An older relative has died. The master of ceremonies calls out, 'Kneel!' Everyone kneels except you. Should you visit and tend graves at Qingming? Can you offer incense? Does kowtowing count as idolatry? Can you kowtow while praying inwardly? These are not abstract theological debates; they are concrete actions you may face this week. This article offers a usable test: ask what the people present understand an action to mean, rather than simply how you explain it inwardly. On that basis it sets out what Christians can do, what they should not do and what needs careful thought first. It also offers words you can say to your family.
Speaker: Pastor Bond
“You shall have no other gods before me.” (Exodus 20:3)
“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which Yahweh your God gives you.” (Exodus 20:12)
At your grandmother's funeral, the master of ceremonies calls out, “Kneel!”
Everyone in front of you drops to their knees. Your uncle is watching you. Still holding a white flower, you stand there. One second feels like a year.
This is no theological exercise. It is a decision you must make here and now, this afternoon.
Two common answers are both inadequate. “None of it is permissible” leaves you to deal with the scene yourself. “As long as you believe in your heart” sounds accommodating, but you know it is not that simple.
Here is a test you can use, followed by a practical list.
Many conflicts begin with a misunderstanding here.
The first and second commandments are certainly firm:
“You shall not make for yourselves an idol … you shall not bow yourself down to them, nor serve them.” (Exodus 20:4–5)
But count further down the same law and the fifth commandment says, “Honor your father and your mother.” In the New Testament, Paul specifically calls it “the first commandment with a promise” (Ephesians 6:2–3). He even makes this very serious statement:
“But if anyone doesn't provide for his own, and especially his own household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” (1 Timothy 5:8)
The question, then, has never been whether to honour your parents, but how to honour them. If a Christian uses faith as an excuse to avoid caring for parents, refuses to attend an older relative's final farewell, or disappears when the family is struggling most, the standard being violated is Scripture, rather than Chinese custom.
The real difficulty is that, in many Chinese families, expressing filial respect and worshipping spiritual beings use the same set of actions. Incense, paper offerings, kneeling and food offerings are bundled into a single ceremony, with no distinction made between them.
Our first task is to distinguish them.
This is not a standard I invented. Paul addresses a strikingly similar question in 1 Corinthians. Much of the meat sold in the market had first been offered to idols. Could Christians eat it?
His first answer is surprising:
“Therefore concerning the eating of things sacrificed to idols, we know that no idol is anything in the world, and that there is no other God but one.” (1 Corinthians 8:4)
An idol is “nothing”: a piece of wood is simply a piece of wood. Following that logic, eating the meat is harmless.
Then Paul adds two statements that change how we see the matter.
The first concerns the true nature of the act:
“But I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, and not to God, and I don't desire that you would have fellowship with demons.” (1 Corinthians 10:20)
The second concerns how the occasion gives meaning to your action:
“But if anyone says to you, ‘This was offered to idols,’ don't eat it for the sake of the one who told you, and for the sake of conscience. … Conscience, I say, not your own, but the other's conscience.” (1 Corinthians 10:28–29)
Notice the turn. You may eat the same piece of meat when no one has identified it as sacrificial. Once someone points out, “This was offered in sacrifice,” you refrain. What has changed is not the meat, but what eating it communicates at that moment.
The test is what an action is commonly understood to mean on that occasion, in the eyes of those present. Your private explanation is not the determining factor.
If everyone reads an action as “asking this spiritual being for help”, performing it is participation, whatever you are thinking inwardly. Conversely, if everyone understands an action as “saying farewell to the deceased”, then it is a farewell.
Using that test, we can broadly distinguish three categories.
Kowtowing. This is the hardest example because it really can mean different things on different occasions. In some places, kowtowing before a body or coffin is the strongest local expression of mourning. Everyone present understands it that way, without reference to a deity. Elsewhere it is performed before an incense altar and ancestral tablet and clearly signifies worship. You must read the occasion, rather than treating the movement in isolation. If you truly cannot tell, substitute a deep bow. Most families can accept this, and it can avoid a public rupture.
“Can I kowtow while praying inwardly?” This is an honest question, and I understand the difficulty behind it. But it bypasses the real problem: other people see your kowtow; no one sees your inward prayer. If the occasion gives the action the meaning of worship, adding a private prayer does not change that meaning. It only leaves you more conflicted. The actual way forward is to choose a different action, rather than add a private monologue to the same one.
Incense you have bought. If you simply enjoy the fragrance and use it as ordinary incense, unrelated to any ceremony, it is ordinary incense. There is one practical question to ask: will your family see it and conclude that you have returned to your former beliefs? If they will, do not light it.
“Can someone who never encountered Christianity have a Christian funeral?” A funeral is held for the living. If the deceased did not believe during life, holding a Christian funeral cannot change their standing before God; that matter is not ours to control. But if the family wishes, it is entirely appropriate to invite a pastor to lead a memorial, read Scripture, sing hymns and speak of hope to those still living. Explain the circumstances honestly to the pastor. There is no need to dress them up.
Do not begin with a debate. Beneath this statement there is usually a fear, rather than a theological objection: have you disowned your ancestors, stopped honouring your parents, or ceased to belong to our family?
Acknowledge that fear before explaining the distinction. You might say:
“I miss Grandpa too. I will still come at Qingming. I will remove the weeds and clean the headstone. I won't burn incense, because the one I believe in does not allow me to worship anyone else as a god. It isn't that I no longer honour my family. The way I express that honour has changed; my heart has not.”
That is precisely the tone Peter teaches:
“But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts. Always be ready to give an answer to everyone who asks you a reason concerning the hope that is in you, with humility and fear.” (1 Peter 3:15)
“Humility and fear” call for neither a self-righteous declaration nor an evasive attempt to slip through unnoticed.
And something carries more weight than words: making more phone calls while relatives are alive is more persuasive than burning more incense at their graves. The better you care for older relatives, the less credible the accusation “believing this makes you unfilial” becomes. This is not a tactic. It is what Scripture already requires of you.
Jesus never misled us. He himself said:
“Don't think that I came to send peace on the earth. … For I came to set a man at odds against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.” (Matthew 10:34–35)
These words are a warning given in advance: if faith in the Lord brings pressure within your family, you have not taken the wrong road. Jesus told us this would happen.
Yet that same Jesus, nailed to the cross and close to death, was still arranging who would care for his mother:
“Therefore when Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son!’” (John 19:26)
Hold your ground, then, while choosing the least hurtful way to do so. Three practical suggestions follow.
Say both “what I cannot do” and “what I am willing to do”. If you say only the first half, your family hears rejection. Say both, and they hear another way of honouring them.
Do not debate faith in the middle of the funeral. Everyone is grieving that day; no one is ready for an argument. Your quiet presence, your help and your tears speak more powerfully than an explanation. Find a quiet time to talk afterwards.
Give advance notice instead of leaving the difficulty until you arrive. If you know next month's gathering will involve an incense altar, speak privately a week or two beforehand to the older relative most likely to listen. Public confrontations often happen because no one spoke in advance.
There is a deeper layer too.
When Chinese people offer incense and worship their ancestors, two heavy concerns often lie underneath: fear that their ancestors are not doing well in the world beyond, because their descendants have failed to provide for them; and fear of having failed in their duty, of being judged unfilial, and of having no one treat them properly when their own time comes.
Christian faith has something to say about both concerns, and it is good news.
First, your ancestors' destiny rests in God's hands, not in your incense offerings. Their destination is God's matter; the actions of the living cannot control it. This may sound as if some control is being taken away. In fact, it removes a burden you could never carry. You never had the power to provide for someone who had died. You were simply taught that you did.
Second, you do not have to repay the debt of making everything right yourself. Often the incense we burn expresses a sense of debt: words left unsaid, a bedside vigil we failed to keep, a harsh remark long ago for which we never managed to apologise. That debt is real; incense cannot extinguish it. But the very debts human beings cannot repay are what Christ dealt with on the cross.
You do not have to exchange a stick of incense for peace of heart. That peace cannot be bought; it is given.
Return to that call to “Kneel!” at the funeral.
You may refrain from kneeling, but please be present. You may refrain from burning incense, but please clean the headstone. You may refrain from kowtowing, but please make those phone calls more often while your relatives are alive.
What you are laying down is a stick of incense, not the person.
If you face an occasion like this during the coming week, there is one small thing you can do today. Find the family member most likely to understand and tell them beforehand: “There will be some actions I cannot take part in, but I will be there for everything else.”
Let us pray together:
Heavenly Father, our families have customs that go back many years. They contain real love and remembrance, and real fear. Give me clear discernment to know which acts of honour I should offer and which acts of worship I cannot perform. Give me gentleness too, so that I do not use truth to wound those closest to me. Thank you for bearing the debts I cannot repay. Please watch over those I miss, and also the family members whose coming to faith I still long for. In the name of the Lord Jesus, amen.
Further reading:
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