Is Xi Jinping Really an Atheist? The Leader’s Quiet Ties to Buddhism
In the rigid hierarchy of the Chinese Communist Party, atheism is not a personal choice. It is a requirement. Party members are expected to be “unyielding Marxist atheists,” a phrase Xi Jinping himself has repeated in speeches and directives. Yet for a leader who demands ideological purity from nearly 100 million cadres, Xi’s own relationship with religion—particularly Buddhism—has long invited quiet speculation. Is the most powerful man in China a committed materialist, or does he carry a private affinity for the faith that once shaped much of Chinese civilization?
The official answer is unambiguous. The Communist Party, rooted in Marxism and dialectical materialism, treats religious belief as incompatible with membership. Applicants are screened. Members who persist in open faith risk discipline or expulsion. Under Xi, this line has hardened. He has overseen tighter regulations, the “Sinicization” of all recognized religions, and campaigns that subordinate spiritual life to Party authority. Christianity and Islam have faced especially intense pressure. Crosses have been removed from church rooftops. Mosques have been altered or closed. Tibetan Buddhism remains under strict political control, with Beijing asserting the right to approve reincarnations of high lamas. In public, Xi presents himself as the guardian of a secular, scientific worldview.
But the private record is more complicated. In the early 1980s, a young Xi Jinping arrived in Zhengding, a dusty county in Hebei province, as a mid-level official. At the same time, a Buddhist monk named Shi Youming took up residence in the ruins of Linji Temple, the historic birthplace of a major Chan (Zen) lineage. The two men formed an unusual partnership. Xi helped clear bureaucratic obstacles so Youming could raise funds and rebuild the temple after the destruction of the Cultural Revolution. He approved its reopening to the public even while it was still in disrepair and later installed Youming as abbot. Years after leaving Zhengding, Xi continued to visit the monk and sent officials to study the arrangement as a model of how the Party and traditional religion could cooperate.
This was not an isolated episode. A U.S. diplomatic cable later released through WikiLeaks recorded the observations of a childhood friend and former neighbor of Xi’s, referred to only as “the professor.” In the mid-1980s, while Xi was posted in Fujian, the friend found him unusually knowledgeable about Buddhist martial arts, qigong, and mystical practices said to promote health and longevity. Xi spoke of sacred sites with evident interest and appeared open to the idea of supernatural forces. The professor could not say whether Xi was a believer in any formal sense, but he was struck by both the depth of knowledge and the apparent sincerity of the fascination.
These early encounters sit uneasily alongside the Party’s atheist orthodoxy. They suggest that Xi’s attitude toward Buddhism has never been purely hostile. Chinese Buddhism, after all, is not a foreign import in the same way Christianity or Islam are often portrayed. It arrived from India centuries ago, was thoroughly Sinicized, and became interwoven with Confucian ethics, Taoist cosmology, and folk practice. In speeches, Xi has repeatedly highlighted this history. At UNESCO in 2014 he noted that Buddhism had taken root in Chinese culture and contributed to it. He has used Buddhist metaphors in political rhetoric—comparing cadres to monks who must chant daily reminders of their duty, or speaking of “facing the wall to attain Buddhahood” as a metaphor for raising one’s horizons. Under his leadership, Chinese Buddhism and Taoism have received relatively preferential treatment compared with faiths viewed as more susceptible to foreign influence.
The preference is strategic as well as cultural. As China’s economy slows and the old social contract of rising prosperity in exchange for political quiet becomes harder to maintain, the Party has searched for new sources of legitimacy. Traditional culture, including carefully managed religion, offers one. Temples are restored. Buddhist forums are hosted. Soft-power projects promote Chinese-style Buddhism abroad. At the same time, the state demands that every religion adapt itself to socialism with Chinese characteristics. Doctrine must align with Party values. Clergy must demonstrate political loyalty. The goal is not the elimination of faith but its domestication.
Rumors about Xi’s family have circulated for years and should be treated with caution. Some reports claim that his wife, the folk singer and former PLA performer Peng Liyuan, practices Buddhism, and that his mother, Qi Xin, requested Tibetan Buddhist rites for her funeral. These stories appear in secondary sources and remain unverified by official accounts. Even if true, they would not prove personal religious commitment on Xi’s part. Chinese elites have long maintained a pragmatic relationship with traditional practices—visiting temples for cultural reasons, consulting fortune-tellers privately, or observing rituals without formal conversion. Party rules discourage open religiosity among members and their immediate families, but quiet cultural participation has often been tolerated.
What emerges is less a secret convert than a complex political personality. Xi is a product of the Party system and remains its most forceful defender. He has never publicly declared religious belief, and there is no evidence he participates in formal Buddhist practice. At the same time, his early career reveals genuine engagement with a living Buddhist community, and his later rhetoric shows respect for the civilizational role of Chinese Buddhism. The fascination recorded by his old friend suggests an intellectual and perhaps existential curiosity that pure ideological atheism would not encourage.
This duality is not unique to Xi. Many senior Chinese officials navigate the tension between Marxist orthodoxy and the persistent pull of traditional culture. Surveys consistently show that large numbers of Party members still hold private beliefs in Buddha, ancestors, or supernatural forces even while identifying as non-religious or atheist. Xi’s approach appears to be a calculated version of the same accommodation: keep the Party atheist, keep religion subordinate, but draw selectively on indigenous spiritual traditions that can reinforce national identity and social cohesion without challenging political control.
The question of whether Xi Jinping is “really” an atheist therefore depends on the definition. By the Party’s own standards, the answer is yes. He enforces the rule and embodies the public face of it. By a broader cultural and biographical standard, the answer is more ambiguous. His record contains clear evidence of interest, practical support, and rhetorical affinity for Buddhism that go beyond mere political calculation. The connection is not secret in the sense of a hidden conversion. It is quiet, selective, and carefully bounded—consistent with a leader who understands both the power of belief and the danger of allowing any belief to stand outside the Party’s authority.
In the end, Xi Jinping’s relationship with Buddhism reveals less about private piety than about the evolving nature of Chinese power. The atheist state has learned that it cannot simply erase the spiritual inheritance of a civilization. It can, however, try to reshape that inheritance into a tool of governance. Whether this strategy succeeds will depend on how long cultural affinity can be managed without becoming genuine conviction—and how long genuine conviction can be contained within the limits the Party sets.
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