Mr. Bowien's singular way with Chinese classics (kung pao pastrami, salt cod fried rice made with house-confited mackerel) immediately created a citywide buzz.
He and a dozen members of his northern New Jersey congregation went to an inland Chinese province so that they could smuggle in Bibles and pray with house-church Protestants in five-hour Sunday services.
Outside the mainstream religions--and outside the supervision of the government--are hundreds of independent Chinese religions that gird China like a rural electric network, illuminating lives house by house.
Beijing claims that 23 million Chinese worship in the official Christian organizations, but they are vastly outnumbered by as many as 107 million house-church participants.