Religion
| Religions of Chinese Malaysians | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Religion | Percent | |||
| Buddhism | 83.56% | |||
| Christianity | 11.05% | |||
| Taoism / Chinese folk religion | 3.41% | |||
| Islam | 0.66% | |||
| Hinduism | 0.23% | |||
| Other religions | 0.13% | |||
| No religion / Unknown | 0.95% | |||
A majority of the Chinese in Malaysia claim to be Buddhist or Taoist, though the lines between them are often blurred and, typically, a syncretic Chinese religion incorporating elements of Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism and traditional ancestor-worship is practiced, with the fact that each individual follows it in varying degrees. Thus, Chinese Buddhism is traditionally embraced by the Chinese which is brought over from China and handed down over the generations of Malaysian Chinese born in Malaysia.
About 11.05% are Christian (Mainstream Protestants, Catholics and other denominations including a fast-growing number of Evangelicals and Charismatics). This is largely due to the influences of Western educated Malaysian Chinese who went overseas either for studies or work.
A small number (0.66%) profess Islam as their faith due mostly to the compulsory conversion to Islam should a Chinese marry a Muslim in Malaysia. Nonetheless, the figure is rather understated due to the fact that most of the Chinese-Muslim individual is easily absorbed with the larger Malay majority population, due to identification of a common religious background, effective assimilation and intermarriage.
Read more about this topic: Malaysian Chinese
Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)
“But is it not the fact that religion emanates from the nature, from the moral state of the individual? Is it not therefore true that unless the nature be completely exercised, the moral state harmonised, the religion cannot be healthy?”
—Harriet Martineau (1802–1876)
“When Catholicism goes bad it becomes the world-old, world-wide religio of amulets and holy places and priestcraft. Protestantism, in its corresponding decay, becomes a vague mist of ethical platitudes. Catholicism is accused of being too much like all the other religions; Protestantism of being insufficiently like a religion at all. Hence Plato, with his transcendent Forms, is the doctor of Protestants; Aristotle, with his immanent Forms, the doctor of Catholics.”
—C.S. (Clive Staples)