A Foreign Friend or an Indigenous Prophet?

Guest lecture by Dr Luping Huang, followed by drinks reception.

This lecture examines the thought of Y. T. Wu (1893-1979), a pivotal Chinese Christian thinker, to explore the challenges of public theology in modern China. Wu’s intellectual evolution—from Social Gospel pacifism to a synthesis with Communism—exemplifies a relentless effort to make Christianity relevant to China's social transformation and national salvation. He argued that faith must address societal ills, positioning Christianity as a force for public good. However, Wu's project reveals a core dilemma: while his advocacy for indigenization (e.g., the Three-Self Movement) successfully aligned the church with national goals, it also risked subsuming Christian distinctiveness under a nationalist narrative. By over-emphasizing identification with the mainstream, Wu's approach arguably diminished the tradition's critical, "prophetic" capacity to challenge society from its position as a minority faith. This lecture argues that a sustainable Chinese public theology must navigate a delicate balance between cultural integration and critical distance, a tension central to Wu's enduring legacy.

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