As 2025 comes to a close and we anticipate with excitement the arrival of 2026, let’s take time to reflect on some highlights from the last 12 months. Full of inspiration, wisdom, and giving us a window into Christianity in China and around the world, join with us as we remember and celebrate the top 10 ChinaSource articles of 2025!
Snake in the Chinese Culture and Serpent in the Bible
January 27, 2025
2025 was the Year of the Snake according to the Chinese zodiac. Snake in the Chinese culture and serpent in the Bible carry diverse meanings in Chinese culture. This article explores the question: Is the snake a symbol of wisdom or the source of temptation? Snakes were a hot topic—this was the number one most-read ChinaSource article among our readers this year. Did this article influence your perspective on snakes?
New Religious Regulations for Foreigners in China
May 6, 2025
As ministry in China continues on and also changes quickly, ChinaSource readers this year were interested in learning about and understanding the new religious regulations for foreigners in China that took effect in 2025. What’s allowed? What’s not? What’s actually new? And moving forward, how will these regulations reshape and reorganize what has been?
Ink That Binds
April 22, 2025
What began as a simple act—handcopying Scripture, one chapter at a time—quietly grew into a shared form of worship among Chinese Christians. Crossing generations, church traditions, and even divided families, this story invites readers to consider how spiritual renewal sometimes comes not through noise or visibility, but through slowness, reverence, and the written Word.
Chinese Christians “Looking East”: The Empirical Evidence
June 2, 2025
Based on interviews with seven Chinese Christians who are “looking East,” this article traces a surprising pattern: the pull of Orthodoxy often begins not with disillusionment, but with curiosity and a desire for historical depth and spiritual formation. Careful, empirical, and non-sensational, the piece invites readers to listen closely to what this emerging interest reveals about the longings—and limits—of contemporary Chinese evangelical life.
Standing in the True Light: A Chinese Scholar’s Spiritual Journey to the Eastern Orthodox Church
May 5, 2025
Having a unique window into one man’s desire to seek what he considers the fullness of Christian life piqued the interest of ChinaSource readers this year. Standing in the True Light: A Chinese Scholar’s Spiritual Journey to the Eastern Orthodox Church shares Mark Shan’s journey and creates an ongoing conversation about faith, change, and rediscovery within the global Chinese church.
Hong Kong: Today’s Most Promising City for Chinese Gospel Ministry?
October 27, 2025
Amid ongoing emigration and uncertainty, this article looks beyond narratives of decline to ask a harder question: what if Hong Kong’s moment of loss is also a moment of unexpected opportunity? Drawing on conversations with pastors and ministry leaders, Andrea Lee explores how new patterns of migration—highly educated families, mainland students, and global Chinese networks—are quietly reshaping Hong Kong’s mission landscape. The piece invites readers to consider how obedience, presence, and long-term vision may matter more than stability in discerning where God is at work today.
Remembering Martha
July 9, 2025
This tribute honors the life and legacy of Martha Chan—a mentor, bridge-builder, and longtime friend of the China ministry community. Through reflections from colleagues and partners, the article remembers a woman whose open-handed leadership fostered deep collaboration, faithful presence, and enduring friendships across organizations and generations. More than an account of what she did, this piece bears witness to how she served: with steadiness, generosity, and a quiet confidence rooted in Christ.
Why Some Chinese Protestants Are Becoming Catholic
June 23, 2025
This article listens closely to a house church pastor in China as he reflects on why some Protestants are drawn toward Catholic and Orthodox traditions. Thoughtful and pastoral rather than polemical, the piece explores questions of stability, depth, and spiritual longing—inviting readers to engage the topic with discernment rather than reaction.
What the Chinese Diaspora is Talking About
May 16, 2025
When Chinese Christian leaders from around the world gathered in Toronto in 2025, the conversations went far beyond programs and strategies. This article reflects on the questions that lingered—about belonging, generational transition, and what faith looks like in diaspora spaces that don’t quite fit inherited categories. It listens for both the tensions and the hope shaping the next chapter of Chinese diaspora ministry.
When the Church Stands Low (to Rise Again): Insights from the 2024 Hong Kong Church Census
May 2, 2025
Understanding what the church in Hong Kong looks like today—after the political upheaval, as well as emigration and leadership changes over the past five years—and how this may impact the future is meaningful to ChinaSource readers. This honest glimpse and valuable information based on statistics and spiritual insight may not necessarily predict what is to come, but it does give hope for the future of ministry in Hong Kong.
A couple more that made the list!
We also want to highlight two of the ChinaSource Journals that ranked at the top of the readers’ most-read list this year!
Sinicization, Chinafication, or Zhongguohua
ChinaSource Journal, Spring 2025
In contemporary China, religion is increasingly framed not as a matter of belief alone, but as an issue of governance, national security, and global positioning. This issue of ChinaSource Journal explores how current religious policy is shaped, justified, and implemented—and what this means for Chinese Christianity today. Drawing on voices and debates rarely available in English, the journal helps readers better understand the forces redefining the space in which faith is permitted, negotiated, and lived.
Where Wisdom Meets Faith
ChinaSource Journal, Summer 2025
As AI rapidly reshapes society, Where Wisdom Meets Faith invites the church to engage this technology with theological depth and discernment. Bringing together voices from theology, technology, and ministry, this issue explores how the church can navigate AI not simply as a threat or opportunity, but as a space requiring wisdom, stewardship, and faithful reflection—especially within the global Chinese church.
More to come in 2026!
Our prayer is that at some point this year you have been encouraged, spurred on, or challenged by a ChinaSource article. We look forward to 2026 and the treasures to share with our readers that are to come!
