Weber’s Confucian Heirs
by James Na ~ May 25th, 2006. Filed under: America, Miscellaneous.Here is something that turns Max Weber on his head:
The story of Asian-American “domination” of campus Christian organizations (h/t Marshall Sana). Some juicy bits:
At Berkeley, California’s premier public university, “evangelical Christian” and “Asian American” are almost interchangeable descriptions. Three trends come together. One is California’s demographics: It is 11 percent Asian compared to 4 percent for the nation as a whole. Two is academic prestige: As the oldest and most selective campus of the University of California, Berkeley has an undergraduate population that is 42 percent Asian. (As a general rule, the more selective the school, the higher the percentage of Asian students.) Three is a national fact: Asian students are more likely to show Christian commitment than other ethnic groups, including whites.
And here’s some affirmative action for ya:
When campus fellowships remain united, their greatest challenge may be to hang on to non-Asian students, including Anglos, who feel uncomfortable as a minority. At Stanford, for example, IV had become predominately Asian five years ago. Only a determined effort has drawn in whites and other ethnicities to create a more diverse group.
And why are they flocking to Christianity? Maybe to find something other than money:
“If someone were to ask me what religion is practiced by Chinese immigrants, I would say money,” says Steven Chin, pastor of a large Chinese church in Boston that ministers to many college students. “This is what they live for and dream about. They want financial security. This is why they want education—not just any kind of education, but an education that will make money. They were taught that if you have enough money, you will be happy, that money will provide the answers for you. As people got money and began to live well in nice homes, young people felt that something was missing. The next generation of Asian Americans is looking for purpose that money cannot fulfill. Many are looking to God. It’s not the influence of Christian parents [that leads so many young Asians to Christianity]. These are non-Christians who are searching.”
Or better yet, to find… a wife!
Asian campus fellowships have unique opportunities for evangelism. The close community draws in non-Christian Asians, who are not likely to find a comparable sense of belonging anywhere on campus. Rarely is another Asian group so large and friendly. Christians so dominate the Korean American student world that one Stanford student posted a lengthy online lament. As a non-Christian, he said, he stood a much-diminished chance of finding a Korean wife. “The challenge for Asian Americans in an ethnic fellowship is to use it as a base for evangelism,” Tokunaga says, “not just to stick with people they are comfortable with.” [Boldface mine]
More:
“We understand sacrifice, because our parents have sacrificed for us. We understand that Christ’s sacrifice for us can’t be repaid, but that it demands a great response. Confucianism is a pretty good background for responsibility, sacrifice, and grace.”
Good grief, did hear enough about the “sacrifice” thing. My parents taught me that there is one commonality to love, whether fraternal, paternal/maternal, platonic or romantic: sacrifice. Doing something for another you love with no expectation of anything in return.
This “Confucian” explanation seems to pop up everywhere (even Bill Lind, a noted cultural conservative claims that “Confucian” Asians are culturally compatible with “Anglo-Saxon” traditions; for the record, I disagree with the notion that only people who come from “compatible” cultures are able to appreciate and adopt Anglo-American civic traditions).
In any case, how ironic that heirs of Confucious are also heirs of Weber.
[Cross-posted in Guns and Butter Blog.]
May 25th, 2006 at 2:49 pm
That wouldn’t surprise me in the case of Korean-Americans, but I never sensed that many Chinese-American Christians in the USA.
May 25th, 2006 at 11:40 pm
An iconoclastic article which should help smash campus stereotypes about Asian-Americans. But at the same time it would appear that there is a need for near-campus Buddhist outreach programs. Perhaps that’s the disadvantage of having a Sangha that is not as well organized and hierarchical as are the Jesuits and some of the Protestant denominations.
May 26th, 2006 at 12:27 am
Dang! Great post, James.
I wonder why of all of the E Asian nations, Korea especially embraced the Christian faith in comparison to China and Japan?
May 26th, 2006 at 1:14 am
Weber’s Confucian Heirs
Weber’s Confucian Heirs
Weber’s Confucian Heirs
[…] Asian-Americans apparently dominate university Christian organizations. Or at least in California. […]
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: usinkorea
EMAIL: usinkorea@hotmail.com
Now that the cat is out of the bag, I expect the deans of all that should be right in the US/World to step in to correct the problem.
I’m sure the prejudice against the Christian faith will outweigh the need for quotas in the minds of the gods of higher education…..
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: jodi
EMAIL: TheAsiaPages@gmail.com
You might find this study interesting.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-08/ru-nsa081505.php
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: James J. Na
EMAIL: jamesjna@hotmail.com
Gosh, that’s a really complex question with lots of variables to consider.
First of all, I should note that there is a very large body of Chinese Christians. The evangelical movement is growing, in fact, in today’s China despite the government’s attempt at repression.
It should be noted also that China, indeed, is a highly multi-ethnic and multi-religious society (including Muslim Uighurs in Xinjiang).
In Japan, Christianity was brutally suppressed during the Tokugawa period. After the Meiji Restoration, the central government intensified emperor-worship associated with native Shinto religion and actively discouraged “pacifist” Christianity (one hidden strain of Kakure Kirishtans survived, however).
Korea, too, experienced a great deal of repression against Christians, but Christianity became identified with modernity, education and resistance to Japanese occupation in the early 20th Century and quickly found favor.
I think Calvinism (Presbyterianism) in the Weberian sense jibed well with the post-Korean War Korean work, educational and financial ethic, and contributed to the explosive growth of Protestantism in Korea.
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: usinkorea
EMAIL: usinkorea@hotmail.com
I would guess one factor that favored too was that Christianity was more favorable to the lower classes than the thought systems before it.
Buddhism was a religion for the masses, but it’s ultimate reward was far away, after many lives, for those in the lower classes of people.
(Re-)birth into the lower classes, including the outcaste classes and slaves, in Korean society was also justified in line with Buddhist thought.
By the time Christianity arrived, Buddhism was much on the outs in Korean society thanks to the efforts of the leaders of Confucianism, but again, Confucianism was a thought system that reenforced an elitist, class-based, family-oriented society.
Those of the lower classes were supposed to know and understand their position in the society and “endure”.
Christianity’s concept of “enduring” was different — the reward for endurance was much closer.
In short, I would think Christianity offered a hope for the peasant masses in Korea much more so than the “native” Confucianism or Buddhism…
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Dan tdaxp
EMAIL: danhabbott@gmail.com
Great post! Just manually trackbacking. Reminds me of an earlier post.
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Sonagi
EMAIL: plhedden@yahoo.com
At a recent dinner at a Korean couple’s home, I asked them whether they went to church out of religious belief or a desire for social networking. “Social networking,” they responded without hesitation. They wanted to feel part of a community and guessed that about half of Korean churchgoers are social Christians and half are religious. I would label many European-American church-goers as social Christians.
Christianity is enjoying a bit of a revival in the PRC. Foreign-sponsored evangelical worship services are restricted to foreign passport holders, but there are plenty of local churches. I was surprised to meet a number of Chinese of all walks of life identifying themselves as Christians or participating in Sunday worship. My local bookstore sold English Bible Study learning materials.
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: James J. Na
EMAIL: jamesjna@hotmail.com
I think this is a disputed point. Many early Korean Christian leaders were highly educated, and saw themselves as an elite, a vanguard of things to come.
They were egalitarian in the sense that they wanted to bring others up to “their level,” so to speak.
In general, this is the case with older Korean-Americans or new immigrants. Their sense of a community-within-a-community is accentuated by belonging to the same church, to an extent greater than that found among native-born European-Americans.
However, there is something else going on with the younger generation, who tend to subscribe to the evangelical movement much more fervently.
When I run into younger Korean-American Christians, they often remind me of Southern white evangelicals in their spirituality. They’re serious, and they don’t believe in a spiritual cafeteria.
In a personal side note, my DC exurb is gaining Korean-American population, and when those who I encounter find out that I am also ethnically Korean, the next two questions out of their mouths are: “Do you go to a church?” “No? Do you want to come to my church?”
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Sonagi
EMAIL: plhedden@yahoo.com
Actually, the couple are in their thirties and have lived in the US a long time. I know the sort of evangelical young Korean Christians you’re talking about. I was nonplussed the first time I was asked by a university student, “Do you believe in Jesus?”
I don’t think the need to belong is less a factor among European-Americans than among Korean-Americans. In fact, it may be greater. Assimilated European-Americans like myself do not have the option of joining ethnic associations.
I’ve actually thought about worshipping with a local university-affiliated Korean Buddhist group, but I haven’t worked up the nerve to go. How open are US-based ethnic Korean organizations to participation by non-Koreans?
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: usinkorea
EMAIL: usinkorea@hotmail.com
“early Korean Christian leaders”
I think the key word here is “leaders”.
You can say the same thing about the Russian revolution (and probably most others).
Leadership often comes from the educated and those who have had standing in the society already.
For general members of the movement, however, the backgrounds of the leadership is not always representative.
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: djchuang
EMAIL: djchuang.web@mail-filter.com
Confucian influence is very strong, it’s intricately weaved into most every East Asian culture, and seeps out to other cultures and civilizations too.
What’s particularly fascinating about the Christian faith is how it can be adapted into all kinds of cultures, even those that are rationalistically polar opposites, and still retain the relationship of God to man.
Now, as for American civic traditions, if it’d (only) live up to the melting pot ideal, then indeed, the notion is that any culture, compatible or not, can actively participate and influence that civic traditions. It’d be interesting in our generation to see how Asian and Middle Eastern cultural thinking affects our civic traditions all the more.
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: usinkorea
EMAIL: usinkorea@hotmail.com
In the US there is a lot of talk about how the big demographic changes in the society are going to affect the nation — with whites moving into the minority - so to speak - though still being the biggest block. Here in north Georgia you can see it happening. When I came back here a year or so ago after being away for over a decade, you could see how much the trend in Spanish-speaking residents that had just gotten some steam under it when I left has matured.
But, most of the talk about the changes - from all sides of the spectrum - seems to miss a good bit of something….
As long as immigration to the US and changes that it brings about (whether by the immigrants or others in reaction to demographic changes) adhere basically to the Constitution and the ideas that built the constitution — like majority rule with rights for all minorities and individuals —- then major demographic changes will alter the surface but not what makes America America. That is why the US was a melting pot —- had the ability to blend so much together — under a shared set of politican/social principles (even if it did have rather glaring rough spots in the history of the society).
Anyway, this reminds me also of conversations I’ve had with Koreans (including Korean profs in the US) about what it means to be “Korean” — especially fear of being “Americanized” or that Korean culture will “disappear” in 10 years if they don’t do something to protect it.
Which reminds me of how I’ve heard Koreans say the Japanese are “Americanized” fully — as if they had lost their “Asian-ness” or their Japaneseness…..
Buddhism and Confucianism were imports. Christianity is an import. Industrialization was an import. Democracy (and Communism) were an import. But Koreans remain Koreans.
Thought systems can have a profound impact on a society —- but different societiess - due to geography - have their own unique adaptation of them — they have their own historical blending -
It would be interesting to compare North Korea and South Korean social differences after 50 years of very different thought systems that animated the government and other key social institutions but I’m sure you would still find much that showed they were Korean — and not “Russian” and “American”….
If this makes any sense….
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: James J. Na
EMAIL: jamesjna@hotmail.com
The thing is, many FOB immigrants do not see it as an “option” to join ethnic associations or religious groups. Because they either cannot or feel that they cannot function adequately in the mainstream society, they consider joining such organizations a necessity of immigrant life, not an option with which one can dispense.
COMMENT:
AUTHOR: phantom
EMAIL: wmd.ghost@gmail.com
I stumbled on to this posting through the Marmot Hole. Good post. The ethnicity with the largest number is Christians are Korean Americans followed by Chinese Americans. (BTW there are many Chinese and Chinese American churches in ethnic Chinese locales.) Although Confucianism’s emphasis on hierarchy, authority, and filial duty, a more extensive study of orthodox Confucianism would reveal serious conflicts with Christianity. The Korean Confucian practice of “jaesa,” that is, the regular practice of raising an altar and pouring libations on the graves of one’s ancestor was very problematic for the Dominican and Protestant missionaries to Korea. In addition, although Confucius never discussed the existence of God. Among the Confucian schools, in particular, Neo-Confucianism, incorporates metaphysical teachings that conflict with orthodox Biblical doctrine. FYI although I am a American of Korean descent (i.e., second-generation Korean American), I became a born again Christian through American Christian radio. I would like to mention an important difference between conservative Presbyterians in America and Korea. IMHO American Presbyterians know their Biblical doctrine better and are better at applying Biblical doctrine to their lives than their Korean counterparts.