Joss sticks being lit/Madam Lin

Music

00.01

Hutcheon:  In the past year, Lin Yujin has undergone an extraordinary transformation.

00.18

Madam Lin acting as medium

This 54 year old housewife claims she's a spirit medium. And for a price, she will read  your future.

00.37

She believes her body has been possessed by the spirit of a local Daoist god named Heavenly Lord Zhao.

00.50

Madam Lin smokes

Lin:  I have a good name and I have saved a lot of people. I can also help others to make a fortune. I can turn whatever you ask for into reality...

01.05

Music

Priests singing

Hutcheon:  Folk religion was branded feudalistic by the communists, and stamped out decades ago. But today, it's back with a vengeance.

01.29

Not in the poor remote backwaters where you might expect ancient spiritualism to resurface. But in a sophisticated urban backdrop, where mainland China and its moneyed neighbours meet.

01.40

Map China

Music

Fuzhou

Hutcheon:  Just a few hundred kilometres from the capitalist island, Taiwan, the city of Fuzhou is a latecomer to China's haphazard blueprint to become a market oriented developed nation.

02.05

Authorities now preside over a newly prosperous city, where faith and fortune are tightly bound together.

02.21

In this incredible resurgence of popular religion, believers are packing Fuzhou's temples in astonishing numbers.

02.37

Believers lighting joss sticks

Hutcheon:   Founded more than 1,5000 years ago, Daoism, which means the way, is China's indigenous religion. It draws its inspiration from the order and harmony of nature, but magic and fortune telling are also part of the equation.

02.52

Hutcheon with Zhang Aizhen

Hutcheon:  Daoist elder, Zhang Aizhen remembers the mid-1960s, when Red Guards demolished all signs of religion, including this temple to one of the Fuzhou's most popular deities, Heavenly Lord Zhao.

03.15

Zhang Aizhen:   Some people who believe in Communism  also believe in religion secretly.  Some of them come here and burn the joss sticks but they don't do it openly.

03.43

Hutcheon:  Businessmen pray for wealth.

04.34

A young woman implores the bronze boy statue for pregnancy and a baby son.

04.33

Prostitutes wish for husbands.

04.49

Wives pray for peaceful homes.

04.54

In Fuzhou's narrow back streets, signs of faith are everywhere. For these people, age old superstition is indistinguishable from approved religion. It's what families have done for generations, whether covertly or out in the open.

05.03

Liu Taicheng in club

It's Liu Taicheng's night off and he relaxes at a friend's night club.

05.30

Liu spent ten years in the army where communist theory was drummed into him day after day.

05.40

Today he still relies on the party membership for his livelihood, as a military affairs teacher at a local university. But even while relaxing he finds it hard to resist his real passion - fortune-telling.

05.46

Liu

Liu: 

I am just like a teacher studying culture - only I put this culture into practise and into my life now. I think this is beyond reproach.

06.06

Hutcheon:  Despite the army background, Liu's guiding principle is no longer socialism. It's the Daoist inspired feng shui.

06.37

Feng Shui compass

Hutcheon:   Using a special compass, Liu advises businessmen how to harness the environment to maximise their profits.

06.52

He evaluates the design of the office, gauging the flow of cosmological energy, which could help to make or lose the company money.

07.03

View out window

Liu:  So this area has very good feng shui resources for this building...  I think your career and fortune should be progressing.

07.14

Hutcheon:  If Liu had his way, he would give up teaching and become a professional fortune teller.

07.26

Liu

Liu:  As for this issue,  the government will not permit you  to practise it so openly.  If I really want to open up a prediction company  I must register it.  But I cannot register it.

07.34

Zhuo

Zhuo:  All of it is illegal. If  we see fortune tellers, we'll persuade them not to do it.  If the situation gets more serious we will confiscate their tools.  We do not agree with fortune telling.

08.17

Hutcheon:  Zhuo Bingqing  is the officer in charge of regulating religion in Fuzhou.

08.11

Zhuo:  Well of course, it will definitely be a destabilising factor - otherwise we wouldn't need to crack down or eliminate them.

But the government appears out of touch with reality.

08.26

Yu Bizhi's Garage

Across town, the Yu family also claims to benefit from the protection of Heavenly Lord Zhao.

08.34

For 30 years Yu Bizhi served in the People's Liberation Army. After retirement, he invested the family nest egg into a motorcycle repair shop.

08.41

His sons are the mechanics, while his wife Lin Yujin runs a profitable sideline, selling drinks and cigarettes to waiting customers. Business has never been better.

08.56

Last year, the family built a five storey mansion, the envy of the neighbourhood.

09.14

Hutcheon greets Madam Lin

Hutcheon:   According to Madam Lin, the household didn't always enjoy good fortune or good health.

09.22

For most of her life, she was constantly in pain, suffering from an illness the doctors couldn't explain. Then one day last September, she says divine intervention changed everything.

09.33

Madam Lin

Madam Lin:  I was asleep the first time the Lord arrived. He suddenly spoke out His name.  My fists were all torn - the Lord jumped up this way... He jumped up and down... It probably lasted for about half an hour. I didn't know what happened to me.

09.47

Yu

Yu:  Now it's very easy for us to do business --  it's also easy for us to open shops.  Whenever we have problems we will consult with Lord Zhao.

10.03

Music

Madam Lin acting as medium

Hutcheon:  Depending on who you are, it costs from a few cents up to $600 to summon the Heavenly Lord Zhao and discover what lies ahead. After the customary burning of joss sticks, Lord Zhao makes a theatrical entrance.

01.23

Hutcheon:  In a city of willing believers there's no shortage of followers eager for an audience with the Heavenly Lord Zhao.

10.59

Chen Rongquin's husband is out of work. She has a sick infant, and can't make ends meet.

11.05

Lin

Lin:  You are 28, so you were born in the Year of the Mouse. Mice can eat a lot of things.

11.12

Chen:  Will I be rich?

Lin:  Yes, you will be rich.

Chen:  Will I have a lot of money?

Lin:  Not too much. You're not very rich.

Hutcheon:  Lord Zhao is isn't the only visitor tonight. The troubled ghost of old Mrs Xu's dead husband is here as well.

11.28

Madam Lin

Lin:  Come here, let me talk to you face to face... I had a bad temper and our relationship was not harmonious.  To blame you would be embarrassing.  I was so incapable - you had to bring up our sons and daughters...  You did everything on your own.

11.40

Family share meal

Hutcheon:  Later, the family recounts the evening's event to Madam Lin. She claims to have no memory of any of it and appears exhausted.

12.10

Mr Yu, the former soldier and hardened communist, believes wholeheartedly in his wife's powers. He appears unaware that the government would describe the evening session as dangerous superstition and a threat to society.

12.23

Yu

Hutcheon:  Has anyone told you that what you're doing is illegal and that you should stop.

12.41

Yu:  No. No... we don't do it frequently. We don't make a living by this - we only want protection. I don't support her doing this outside.

Heavenly Lord Zhao's Temple

Hutcheon:  At Heavenly Lord Zhao's Temple, Madam Lin pays  her respects to the god who has helped secure her family's fortune.

13.18

Though her methods are surely questionable, she already has disciples who hang upon her words.

13.28

Faith consumes China like wildfire and it's difficult to imagine this regime dousing the flames of ancient spirituality.

The tide of popular religion isn't simply unstoppable, it's now in the realm of the unknown, in the hands of gods like Heavenly Lord Zhao.

13.37

13.48