When analyzing contemporary Chinese religious life and religious policy of the Chinese state, the starting point should be to understand the context in which the term religion was introduced in China and to recognize the tools that the Chinese state has been using for handling religious expressions in society. These issues are rooted in the long history of the relationship between religion and the state in China; however, they are perceived through modern terminological and theoretical discourse. In fact, it is modern European science (humanities) that has defined the historical role, function, and form of religion since the late 19th century. With extensive help from the Chinese intellectual elite, the humanities have also interpreted various manifestations of religion in modern as well as in traditional Chinese society. Indeed, science, both domestic Chinese and Western, has played an important role in the introduction of the theoretical concept of religion into Chinese society and its subsequent use for specific political goals. This paper focuses on the origins of the concept of religion in the Chinese reality; it traces these origins in modern European thought and, in particular, the cultural and structural patterns that are unfamiliar to traditional (pre-modern) Chinese culture and society. It also attempts to outline problems that arise from the penetration and acculturation of the concept of religion into Chinese society and describes how these problems are reflected in the academic environment, especially in the Euro-American area.
Armanno, nicknamed Pungilupo, from Ferrara, Italy, was considered a religiously active person during his life. After his death in 1269, he became venerated as a saint in the cathedral of Ferrara. However, the inquisitors knew that they had received his confession and abjuration in the matter of heresy in 1254 and they had serious suspicions that his heretical contacts had continued even after his abjuration. They gathered a significant body of evidence against him. The canons of Ferrara cathedral reacted and struggled to defend Armanno's reputation as a holy man. There are several sources on Armanno – among others, detailed notarial testimonies from both parties: on Armanno's "heretical" statements and practices, on his miracles, on his going to confession and communion. The sources can be read in more than one way. In this paper I attempt to reconstruct Armanno's individual religiosity (his representations, emotions, and practices) and I confront the results with the concept of religion understood in the Durkheimian way, i.e. as a system of representations and practices where affiliation is understood as membership. I conclude that Armanno's religiosity was non-doctrinal, practical, indefinite, and anchored in particular situations. Indeed, some of his practices clash with others or with some of his beliefs, and they do not respect the borderlines between religious communities (Cathar vs. Catholic). Armanno's religiosity was not at all systematic and contrasts deeply with the usual concepts of religion and membership.
In this article, I analyze the religiosity of Bompietro of Bologna as reported in the register of the inquisition of Bologna, 1291-1310. I attempt to show that Bompietro's religiosity was above all practical; its doctrinal content seems to be scarce, and it was not focused on support of any church (Roman or Cathar). Bompietro's case reveals a non-confessional type of religiosity, one still underrepresented in the image of medieval Christianity. This case also encourages wider reflection on the relations between beliefs, practices and membership. Far from having direct causal links, these relations can sometimes prove quite intricate.