese Christian families and that of the general population. However, Pew Research Center released a study in 2015 documenting the population growth estimate for

Christianity around the world. Concerning Christian fertility the report states, “With a Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of 2.7 children per woman in the 2010–2015 period, Christians worldwide have fertility levels slightly higher that the world’s overall population (2.5), and significantly higher than the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman (the number considered necessary to maintain a stable population, all else being equal). Christian fertility rates are lowest in Europe (1.6), but at or above the replacement level in all other

[471] See discussion of agap? in Chapter Three.

[472] See Wielander, “Beyond Repression and Resistance–Christian Love and China’s Harmonious Society,” 123.

[473] Wielander, “Beyond Repression and Resistance–Christian Love and China’s Harmonious Society,” 127.

[474] “The Decay of the Chinese Family,” Chinasource, 11 July 2016, http://www.chinasource.org/resource-library/articles/the-decay-of-the-chinese-family.

[475] See Appendix B in “Women More Likely than Men to Affiliate with a Religion,” Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project, 22 March 2016, http://www.pewforum.org/2016/03/22/womenmore-likely-than-men-to-affiliate-with-a-religion/.

[476] See “???????????????www.IFreeWind.Com????|???|??|????|????|??|,” n.d., http://www.ifreewind.net/.

[477] See Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, “Can Christianity Save China?,” n.d., http://theweek.com/articles/635668/christianity-save-china.

[478] See Gobry, “Can Christianity Save China?”

[479] John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971), 364.

[480] Nicholas Dixon, “The Morality of Anti-Abortion Civil Disobedience,” Public Affairs Quarterly

[481] .1 (1997): 21.

[482] Lily L. Tsai, “Constructive Noncompliance,” Comparative Politics 47.3 (2015): 253.

[483] Martin Luther King, Letters from a Birmingham Jail, I Have a Dream: Writings and Speeches That Changed the World (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1992), 90.

[484] Tsai, “Constructive Noncompliance,” 257–258.

[485] Even more unexpected in the study were the number of participants who were willing to say that they would certainly not obey the government when it made policy decisions that were contrary to a Christian ethic of life. It should be noted, however, that given the risks of contravening policy in a totalitarian regime, the data in this study should not be solely understood as precise estimates of noncompliance but rather as “indicators of hypothetical noncompliance.” And it is important to note that not all of the participants in the study are committed to political change; in fact, 11 percent of participants made it a priority to avoid political issues altogether. See Tsai, “Constructive Noncompliance,” 268.

[486] See “RWJF – Qualitative Research Guidelines Project | Thick Description,” n.d., http://www.qualres.org/HomeThic-3697.html.

[487] Wielander writes, “The CCP remains much more comfortable with Christian love as a doctrine than as active engagement.” Wielander, “Beyond Repression and Resistance–Christian Love and China’s Harmonious Society,” 139.

[488] Ma and Li, “Remaking the Civic Space,” 18. ³⁶ “Cracks in the Atheist Edifice–Religion in China.” ³⁷ Ma and Li, “Remaking the Civic Space,” 18.

[489] See Ma and Li, “Remaking the Civic Space,” 18.

[490] See “China’s Christian Future | Yu Jie,” First Things, n.d., https://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/08/chinas-christian-future.

[491] Rodney Stark and Xiuhua Wang, A Star in the East: The Rise of Christianity in China (West Conshohocken: Templeton Press, 2016), 113.

[492] Stark and Wang, A Star in the East, 114.

[493] “China’s Christian Future | Yu Jie.”

[494] “China’s Christian Future | Yu Jie.”

[495] “China’s Christian Future | Yu Jie.”

[496] The mission of All Girls Allowed is threefold: 1) Expose the injustice of China’s One-Child Policy; 2) Rescue girls and mothers from gendercide in society; and 3) Celebrate women by embracing them as equal image-bearers of God. See “Who We Are | All Girls Allowed,” n.d., http://www.allgirlsallowed.org/about/who-we-are.

[497] Interview by Timothy C. Morgan, “Q & A: Chai Ling,” ChristianityToday.Com, n.d., https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/october/chai-ling-women-china.html.

[498] See “Tiananmen Square, A ‘Watershed’ For Chinese Conversions To Christianity,” n.d., http://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2012/06/04/tiananmen-square-christianity.

[499] Morgan, “Q & A.”

[500] Morgan, “Q & A.”

[501] Chai Ling, A Heart for Freedom: The Remarkable Journey of a Young Dissident, Her Daring Escape, and Her Quest to Free China’s Daughters (Carol Stream: Tyndale Momentum, 2012).

[502] Statistics provided by All Girls Allowed.

[503] Chai Ling, A Heart for Freedom, 322.

[504] Morgan, “Q & A.”

[505] Sina Weibo is China’s most popular social media platform that incorporates the major features of social media channels like Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter. “ChinaSource | An Anti-Abortion PSA and a Call for the Church to Repent,” n.d., https://www.chinasource.org/blog/posts/an-anti-abortion-psa-and-acall-for-the-church-to-repent.

[506] “Chengdu Bus,” n.d., http://www.gochengdu.cn/travel/traffic/chengdu-bus-a4398.html. ⁵⁶ “ChinaSource | An Anti-Abortion PSA and a Call for the Church to Repent.”

[507] “Strengthening Marriages in the Chinese Church,” Chinasource, n.d., http://www.chinasource.org/blog/posts/strengthening-marriages-in-the-chinese-church.

[508] “Strengthening Marriages in the Chinese Church.”

[509] See Brent Fulton, China’s Urban Christians: A Light That Cannot Be Hidden (Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2015), 59.

[510] “ChinaSource | A Theology of Family for the Chinese Church,” n.d., https://www.chinasource.org/resource-library/articles/a-theology-of-family-for-the-chinese-church.

[511] See “The Decay of the Chinese Family.”

[512] See Brent Fulton, China’s Urban Christians,56–57.

[513] See Fulton, China’s Urban Christians, 59.

[514] Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, Vol. 2: God and Creation, ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004), 158.

[515] “ChinaSource | A Theology of Family for the Chinese Church.”

[516] See “Strengthening Marriages in the Chinese Church.”

[517] See “The Decay of the Chinese Family.”

[518] See “The Decay of the Chinese Family.” Li Ma bases her understanding of family foundations in Moses’ instructions to the people of Israel, “And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deut 6:6–9)

[519] See “Strengthening Marriages in the Chinese Church.”

[520] See “A Journey of Opportunity: Following God’s Direction in China,” n.d., https://missionexus.org/a-journey-of-opportunity-following-gods-direction-in-china/.

[521] See “Perceptions and Priorities of Christian Leaders in China,” Chinasource, 20 March 2017, http://www.chinasource.org/resource-library/articles/perceptions-and-priorities-of-christian-leaders-inchina.

[522] Li Ma and Jin Li, “Remaking the Civic Space: The Rise of Unregistered Protestantism and Civic Engagement in Urban China,” in Christianity in Chinese Public Life: Religion, Society, and the Rule of Law, ed. Joel A. Carpenter and Kevin R. den Dulk, Palgrave Studies in Religion, Politics, and Policy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan US, 2014), 15.

[523] See Russell Flannery, “Why The Private Education Market In China Will Outperform In The Next Decade,” Forbes, n.d., https://www.forbes.com/sites/russellflannery/2018/03/25/why-the-privateeducation-market-in-china-will-outperform-in-the-next-decade/. Also see, Fulton, China’s Urban Christians, 63.

[524] See “Metamorphosis of Chinese Family Structures,” GBTIMES, n.d., https://gbtimes.com/changing-family-structures-china-0.

[525] “Reformation 500 – The Gospel Always Subverts and Changes Us,” China Partnership, n.d., http://www.chinapartnership.org/blog/2017/3/reformation-500-the-gospel-always-subverts-and-changes-us. ⁷⁶ See David A. deSilva, The Hope of Glory: Honor Discourse and New Testament Interpretation

(Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2009); Bruce J. Malina, Social Science Commentary on the Book of Acts

(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2008); Jayson Georges and Mark D. Baker, Ministering in Honor-Shame Cultures: Biblical Foundations and Practical Essentials (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2016).

[526] In 2016, the birth rate percentage was 12.95 for the general population, compared to a global rate of 18.5. 

[527] Samuel Ling and Stacey Bieler, eds., Chinese Intellectuals and the Gospel (Vancouver: P & R Publishing, 2000), 1–3.

[528] Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity, 3^rd edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).

[529] Rodney Stark, “Reconstructing the Rise of Christianity: The Role of Women,” Sociology of Religion.3 (1995): 242.

[530] Michael J. Walsh, The Triumph of the Meek: Why Early Christianity Succeeded (San Francisco:

Harpercollins, 1986), 216.

[531] Alan Kreider, The Patient Ferment of the Early Church: The Improbable Rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2016), 87.

[532] See Georg Schöllgen, Ecclesia sordida?: zur Frage der sozialen Schichtung frühchristlicher Gemeinden am Beispiel Karthagos zur Zeit Tertullians (Aschendorff, 1984), 210.

[533] Specifically, is there a significant differential between the fertility rate of Christians in China and the general population?

[534] See “Experts: Civil Code Plans Don’t Mean Family Planning Is over-Chinadaily.Com.Cn,” n.d., https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/201808/28/WS5b8511a7a310add14f3883c3.html.

[535] See “China Moves to End Two-Child Limit, Finishing Decades of Family Planning – CNN,”

n.d., https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/28/asia/china-family-planning-one-child-intl/index.html.

[536] Mara Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys Over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men, Reprint edition (New York: PublicAffairs, 2012), 133.

[537] See Andrea Parrot and Nina Cummings, Forsaken Females: The Global Brutalization of Women (Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006), 56.

[538] Hvistendahl, Unnatural Selection, 133.

[539] Valerie M. Hudson and Andrea M. den Boer, Bare Branches: The Security Implications of Asia’s Surplus Male Population, ed. Steven E. Miller and Sean M. Lynn-Jones, 1st edition (Cambridge, Mass; London: The MIT Press, 2005), 56.

[540] Hudson and Boer, Bare Branches, 56.

[541] Seung-Kyung Kim and Kyounghee Kim, “Mapping a Hundred Years of Activism: Women’s Movements in Korea,” Women’s Movements in Asia: Feminisms and Transnational Activism, eds. Mina Roces and Louise Edwards (New York: Routledge, 2010), 200.

[542] Robert E. Buswell and Timothy S. Lee, eds., Christianity in Korea (Honolulu: University of Hawai?i, 2006), 351.

[543] See Phillip Connor, “6 Facts about South Korea’s Growing Christian Population,” Pew Research Center, 12 August 2014, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/08/12/6-facts-about-christianity-insouth-korea/.

[544] Connor, “6 Facts about South Korea’s Growing Christian Population.”