Yuan Ren

China is baffled by Britain’s coronavirus response

For the past two weeks, my relatives and friends in China have been frantically messaging me worried for my health and mortified that Britain’s pubs and clubs were still open. With Boris Johnson’s announcement of a lockdown, their concern hasn’t eased as images of London’s parks as busy as ever raise doubt over how seriously

Inside China’s ‘secret’ churches

 Beijing A strong coffee always perks me up on a smoggy day, especially when I can drink it somewhere clandestine — like an ‘illegal’ church. Seek, and you shall find — but when it comes to Christianity in China, you’re likely to get a bit lost. Without being told where it was, I could have

China’s quiet Christians

 Beijing A strong coffee always perks me up on a smoggy day, especially when I can drink it somewhere clandestine — like an ‘illegal’ church. Seek, and you shall find — but when it comes to Christianity in China, you’re likely to get a bit lost. Without being told where it was, I could have

Importing the gentleman

 Beijing Gerard Manley Hopkins said that if the English had done nothing but ‘left the world the notion of a gentleman, they would have done a great service to mankind’. He was right. Yet in Britain today, you’re so very embarrassed by what we regard as your greatest single industry — turning out polished young