Of course, Chinese Buddhism is very much Chinese. If “Sinicization” meant adapting Buddhism to Chinese traditions and culture, this was done two thousand years ago. However, for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the United Front, bureaucrat, “Sinicization” means adapting Buddhism to Marxism and the programs and directives of the Communist Party. What is advertised as “humanistic Buddhism” is in fact “Marxist Buddhism.”
Ma Lianmei, a bureaucrat from the United Front, calls for finding and emphasizing in Buddhist scriptures “the aspects that resonate with socialist core values” and enforce the principle of “strict governance” of religious communities, a new slogan that means direct control by the CCP and the United Front without relying only on the bureaucracy of the China Buddhist Association.