Big Trouble in Little China

The Chinese are coming, the Chinese are coming. The last time I was there (climbing the Great Wall on my birthday-Wow!) I was a bit overwhelmed at the pace with which the largest nation on earth is progressing. The economic powerhouse of Peking is about to become the mightiest power on the planet. With Washington in the political doldrums, China is surging past the U.S. So what’s next? American’s aren’t likely to exchange Big Macs for egg rolls or Apples for Lenovos (disclosure-I’m typing this on a Lenovo), but the behind-the-scenes ownership of American icons may eventually be communist controlled. Picture restrooms in airports with signs in Chinese characters. Wells Fargo with a dragon replacing a stagecoach. Seriously, my issue isn’t with corporate takeover but the spiritual aspects of the Chinese effect.

An article in The Economist (my personal favorite news magazine) argues of the future, “China’s power will make itself felt in every aspect of American life.” Here’s the rub. Granted, The People’s Republic of China is officially atheistic, but religion is very much alive. Missions experts have speculated that there may be more born-again Christians in China (mostly worshiping underground) than in the U.S. A. But my concern is that China is a profoundly superstitious and occult culture, filled with demonic ritualism. Some American architects, like their counterparts in Hong Kong, already consider Feng Shui when erecting an edifice. (In Hong Kong no office or residence would ever be built without consulting a Feng Shui master and appeasing the metaphysical energies of chi.) What happens if the Chinese investor in an American skyscraper insists on occult ceremonies before the ground is broken? That is just one of a thousand subtle ways that the America of the future may be overcome by Chinese culture. I’m not Xenophobic but with our country already succumbing more every day to New Age ideas, such as “holy yoga” in churches, who knows where it will lead. Conspiratorialists of another age were worried that the Antichrist was the Pope, or Hitler. Who knows, he may speak Mandarin.