Nanlai Cao's short volume Constructing China's Jerusalem presents an intriguing ethnographic case study of the Protestant church in Wenzhou, Zhejiang, based on fieldwork undertaken in 2004–06. Wenzhou is distinguished for its thriving economy and burgeoning church growth, and the study explores the connections between the two. Geographically and linguistically isolated, the area nurtured numerous independent denominations in the pre-1949 era, and now boasts an unusual density of churches, which thrive even outside the auspices of the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM). In Wenzhou “boss Christians” preach in the office as well as at church, and leverage their relationships with the local party state to ensure the smooth growth of their churches as well as businesses. The close ties between economic growth and power and church growth and funding have left their mark in the highly gendered Wenzhou brand of Christianity, as Cao's exploration of leadership roles and expressions of faith shows.

In line with other recent studies such as Yoshiko Ashiwa and David Wank's Making Religion Making the State (Stanford University Press, 2009), Cao aims to deconstruct the binary which pits state against religion. Back in 2009 at the annual CASS conference of academics studying Christianity in China, much mention was made of the grey area of house churches, no longer “illegal,” but now termed “extra-legal” (fawai). Cao explores what he terms a “third way” that many Wenzhou churches have forged, as “state-recognized but unregistered ‘house churches’” (p. 27). In Wenzhou, the concentration of Christians and their economic clout has led to an unusually open and assertive house church operation, with the “conspicuous red crosses” of house church rooves spread across the suburbs. It is the entrepreneurial “boss Christians” described in chapter two who both weave together state and church and create the image of a prestigious, successful modern citizen of faith. This image is described further in chapter three, which considers the symbols of modern, Westernized, Christian professional life and the strict morals, for both sexes, that underpin it.

Cao excels in describing the structural features of local church and economic life: its interlacing networks, the financial support flowing from patrons to local clergy, and the business-style operations of evangelism in the city. Chapter four, which looks at the “Wenzhou model” of church development, where financial models dominate thinking, is particularly illuminating on the competitive faith market. This is prosperity gospel writ large, but with a strong work ethic pushing it. The professionalized nature of lecture series for church members, and invitation-only networking lunches for business elites form a powerful new model for church development, but one which ostracises some. Chapters five and six, on gender distinctions in the churches and on migrant worker participation, document this. It is here that the links between a business model and church are most problematic, and where the Wenzhou-insider, masculine-commercial version of Christianity shows its negative side.

The author notes at the outset the differences between anthropology and theology, and sets his study firmly in the former camp. This is an excellent, informative case study, with many insights not seen elsewhere and rich with possibilities for future research. Its shortcomings relate only to what is omitted. As an ethnographic case study it asks, via what Cao terms “life histories,” in interviews with 70 individuals, how “locals produce, consume and interpret Christian values” (p. 11), but it does this in an isolation that parallels Wenzhou's own. There is little attempt at contextualizing Wenzhou Christianity in its historical or theological setting, and discussion of wider Chinese church structures or controversies are absent. “Theological reconstruction,” the main project of the state church in the period does not make the index, and when historical parallels are crying out to be made between the paternalistic attitudes of Wenzhou elite Christians towards migrant workers and lay leaders in their congregations, and Protestant missionaries' treatment of ‘native’ pastors in the early 20th century, the only reference we are given is to English Methodism and industrial labour patterns. We have a wealth of interesting data on Wenzhou, but little means of assaying just how different Wenzhou Christianity is from urban church movements elsewhere in China. A second, related, concern is that viewing church structures entirely through economic and market lenses leads to potential distortions, particularly in discussions of individuals. There is always a fine line between relating and analysing personal perceptions, especially in imputing motivation, but to assume that young males take theological courses to gain cultural capital, or to describe food and toiletry handouts to migrant works as “an aggressive practice of giving” errs towards giving too little credence or agency to the beliefs of those involved. Extrapolating from Wenzhou to China is problematic given the highly gendered nature of the Wenzhou church, so it is difficult to see, for example, how gender differentiation in the Wenzhou church “sheds new light on the nature of mass religious participation in the post-Mao era” (p. 124).

The volume is a must-read for anyone interested in church–state relations or in contemporary religious practice in China, and the easy reading style makes it a suitable text for undergraduates.