In part one of two discussing Christianity in China, we look at the elephant in the room when it comes to this subject: the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom (1850-64). It's no big deal, just the third most destructive war in all of human history, behind only the two World Wars. And it began when a disappointed scholar, in a vulnerable moment, came across some Christian missionary literature. Reading it, he decided that he was the younger brother of Jesus Christ, charged by his Heavenly Father with establishing a Christian theocracy in China. Obviously.
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